New Boblink Habitat in Hamilton

Interesting project in Hamilton - so great that they are creating Bobolink habitat!  From the webpage:

Hamilton’s Bobolink community is getting the boot from their current home in Greensville and being re-located to a former dump. 

The city is hoping that the “threatened” bird species, will feel right at home at the old Upper Ottawa Street dump. 

Bobolinks had been living behind Greensville Public School but their habitat has been taken away by the construction of a new Johnson Tew park and arboretum. 

“The likelihood is that they will continue to be there until the trees start to grow up, then the Bobolink don’t like that habitat as much.” said Cynthia Graham. 

The city is hoping to entice the Bobolinks to move here, to the old Upper Ottawa Street dump, but the Bobolink is a very picky tenant, and the city will have to cut down some trees and plant prairie grasses in order for the birds to feel more at home. And the Bobolinks don’t like visitors. 

“It already is grassland, so there is the potential to establish the habitat they like which is mostly grasses. It’s restricted to public access and bobolinks are birds that don’t like a lot of disturbance.” 

They are an elusive bird, and are considered “at risk.” 

“Certainly the Bobolink are suffering because of habitat loss across their range, so whatever we can do to create habitat suitable for them is within our mandate to do so”
When they are in town, the nesting birds prefer staying on the ground in tall grass or crops. 

“The reason we chose that is because it has potential to be Bobolink habitat, but they’re not currently using it to full extent, so there’s an opportunity for enhancement.”
The move is estimated to cost $120 000 and another $200,000 is being requested from the city’s park project budget next year, to cover consultation with bird experts, and ongoing monitoring of the success of the project over the next 20 years.

http://www.chch.com/relocating-at-risk-bird-species/

Green Roof in Ottawa

Image from Google Earth

From Metro News:

Ontario Completes Ottawa Courthouse Green Roof (2012)

"A new green roof at the Ottawa Courthouse will reduce energy costs, improve air quality and help Ontario meet its long-term energy conservation goals.  (The roof's green space is bigger than four hockey rinks put together, or one football field.) 

The Ottawa Courthouse's green roof is a living landscape that supports 60 varieties of plants and protects the building's structure from the elements. There are 26 separate green roofs spanning multiple elevations, for a total of 70,000 square feet of green space that will help keep Ottawa's air clean. 

While a conventional roof lasts only 20 to 25 years, green roofs last at least twice as long. The new green roof will save $23,000 a year in energy costs by reducing summer cooling and winter heat loss by 26 per cent."

I found this after reading about Ottawa investing in solar energy on their municipal buildings:

Ottawa gets green with solar energy project (Metro News, September 2016)

"Eight municipal buildings now equipped with solar panels."

SNAP details

FROM THEIR WEBSITE:

The Sustainable Neighbourhood Retrofit Action Plan (SNAP)

The Sustainable Neighbourhood Retrofit Action Plan (SNAP) is an innovative pilot program led by Toronto and Region Conservation (TRCA) in collaboration with many municipal and community partners. The SNAP program aims to accelerate the implementation of environmental improvements and urban renewal at the neighbourhood scale. It takes an integrated approach to overcome urban retrofit challenges and address a broad range of objectives with locally tailored solutions. Each SNAP neighbourhood features unique initiatives to inspire residents, businesses and governments to take action.

Depave Mississauaga:  http://sustainableneighbourhoods.ca/wp/depave-paradise/

Brampton’s Bio-Filter Swale (County Court SNAP): http://sustainableneighbourhoods.ca/wp/step-monitors-bramptons-bio-filter-swale-county-court-snap/

Fruit Tree Care On Site and Off

The Beginner Fruit Tree Care Certificate Program consists of 9 two-hour classes. The students learned theory in the classroom but spent at least half of the 18-hour program out of doors, using their new skills in hands-on fruit tree pruning and care.

We visited neighbourhood gardens to work on privately owned fruit trees of all ages. Often local homeowners, like Wilson Mosquera, had been encountering problems with their trees like fruit tree pest and disease problems and poor fruit production. Wilson and his family had apple, cherry and pear trees in their lovely garden. But his fruit trees trees were not thriving.

The students came, sterilized their tools and got to work. They removed larger diseased branches with a handsaw. They improved the air circulation on the trees and promoted growth by removing smaller branches with hand pruners, loppers and pole pruners. Over two hours the fruit trees looked very different. Wilson and his family were impressed.

“It was a surprise there was such help available for people (with fruit trees). The students talked to me and clarified all the things I didn’t know about how to care for my trees. It was a beautiful experience. Before I had a few issues with my trees, now (after the student’s work) they are doing well. Now one of my apple trees has produced so much fruit that the branches are starting to be heavy,” Wilson says.

James Hackman uses a handsaw to remove a large diseased branch off a mature fruit tree in a local backyard. Students faced all sorts of challenges during the course, including challenges in their own newly planted orchard.

Drought, Hail and Other Fruit Tree Challenges

But this year’s course came with many challenges. For instance, planting day was scheduled for May 15 and our goal was to plant 14 bare root fruit trees in the San Romanoway Orchard. But that morning there was an unseasonal wind and hailstorm! The students showed up ready to go to work anyway, but due to the terrible conditions we rescheduled the planting for the following day.

