by CONNIE TABBERT
Editor
WHITEWATER REGION (La Passe) — The shoreline of the Ottawa River in a certain area of La Passe has been saved from future erosion and water quality improved from run-off.
Wednesday morning, about 18 volunteers, including staff from Watersheds Canada and the Ottawa River Keeper, planted just over 200 trees, shrubs and wildflowers at the home of Vince and Margarit Gervais and Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic Church.
This was a project initiated by the community and then partnered with Watersheds Canada and the River Keeper, noted Larissa Holman, River Watchers co-ordinator for River Keeper.
“River watchers are volunteers who live along the main stem of the Ottawa River, and tributaries,” she said. “They inform the Ottawa River Keeper of different issues that are impacting the river and we work with them to support their efforts in their own communities and also to bring to different communities some of the issues we are working on.”
Ms. Holman noted through many communications with the river watchers, they kept hearing concerns around shoreline development and the shoreline being impacted, vegetation being removed, and how that was impacting the river.
Shoreline planting is not something the Ottawa River Keeper does a lot of, she said. It really is an activity to help people from different communities who have identified an area they feel would benefit from it, then we go and help — it’s really from the ground up, she explained.
“We started working on some ideas around what we could do with that and that’s how we started working with Watersheds Canada, to do these naturalization programs, identifying shorelines in different communities that could benefit from a naturalization project to help better protect the river,” she explained.
Just over 200 trees/shrubs/wild flowers were planted Wednesday morning. She noted that the important thing when doing a shoreline planting is to have a variety of root stalk, so there is some finer roots with shrubs and wild flowers and deeper roots from the trees, to anchor the soil and pull the soil back from erosion.
“Having that variety of vegetation also helps to protect the river from run-off, so you don’t have sediment, pollutants reaching the water, which helps protect water quality,” Ms. Holman said.
Chloe Lajoie, Natural Edge Co-ordinator with Watersheds Canada, said the organization works with waterfront property landowners, communities and lake associations to help protect their shorelines and water quality on the lakes. The plantings’ roots help protect soil erosion, since those roots growing along the shoreline take hold of the soil, as well as create habitat for birds, small animals, fish, frogs and turtles, she said.
“Today, working on natural edge program, we planted native trees and shrubs to help with water quality,” Ms. Lajoie said. “Trees are great for filtering out excess nutrients or run off. It helps to emit cleaner water into your waterway.”
As the plants grow, they will continue to create more habitats, she added.
Ms. Lajoie noted it was Ms. Holman who contacted Watersheds Canada about the planting project.
Watersheds Canada has funding to do these projects and they pay for 75 percent of it and private property owners are responsible for the other 25 per cent, Ms. Holman said. For this particular project, the Ottawa River Keeper is assisting with the costs, she added, so there is a three-way partnership.
There is also funding through the Ontario Trillium Foundation, for various projects, she noted.
“Watersheds Canada has been doing this type of work for the last three years and that’s one of the reasons why we wanted to partner with them, they have more experience in site planning, and we’re able to benefit from that expertise,” Ms. Holman said. “It doesn’t make as much sense to repeat something they are doing well, so we work together.”
This is the second shoreline planting in Whitewater Region, the first on John Meadows’ property in Westmeath last October. There have also been parks and private property shorelines done in Arnprior, Fitzroy Harbour and McNab/Braeside Township, she said.
During the monthly Catholic Women’s League luncheon Wednesday, Ms. Holman and Ms. Lajoie both spoke about the project to those at the lunch about the morning’s project.
Ms. Holman noted she brought along the Ottawa River Watershed map and would answer any questions about the watershed. She noted the river itself is 1,271 kilometres long, and 154,000 square kilometres, which is larger than the country of England.
The Ottawa River starts in northern Quebec, at Lac des Outaouais, travels west to Temiskaming in Ontario and then travels south to the St. Lawrence River coming out at Montreal, Quebec.
The Ottawa River Keeper works throughout the entire watershed, Ms. Holman said.
“Our main goal is to keep the Ottawa river swimmable, drinkable and fishable”, she said. “All of the work we do is to try and protect the Ottawa river through working with communities and different organizations that are also doing good stuff in the watershed.”
Ms. Holman continued, “I work as the river watch co-ordinator. I work with river watchers who live along the main stem of the Ottawa river and tributaries. They are a group of volunteers who are a key part of our organization. They provide us with really great timely information about things happening on the river. They help to support us in their own communities and that’s why we’re here today.”
Ms. Holman thanked the volunteers who helped with the Wednesday morning planting.
“It was a drizzly morning,” she said, adding with a laugh, “I thought it was going to be sunny. It was great planting. It took about 45 minutes to plant over 200 trees, and so that was an amazing community effort.”
