Protecting Muskoka’s trees, rocks and water

Muskoka is a young community, even by North American standards, with white settlement going back only 150 years or so. Travelogues from the early days didn’t exactly make you want to hop the next stagecoach North.

“Extremely rocky and barren,” wrote J.W Bridgland in 1853. “It is a wonder how anything--even a birch tree--can grow,” was Joseph Bale’s assessment in his “Warning to English immigrants” in 1874.

What they wanted was arable land, the kind you could get your oxen to plow. It’s a good thing they didn’t find it here, or Muskoka today would look like Idaho, or southern Ontario.

Not that corduroy fields are a bad thing. But they sure aren’t Muskoka, the land of asymmetrical trees, jutting rocks and water; inconceivable quantities of fresh water. More than all of Russia, in 2000 lakes covering 78,000 hectares across the district, some of them dotted with cottages, resorts and hunt camps, others left to nature.

In our modern, overbuilt, increasingly-sullied world, we are now well aware that the bounty that surrounds us in Muskoka is good for more than wakeboarding and washing our hair in. And to that end, the Muskoka Heritage Foundation, in partnership with the District of Muskoka, created the Muskoka Watershed Council,  an advisory body concerned with the protection, restoration and enhancement of the quality of the area’s watersheds.

As luck (or careful planning) would have it, The Muskoka Watershed Council hosted The Freshwater Summit 2010, which took place June 1 and 2 in Bracebridge, highlighting freshwater issues and trends and examining policy options for future action for Muskoka and beyond. The speakers list included heavy hitters like Maude Barlow, national chairperson of the Council of Canadians, Ontario Environment Commissioner Gord Miller, and F. Henry Lickers, director of the department of the environment for the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne.

Barlow's keynote suggested a three-part strategy for protecting this precious resource; 

1. Watershed preservation and iodiversity conservation
2. Treating water as a public trust, and regulating it as such. 
3. Access to fresh water should be a human right.

The Freshwater Summit concluded with the creation of a communicque on freshwater for Parry Sound-Muskoka MP Tony Clement. Let’s hope that he and the G8 leaders can tune in.

Courtesy of Muskoka Tourism

By Tamsen Tillson

Bracebridge, ON

Published on May 27, 2010

Last updated on June 11, 2010

From the Bracebidge Examiner: Water wake-up call

Go to Nature & Environment Sources & Resources

Return to Nature & Environment landing page