Tag: Parks Canada

Categories
Cottage Life

Parks Canada launches new camping reservation system

Songquan Deng/Shutterstock

Avid campers are used to gearing up in January to book their favourite sites in our national parks—but that wasn’t the case this year, as Parks Canada completed a major revamp of their camping reservation system. The new platform went live on March 13, and some parks are officially open for bookings; others will continue to open throughout the month. Here’s what you need to know about the new system and how to reserve a campsite.

You need to make a new online account prior to booking

This is the crucial first step for everyone, regardless of whether you had an existing Parks Canada account. Make note of your username and password, and make sure your browser is compatible and running the site smoothly. 

Different parks have different booking or “launch” dates—make sure to identify the one you want. 

While March 13 was technically launch day for the new camping reservation platform, parks have varying dates for when reservations open, ranging from now until April 3. In Ontario, for example, all six national parks open their bookings on March 21. Also, note that some parks have different dates for front-country camping versus backcountry or hiking trips. 

Here are a few opening dates for a few of the top parks across the country:

Banff National Park—Thursday, March 23
*Some booking dates for backcountry campsites, backcountry hikes, and shuttles within the park are different (March 22, March 29, and April 13, respectively). Read through the whole section to be sure of the one that applies to you.

Jasper National Park – Thursday, March 16

Gros Morne National Park – Friday, March 31

Cape Breton Highlands National Park – Saturday, March 18 

Pacific Rim National Park Reserve – *Open as of Monday, March 13

Have your trip details ready 

While some features will be familiar if you’ve booked campsite reservations through Parks Canada before, it’s helpful to have a refresher on what some key terms mean so you know which details to fill in. 

You should have a general idea of the trip you’d like to do, as you’ll be asked what campsite you’re looking to reserve, the “reservable period” (the time frame of your trip, and the period that campsite is actually available), and the “operating season.” Some parks or campsites may be open for fall camping, for example, and others might not.

If you log in before bookings open, you’ll be directed to a waiting screen—when your turn comes up, you have 30 minutes to book

Remember that you’re not allowed into the booking system based on how early you logged in; it’s randomized. The goal is to have all of your trip details ready to go, so you can get the booking done quickly but also be ready to shift if necessary. While the new camping reservation system is meant to make things more streamlined, spots will still book up quickly. 

Be prepared to be flexible 

Look at a “site calendar” to see when a site is available. Remember that cancellations happen as the months go on; check back often, and know that not all campsites and parks are technically on a first-come, first-serve basis.

A voice from the wilderness

Get The Great Outdoors, our biweekly brief on all things nature

Sign up here

Categories
Cottage Life

Parks Canada bans personal vehicles from Moraine Lake in Banff National Park

Photo by Shutterstock/Lucky-photographer

Perched 1,800 metres above sea level, in Banff National Park’s Valley of the Ten Peaks, is the turquoise water of Moraine Lake, one of the park’s crown jewels. Tranquil, meditative, and quiet—or at least that’s how it appears in pictures. However, behind the lens is a different story. Parks Canada says this tourist hotspot has become inundated with visitors.

To combat the overcrowding and protect the natural resource, the agency announced that it will be closing Moraine Lake Road to personal vehicles. “Demand to reach Moraine Lake far exceeds available parking. In 2022, traffic flaggers were required 24 hours a day to manage the demand for access. During the peak of summer 2022, the parking lot remained full nearly 24 hours a day,” Parks Canada said in a statement.

Visitors are welcome to walk or bike to Moraine Lake, which is 14 kilometres south of Lake Louise, or there will be Parks Canada shuttles, Roam Transit, and other commercial transportation, such as tour buses, operating from June through mid-October.

By closing the road, Parks Canada said it will reduce stress for wildlife in Banff National Park, which use a section of Moraine Lake Road as a corridor; it will eliminate approximately four tonnes of carbon emissions per day; and it will remove the uncertainty of visitors finding a parking spot.

Parks Canada said the closure will be in place for summer 2023 but hasn’t specified whether it will extend beyond that.

Lindsay Copeland, a Banff native who operates Rocky Mountain Photo Co., a wedding and elopement photography company, wasn’t surprised by the closure. “They have to do what they have to do to keep these areas sustainable so that people can continue going to visit them,” she said.

Copeland added that the experience was getting out of control. Sunrise at Moraine Lake had become a popular event, but to guarantee a parking spot, Copeland said you’d have to show up at 2:30 a.m. and then sleep in your car for two hours.

While the closure will limit visitors, Copeland said it shouldn’t affect her business. “It’s definitely one of the places we specialize in shooting. But we’ve already been operating with private transportation because of the way that the area was, because of the demand to get in there,” she said. “We have already been recommending private shuttles, and private transportation, so if anything, this is just confirming what we were already doing.”