The next challenge was drought. This year we had the driest spring that we’ve had here in Ontario for years. This, coupled with delays in setting up the orchard’s irrigation system, made it challenging for the group to irrigate the orchard’s young trees. But even that didn’t stop the San Romanoway Dream Team, who met in the orchard multiple times a week to water the trees using water from the site’s rain barrels or carrying heavy buckets of water from the nearby community vegetable plots.

The students faced a fireblight breakout in their orchard as this nasty bacterial disease has been spreading in various locations in Toronto. And in another experience they found that an apricot tree planted years ago on the site was covered with a fruit tree pest called scale. That tree was removed to protect San Romanoways newly planted orchard. All this gave the students a glimpse of the challenges fruit tree growers can face and how important it is that you know how to protect your orchard with proper care.

And yet, despite the challenges the San Romanoway Dream Team was amazing. They worked together. They came up with solutions. And the fact that the young trees on the site are growing well today is completely the result of their knowledge, teamwork and dedication.

About Caledon SNAP

The Caledon SNAP is located in a mature neighbourhood in Bolton, Caledon’s major urban centre, within the Humber River watershed. Located in west Bolton, the neighbourhood is west of the historic core and is comprised mostly of residential properties, with pockets of commercial and institutional development. The neighbourhood is also comprised of parks, schools, green spaces and trails, and is transversed by Jaffrey’s Creek, a tributary of the Humber River. The local demographic is a mix of young to middle-aged families and older couples ranging in cultural diversity.

This is one of six SNAPs happening across the GTA, and will focus on working with the community to achieve measurable environmental and neighbourhood improvement. Critical municipal priorities, neighbourhood-specific issues and multiple watershed and regional objectives will be addressed across a range of theme areas including:

•    Long-standing drainage and erosion issues in Jaffrey’s Creek and surrounding catchment;
•    Improved water balance and Low Impact Development (LID);
•    Watershed regeneration;
•    Regional urban forest and public health priorities;
•    Energy consumption ‘hot spots’; and,
•    Increase active transportation.

This project is being led by the Town of Caledon, Toronto and Region Conservation Authority and the Region of Peel, working closely with neighbourhood residents and businesses. The SNAP will be an on-the-ground demonstration of the Town’s Community Climate Change Action Plan.

2016 Burnhamthorpe SNAP Residential Program

March 24, 2016

We’re here to help you improve and renew your neighbourhood – to make it more sustainable, resilient and adapt better to future extreme weather. We provide you with tools and understanding so that you can make the best decisions for your home, property and family.

Residential Program offers (at no cost):

1) Home Consultations:
Call us to arrange for a Program Advisor to visit your home and explain what may help protect your property from stormwater damage. These 20 minute visits will include a walk-around your property to review how your home and property can not only better manage stormwater, but also how you can potentially make use of this free resource! Pertinent information will be provided to you according to your needs.

2) Spring Workshops:
Join us to learn how to disconnect your downspout and more! Learn how to ‘Green your Grounds’ with such things as rain barrels and rain gardens. Representatives from the Region and Municipality will also be there to provide information on rebate programs and answer questions. Click here to reserve a seat.

Via Verde project in Mexico City (citizen-led)

Have you seen this?  Even just looking at this image makes me feel calm!  I'd love to drive on a highway like this - imagine if Toronto did this to their highway downtown!

Great facts about the project:

- 40,000 meters of roadways and concrete pillars will be covered
- will fight pollution, beautify the city and decrease stress levels of motorists
- the green walls will generate oxygen, absorb pollutants and moderate traffic noise
- an automated irrigation system supplied by rainwater will be used
- the project is being funded by private donors, government and advertisers

From Upworthy and Now This:

More about SNAP - Black Creek (TRCA - Toronto)

From SNAP - Black Creek:

San Romanoway Revival: Greening the Corner of Jane and Finch.

The Black Creek SNAP transformed underutilized spaces around the low-income apartment towers at the corner of Jane and Finch into a vibrant park, with a 63 plot allotment garden and Toronto’s largest urban orchard. The project also includes pollinator gardens, naturalization areas with hundreds of native trees and shrubs, interpretative signage and a beautiful arbour structure, designed to offer shade and harvest rainwater to support the gardens. Hundreds of volunteers participated in the development of the park.

Balcony Gardening program

114 edible balconies in five low-income, high rise apartment towers were implemented during the summers of 2014 and 2015. Eight residents were hired as community leaders to mentor their neighbours

Black Creek Orchard Co-op

Black Creek SNAP homeowners with fruit trees have been joining forces to tend their collective urban orchard. Comprised of a very diverse group of fruit tree owners, the group meets regularly to exchange information and attend presentations led by professionals. A short term goal is for members to help one another prune trees and harvest fruit, and a long term goal is to create a social enterprise opportunity by pooling the harvested fruit and creating a Black Creek Orchard wine label, which can be sold at markets around Toronto and even beyond.

http://sustainableneighbourhoods.ca/wp/black-creek-snap/