Newsletters: The club will issue 4 in 2001 - 2002 (September, November, February, and May)

The first fall General meeting of the PHFN will be on Tuesday, September 11^th, 2001. The next Newsletter will be published just prior to that meeting. Have a great summer everyone, and HAPPY BIRDING!!!!

IT WAS AN ELEVEN ORCHID DAY! Sixteen members of PHFN met Judith Jones at the picnic area on Lake Wolsely on June 22, 2001. She was to be our guide for a botany tour of various parts of Manitoulin. Our first stop was a well-grazed savannah alvar with Bur Oak as the predominant tree. One of the most abundant flowers was Geum Triflorum or Prairie Smoke. Judith informed us that cows don't like to eat it because of the fuzzy seed heads. Many other flowers that belong to the Aster family, such as Yarrow, that even though they don't look like daisies, they have the same arrangement of flowers. The fragrant Sumac was one of the shrubs identified. Judith's definition of a weed was "a plant that was not indigenous but had been introduced". We saw a lot of weeds.

Our next stop was Coburn Road, where we walked along a road through wet, boggy territory. Here is where we saw our first orchids. In all, we saw 11 different orchids. The most abundant in this area was the showy Lady Slipper, which is a spectacular white and pink orchid. In one of these plants, which had a double bloom, we spotted a small spider that was coloured the same as the orchid. A really unique find! Sadly, in another of our stops along the road, it was pointed out to us, places where people had dug up these wonderful orchids. Not so spectacular, but nevertheless, still orchids, were flowers such as Alaska, Northern Green and Blunt Leaved Orchids. These are all multi-flowered orchids with their blossoms growing in racemes at the end of the stem. One of our last finds in the orchid family was the Bog Candle, which has such a wonderful fragrance and beautiful white flowers.

Before we knew it, it was lunch time. We drove to Providence Bay and "dined" at the picnic tables on the beach. After lunch, a short jaunt on the dunes produced Beach Pea, a native legume, and Pitcher's Thistle, which is an endangered species. Because its habitat is on the edge of the dunes, both people traffic and shifting sands threaten its existence. As well, it takes two to three years to mature and reproduce more of its kind.

Another unique plant of this area was the Great Lakes Wheat Grass. This is a tall, grey-green grass that is native to Manitoulin, but rare. Because of its geological history, Manitoulin has many plants that normally would not be found in this area. Judith explained that at one time, Manitoulin was connected to the Bruce Peninsula, hence the myriad of orchids. There are also Prairie and Arctic type flora here.

Our last stop was Michael's Bay and the Blue Jay Creek park. Most of us bravely waded across the Manitou River in knee deep water to get to the park. One of the highlights of this trip was to see Pitcher Plants and Sundews in abundance in a fen. These two plants are carnivorous because of the paucity of nutrients in the soil. They gain some of their nutritional needs from the insects they trap. However, we were too early to see the Rose Pogonias (another orchid) as they were just in bud. It was here also, that we saw orchid number eleven - the Bog Candles.

Once more we waded the Manitou River to get back to the cars. Everyone was delighted at our botanical finds. Judith Jones was given a heartfelt thanks from Terry Carr and we all went our separate ways.

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GUEST SPEAKER FOR OCTOBER GENERAL MEETING:

Our General meeting in October will be held on Tuesday evening, October 9^th, 2001, at the usual time of 7:00 p.m. Guest speaker for this occasion will be Tim de Bortoli, a medical doctor in town. He is an amateur Astronomer and has been since childhood. He is also a member of the Elliot Lake Astronomy club, and he will talk to us about "The Heavens."

So circle that date on your calendar as a "must attend" meeting.

Sherriff Creek Wildlife Inventory....on its way!

Did you know that, in Britain, the term Wildlife refers to all living things that are not domesticated? That means BOTH wild plants and animals (all living things that are not plants) and it is the way we are going to use the term when describing our "Wildlife"Inventory of the Sherriff Creek Sanctuary.

And it has already begun!

A number of our members, including the "Saturday Morning Nature Walkers" have started to list the multitude of plants and animals that can be found in our rich and diverse habitats of Sherriff Creek.

We are doing this inventory for a number of very good reasons ... here are just some examples:

1. to keep track of the "changes" that occur in wildlife over the years...species come and go
2. to help us understand the biodiversity of Sherriff Creek Wildlife Sanctuary
3. to encourage members to participate and to better understand the wildlife of our area
4. to help us develop checklists of plants and animals for ourselves and our visitors
5. etc. (You could add your own reasons why this will be a good thing!)