Moraine Lake
Photo by Rocky Mountain Elopements/Rocky Mountain Photo Co.

The one major downside, from Copeland’s perspective, is that it will affect locals who like to hike in the area. “We have to now find a different way to get up there,” she said. “But I, myself, would have probably avoided the area because of how busy it was.”

Not all Albertans are as accepting of the closure. Todd Loewen, the province’s Minister of Forestry, Parks, and Tourism, published an open letter, calling on federal Ministers Steven Guilbeault, who heads the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change, and Randy Boissonnault, in charge of the Ministry of Tourism, to reconsider the change.

“Parks Canada’s decision to block personal vehicles at Moraine Lake means fewer visitors to this important part of the province, less time to climb in the area, and less access to the backcountry,” he said. “Sunrise and sunset hikes or night photography are near impossible to achieve under this plan, unless people can afford to pay for commercial transportation or travel unsafely by foot or bike in the dark.”

In a tweet, Parks Canada stressed that the closure was enacted due to safety concerns around excessive vehicles and anecdotes from visitors about negative experiences trying to find parking.

Categories
Cottage Life

Point Pelee National Park temporary closes for deer cull

Photo by Shutterstock/Roxana Gonzalez

Parks Canada has temporarily closed Point Pelee National Park to the public due to an overabundance of deer. The park, located on a Lake Erie peninsula in southwestern Ontario, will remain closed from January 5 to January 20 while Parks Canada conducts deer reduction activity.

“Parks Canada is responsible for maintaining and restoring ecological health in national parks. A high population (hyperabundance) of white-tailed deer in Point Pelee National Park is a serious threat to forest and savannah health and the species that depend on these precious habitats,” the agency said in a statement.

Park staff said that Point Pelee can sustainably house between 24 to 32 deer. The current deer population is estimated at 61 to 73 deer, more than double the park’s capacity. “Point Pelee National Park is home to a large amount of leafy vegetation, experiences mild winters, and, most importantly, lacks natural predators such as wolves, bears, and cougars which would have normally kept the deer population in balance,” the agency said.

The problem with too many deer

With so many deer left unchecked, native plants are being consumed faster than they can regenerate, damaging the health of the park’s Carolinian Forest, home to at-risk species such as the red mulberry tree, Eastern wood-pewee, and Eastern fox snake. Parks Canada said the deer are also impeding the restoration of the Lake Erie Sand Spit Savannah. This globally rare ecosystem supports 25 per cent of the species at risk in the park, including the five-lined skink.

What’s the solution?

To reduce the deer population, Parks Canada has partnered with Caldwell First Nation, whose traditional territory encompasses Point Pelee, to hunt the deer. “The population of White-tailed deer is reduced by means of an organized annual cull,” park staff said in an email.

Using rifles, 15 to 20 members of Caldwell First Nation and park staff will hunt the deer in the mornings and evenings, when the animals are most active. This cull is not a recreational hunting opportunity, staff stressed. “It is a resource management intervention designed to reduce a major threat to the continued health of the park.”

These annual culls with Caldwell First Nation have been happening since 2015. On top of keeping the park’s ecosystems healthy, the reduction activity also provides Caldwell First Nation members with the opportunity to mentor youth and strengthen traditional connections to the land while sharing knowledge and expertise with park staff. Caldwell First Nation keeps the meat and hides from the deer, using them for personal, community, and ceremonial purposes.

Hunting the deer has proved effective and more efficient than relocating them, Parks Canada said. “Trapping and relocating deer has been investigated by the park and by other sites in Ontario. Unfortunately, this method does not offer a long-term solution to the problem because of a lack of other available habitats to put deer, very high costs, as well as low survival rates as a result of relocation efforts.”

Point Pelee will reopen to the public on January 21.

A voice from the wilderness

Get The Great Outdoors, our biweekly brief on all things nature

Sign up here

Categories
Cottage Life

Toronto Zoo, Parks Canada voice concerns over planned development of the Greenbelt

Photo by Shutterstock/Colin Temple

The public consultation period for a controversial proposal from the Ontario government has come to an end. In early November, the province announced plans to open 15 sections of protected land within Ontario’s Greenbelt, totaling 7,400 acres, for housing.

In an attempt to tackle Ontario’s housing crisis, the proposal would expand the amount of land available for development in the Greater Golden Horseshoe Region. Premier Doug Ford has committed to building 1.5 million new homes in the next 10 years, and the government says 50,000 new homes would be built on the Greenbelt land.

The government has also stated that it would replace the developed land with 9,400 acres, consisting of 13 urban river valley areas and a section of the Paris Galt Moraine, approximately an hour’s drive east of Toronto.

