View topic - A Biodiversity Charter for Ontario

Is it possible they are planting species that are more tolerant to a warming and drier climate?

Here's another...... The other day while walking Nakoda through one of our local conservation areas here the authority was cutting down dead trees that were in no danger to either property or humans. Those dead trees provide much needed food and habitat for some Wood Peckers and Southern Fly Squirrels that are threatened in this area.

TOBY ERHART: The first year, we did about 120,000 of nine different species. This year, we're doing near 400,000 of 13 different species.

JULE GILFILLAN: Stafford Creek inmate, Toby Erhart, is growing prairie grasses for the Lewis McChord restoration with the help of Evergreen graduate student, Carl Elliott.

CARL ELLIOTT, graduate student, The Evergreen State College: So the training is basic horticulture techniques. And I spent a lot of time teaching them sensitivity and observation. I want them to be able to observe what they see and be sensitive to changes in the plants or insects that they may see affecting them.

And that's why they're good for the insects, because --

JULE GILFILLAN: The time these inmates have for observation and recordkeeping also results in valuable scientist data.

TOBY ERHART: There's virtually no science on the germination or growth of these species, because they are wild and no one has cultivated them for profit so there's no mass sowing (ph) information on them.

JULE GILFILLAN: The program may be without a profit motive, but there's plenty of motivation.

NALINI NADKARNI:I mean I came to a prison thinking it was going to be so tough and so hard to break through to these guys with bald heads and -- and tattooed. And they've been the easiest. They've been the ones who have accepted and wanted more -- more than other audience I've

-- I've ever worked with.

TOBY ERHART: The scientist aspect of this project has been pretty much new to me. I had never even heard of any of these things. These are called lomatium that we're planting right now. These ones, they're little phylum linatum (ph).

You know, I -- I'm learning Latin, for goodness sakes. You know, linatum means to provide with wool or covered with wool.

JULE GILFILLAN: In addition to educational and scientific benefits, there also seems to be a social upside.

NALINI NADKARNI: What I've seen is that their stress levels go down and their fear levels go down. Their aggression levels go down. It's a hard thing to measure in a prison, but we have some deep sense of that in each one of the prisons that we're working in and each type of the projects that we're working, as well.

The Pinery P/P still to this day does controlled burns. They say its for better Oak Savanna management. Years ago they planted Non- Native Jack Pine in the Park. Years later they realized their mistake. They've been cutting these down and using controlled burns in big areas.

Nature has always figured out a way to adapt …

.But they have balance them selves. And as much as we don't like it the Zebras have contributed to a more positive and cleaner lake system.