Here is the challenge. If you should observe and be able to identify any plants or animals within the Sherriff Creek Wildlife Sanctuary, please record your sighting and pass it on to one of our directors .... with the following information:

1. Sighting (name the plant or animal as fully as possible....including latin name if you know it or can look it up)
2. Time and Date and weather conditions
3. A brief description of the plant or animal
4. Location within the Sherriff Creek Sanctuary (trail, habitat type, etc.)

We have prepared a Field Data Form that you may obtain at any of our General meetings from Ev Brooks, our newsletter editor.

Should you wish to use e-mail to make your report please feel free to send it directly to me. My address is: tcarr@vianet.ca

Help out your club and have fun learning to identify the wildlife of Sherriff Creek Sanctuary.

Your contribution is important for our records and will be much appreciated.

Terry

Group pins down white pine locations in Quetico

By Kris Ketonen - The Chronicle-Journal

August 21, 2001

It was a long time coming, but there's finally a light at the end of the tunnel for white pines in Quetico Park.
Eastern white pine trees were the focus of a survey by volunteers from Working For Wilderness ---- a group that participates in conservation projects throughout the year ---- and things are looking up for Ontario''s provincial tree.

The group of 13 people checked 15 sites where 2,000 trees were replanted in 1990 and 1992 because few natural pines were left due to land clearing, logging and fires, Quetico assistant superintendent Dave Maynard said. "In the 1920's and '30's, first there was the logging in that northwest corner," he said. "Then we had a fire that wiped (the regrowing pines) out again. Then they came back again, and there was another fire."

The volunteers checked the overall health of the pines, clearing out competing vegetation and measuring trunk diameter. According to Marilyn Freeman, a volunteer leader who was on-site with the surveyors for the eight days, there's little to worry about.
"What we found was in some areas the trees were doing excellent, and in other areas they'd barely grown from the seedlings that were originally put in," she said. Soil conditions or competing vegetation might be behind the trees that didn't grow", Freeman said. "There hadn't been a lot of loss through browsing by moose or deer beyond the first two years of growth", Freeman said, adding that a few trees had diseases. Overall, "I think they're looking good," she said.

The volunteer survey ---- which Maynard said will likely be repeated in a few years ---- came about because of budget cuts.
"The park had this idea that they should re-establish some of those trees," Freeman said. "In '90 and '92, park staff went in, decided on areas that would be suitable, and planted them. Then, cuts being what they are and staff being dispersed, nobody got in past '95 to see how these little trees were doing."

Quetico Park got in touch with the Federation of Ontario Naturalists WFW program. WFW partners with groups that need help in conservation activities, and found the volunteers for the survey. Another outcome was the mapping of the pine sites, and finding their co-ordinates with a Global Positioning System. They weren't marked clearly before the survey, so the volunteers had a hard time finding all the sites, Freeman said.

This article was submitted by Terry Carr.

Remembering Cape St. Mary's

One of the grandest and most spectacular monuments in nature in North America rises hundreds of feet above the Atlantic Ocean north of the Grand Banks on Newfoundland's southern coast.

It was not by accident that we arrived here for a visit on the final leg of our 5,000 kilometre trek
about the Island during the summer of 2000.

We had just completed a three day stay in and around the small village of Trepassey near Cape Race and Mistaken Point. We wanted to experience the vast remoteness of the immense Avalon Wilderness Reserve and were not disappointed. Woodland caribou came upon us almost immediately. The herd of 100,000 has thinned because of climactic changes but small groups
of these beautiful animals are visible here almost everywhere. Of notable interest are their very thin
legs and relatively large hoofs. Fortunately, the Great Trepassey Barrens are totally treeless and the
animals can be spotted from, and frequently on, the roadways. This area is very rich in blueberries and other ground fruits.

The northern Gannet colony of the Cape St. Mary's Ecological Reserve is a noisy and busy one.

Thousands of birds nest on the rocks and cliffs below. The mature birds climb high to plunge-dive for fish. Their bodies appear like giant arrows just seconds before hitting the surface of the water. They are large birds, 3 feet long with a 6-foot wingspan. They are white with black wing tips; the back of the head is a soft yellow.

This haven for birders and photographers is a 2 kilometre hike from it's beautiful Light House and
magnificent interpretive centre across a vast meadow, above the cliffs, where sheep graze happily but dangerously close to the edge of the sheer drop-offs. Murres, Kittiwakes and Razorbills are other bird species which are guests here.

"Bird Rock"... worthy of a return visit!