The proposal, however, has been met with opposition. Protests have erupted around the province as stakeholders voice concerns about the environmental impacts of developing the Greenbelt and point out that Ford promised he wouldn’t touch the Greenbelt during his re-election campaign.

It’s also been revealed that developing the Greenbelt could thrust the provincial government into a series of legal complications.

Parks Canada issues letter in response to removal of Greenbelt lands

As part of its Greenbelt proposal, the Ford government plans to open a section of the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve, an area of protected land in Pickering, for development. This section of land is adjacent to the Rouge National Urban Park, which falls under Parks Canada’s jurisdiction.

During the public consultation period for the Greenbelt amendment, Parks Canada submitted a letter to the Ontario government, pointing out that if the province developed this land without consulting Parks Canada, it would be breaking a Memorandum of Agreement between the provincial and federal governments.

The letter went on to say that a Parks Canada analysis found that developing the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve could cause irreversible harm to the wildlife, natural ecosystems, and agricultural landscapes within the Rouge National Urban Park.

“Parks Canada looks forward to productive discussions on the issue with the province,” said a spokesperson for the agency in an email.

Toronto Zoo concerned about how developing the Greenbelt lands will affect endangered species

Developing so close to the Rouge National Urban Park could also endanger Blanding’s turtles, which are protected under the federal government’s Species at Risk Act. To help the species recover, the Toronto Zoo, in collaboration with Parks Canada, the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority (TRCA), and the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry (MNRF), has been raising Blanding’s turtles and then releasing them into the Rouge National Urban Park.

“Since 2012, 603 Blanding’s turtles have been released into the Rouge watershed,” said Dolf DeJong, CEO of the Toronto Zoo. “It’s a really challenging narrative for us because we usually don’t share the locations where these animals are put back publicly. We do that to reduce the threat of poaching and unintentional habitat damage from people trying to see them. But there are 149 of these animals that have been released adjacent to where they’re talking about developing with the proposed amendments to the Greenbelt Act.”

DeJong pointed out that the Rouge National Urban Park acts as a corridor for these at-risk species, connecting Lake Ontario to land north of Highway 407.

“Our research is suggesting home range lengths can be between just under a kilometer to over three kilometers, with maximums over seven,” he said. “Having linked spaces that connect wetlands and wild spaces, as well as underpasses and natural corridors that ravines, valleys, and rivers provide is so important for [the Blanding’s turtles] to connect and mix.”

The Rouge National Urban Park is also home to other at-risk species, including three types of bats: the northern myotis, the little brown bat, and the tricoloured bat.

According to the Species at Risk Act, a corporation that damages an at-risk species’ habitat could be fined up to $300,000.

Mississaugas of Scugog Island First Nation say they were not consulted

On December 5, Pickering held a city council meeting to discuss endorsing staff recommendations to support the province’s decision to remove the lands in Pickering from the Greenbelt under Bill 23. In 2019, Pickering’s former mayor, Dave Ryan, wrote a letter to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, asking them to repeal the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve Act so that the city could develop on the land.

On November 16, 2022, newly elected Pickering mayor Kevin Ashe, communicated the same sentiment, writing a letter to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing indicating support for the removal of the Duffins-Rouge Agricultural Preserve from the Greenbelt and the repeal of the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve Act.

The December 5 city council meeting allowed Pickering residents to voice their opinions on whether the city should support the province’s removal of the Duffins-Rouge Agricultural Preserve from the Greenbelt. The meeting lasted approximately six hours, dragging into the early morning of December 6. A succession of 30 speakers stepped forward, the majority opposing the proposal.

One of the meeting’s biggest revelations came around the fifth hour when Chief Kelly LaRocca of the Mississaugas of Scugog Island First Nation (MSIFN), whose reserve is in Port Perry, northeast of Pickering, addressed council.

“Just for a bit of background,” she said. “It’s the province’s constitutional duty to provide informed and meaningful consultation to First Nations when its rights and land would be impacted by Crown decision-making. It must be noted that MSIFN were not consulted by the province in advance of its decision to pass Bill 23 or amend the Greenbelt and Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve Act. These legislative and regulatory changes are, therefore, in our view, unconstitutional.”

LaRocca went on to accuse both Pickering and the provincial government of pursuing symbolic gestures during “this time of reconciliation,” rather than engaging in meaningful action and consultation.

“We submit the city should not pursue any significant planning reforms until such time that the province addresses its consultation failures and the municipality engages in informed consultation,” she said.

In the end, Pickering’s council voted against supporting the removal of the Greenbelt lands and also repealing the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve. However, the Province has since passed Bill 39, repealing the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve Act and effectively leaving the lands without legislative protection.