Bob & Marthe Doesburg

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ATTENTION ALL MEMBERS:

MEMBERSHIP RENEWALS ARE DUE NOW. This can be done at the General Meetings in September, October, and November, or you can mail them to Penokean Hills Field Naturalists, P.O. Box 74, Elliot Lake, Ontario, P5A 2J6.

Some Articles submitted by Scott Helman:

Some Plants and Butterflies you might like:

Grey-headed Coneflower, known as Ratibia Pinnata, seen in southern Ontario and the Prairies, is loved by butterflies.

Butterfly Milkweed, or Asclepias Tuberosa, provides food for Monarch and Viceroy butterflies on a lovelier, more civilized plant than the common weed.

Black-eyed Susan or Rudbeckiahirta, blooms all summer and is visited by butterflies. It has seeds for birds in the winter.

B.C. Larkspur or Delphinium Menziesii, found in the B.C. rain forest, feeds hummingbirds native to the West Coast with lots of sugar syrup and is a host plant for butterflies. It is also very poisonous and in feeding on them, the butterflies become poisonous to birds.

Useless Facts:

The African Lungfish can live out of the water for up to four years.

The Albatross can glide on air currents for several days and can even sleep while in flight.

The amount of gold dissolved in the oceans is nearly ten million tons, which is about 180 times the total amount of gold dug in mines in the entire history of humanity.

The Ancient Egyptians trained baboons to wait at their tables.

Did You Know...

What's for dinner: Elephants spend about three-quarters of their time thinking about food. They're either selecting, picking, preparing, or eating it. Most of their diet, about 60 percent, is grass.

Old Faithful: The world's most famous geyser, old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park, is truly faithful. It has not missed erupting every 76 minutes or so for the last 80 years. It spouts a gush of hot water and steam about 120 to 150 feet into the air.

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ATTENTION MEMBERS:

There are a number of members who are online now. As the newsletter is being posted to the PHFN website, the Board of Directors would like to hear from you "wired" members, who perhaps do not need to have a "hard copy" anymore. If you do not require a paper copy of the Newsletter, please email to the editor and your delivered copy will be discontinued.

Editor email is

rsmeb@worldwide-e.com.

Thank you for your input regarding this item.

Ev Brooks

Editor

SEPTEMBER / OCTOBER 2001 OUTINGS

Come to outings dressed appropriately for the day (check out the weather forecast). Trip leaders have the right to refuse people who are not properly equipped. Participants must make leaders aware of any serious medical condition that may arise during an outing.

For further information about outings in general, call Naomi Maggs (848-5656)

WEDNESDAY 12^TH SEPTEMBER

MUSHROOM HUNT

Meet our leader, Sabine, at 11 am in Sherriff Creek Sanctuary parking lot. Bring a knife, field guides, magnifying glass and container to hold mushrooms and a snack. We should be back in the parking lot by about 1 pm.

SATURDAY, 15^TH SEPTEMBER

SHERRIFF CREEK SANCTUARY STROLL

Meet at the Sherriff Creek Sanctuary parking lot at 10.00 am for our regular Saturday morning walk around the Sanctuary trails. The sights, sounds and smells will please the observant stroller and lure them to constantly return to "see something new by traveling the same path again". We should be back at the gate by 12 noon. Please note that this is NOT a hike and can be undertaken by anyone with reasonable mobility.

SATURDAY, 22^ND SEPTEMBER

SHERRIFF CREEK SANCTUARY SPIN

See notes for 15^th September

WEDNESDAY, 26^TH SEPTEMBER

A VISIT TO GISELA'S CEDAR POINT

Meet at 9:00 am in the Brunswick Walk parking lot to car pool for the drive to Thessalon. This is a combination fall colour, wildlife, self dependancy demonstration outing to a remote camp on the north shore of Lake Huron. Our host, Gisela Roemer lives on a rocky promontory in a home which is supplied with electricity derived from wind and solar sources. The installation is interesting and the surroundings are idyllic. It is recommended that we walk or canoe the 3 km from the paved road to her camp but there is a good gravel road for any who cannot walk that distance. Bring lunch, binoculars and hiking boots if you plan to hike (there are some short trails on the property and a lot of lakeside rocks.) Please do not leave any foodstuff in the area, including apple cores etc. as she takes great pains not to attract wild beasties.

SATURDAY, 29^TH SEPTEMBER

SHERRIFF CREEK SANCTUARY CRAWL

See notes for 15^th September

SATURDAY, 6^TH OCTOBER

SHERRIFF CREEK SANCTUARY SOJOURN

See notes for 15^th September

WHV2n1 - Sep 2001