Categories
Cottage Life

Sable Island’s wild horse population weathers Hurricane Fiona

Photo Courtesy of Sable Island Institute/Facebook

On Saturday morning, Hurricane Fiona collided with the East Coast of Canada. Wind speeds reached 179 km/h, Antigonish, N.S. recorded 200 millimetres of rain, and waves in the Atlantic Ocean peaked at 30 metres high. Homes were flattened, towns flooded, and thousands have been left without power.

One of the few groups to emerge unfazed by the hurricane is the wild horses of Nova Scotia’s Sable Island. “Late Friday afternoon the horses were still grazing as usual. They sought shelter during the storm and by mid-day Saturday they slowly came out from the dunes to continue their grazing,” said the Sable Island National Park Reserve in an update.

Sable Island is a 42-kilometre-long crescent of shifting sand dunes and long grass, located 290 kilometres off the coast of Halifax in the Atlantic Ocean. The island is operated by Parks Canada and plays host to researchers and visitors.

The island is also home to around 500 wild horses. The exact origin of the horses is unknown, but the most common theory is that they were taken from Acadians deported to the U.S. in 1760 and resettled on Sable Island to be used at a later date. No one came for the horses, though, and eventually, they grew feral.

The horses have had to adapt to a harsh, windy climate. With no tree coverage, Sable Island is exposed, leaving only beach grass and marram grass to cover the island’s surface. Over the years, there have been initiatives to plant trees on the island, but the only tree that’s managed to survive is a shrub-sized pine.

To deal with the climate, the horses have grown shaggy coats and manes, and have learned to dig shallow wells in the sand to access groundwater. There are also freshwater ponds the horses drink from on the western half of the island.

The horses live in small family groups with a dominant stallion, one or more mares, and their young foals, sticking within a territory of three square kilometres.

In 1960, the Federal Crown Assets Disposal Corporation put the horses up for sale with the intention of removing them from the island, but enough people wrote to then Prime Minister John Diefenbaker objecting to the sale, that he put an end to it, protecting the horses under the Canada Shipping Act. It’s now illegal for the horses to be touched or fed, and they don’t receive veterinary care.

Despite how well the horses have adapted, storms are still hard on the animals, and Hurricane Fiona managed to pummel Sable Island. “They find shelter from the wind and blowing sand in the lee of dunes—there are plenty of hollows and high dune slopes in inland areas, and depending on the wind direction, the horses also huddle on the beach at the base of the dunes,” the Sable Island Institute said in an update. Often the older horses will huddle around the younger ones, protecting them from the wind.

Once the storm had passed on Saturday, staff saw the horses emerge from the dunes and carry on with their routines as if nothing had happened.

The island’s buildings weren’t as lucky. Three Parks Canada employees and one Sable Island Institute researcher were holed up in the island’s station during the storm. “Our houses shook and we heard lots of banging with loose siding. Needless to say, like a lot of Maritimers, there was a lack of sleep that night. We were in regular contact with the mainland using a satellite telephone,” The Sable Island Park Reserve reported in its update.

The building lost siding and the storm damaged the roof, but no major catastrophes otherwise. There is a lot of debris around the station to be cleaned up and erosion to the dunes has prevented staff from taking vehicles out to check on the island’s beaches.

Visitor flights to the island have been cancelled until September 30 while staff complete urgent repairs and make a full assessment of the damage.

Categories
Cottage Life

Parks Canada offering free admission and lockage on Canada Day

Photo by Elena Berd/Shutterstock

Celebrate Canada Day on historic canals and waterways in Ontario and Quebec, for free. Parks Canada is waiving admission to locations it runs including national historic sites, parks, marine conservation areas and lockages such as the Trent-Severn Waterway.

The cost of a lockage depends on the waterway but for the TSW it is $1/foot for a single lock and return. For a detailed list of lockage fees and information on mooring permits, click here.

The news comes after Parks Canada decided to partially reopen the locks along the Trent-Severn Waterway after rising water levels posed a risk to boaters and property owners, and threatened to erode the shoreline.

Categories
Cottage Life

Parks Canada to partially reopen locks along Trent-Severn Waterway

Photo by JHVEPhoto/Shutterstock

After several weeks of partial closures, Parks Canada has decided to reopen the locks along the Trent-Severn Waterway that have been closed to boaters due to high water levels caused by significant precipitation.

Since June 10, locks 1-19 and 22-27 have been closed to boaters due to safety concerns, shoreline erosion, and property damage.

According to Parks Canada conditions have shifted and now permit the reopening of the locks on June 24 at 9 a.m. Boaters are encouraged to lower their speed to limit their wake.

As Parks Canada cycles water through the Severn River, locks 42-45 will be closed outside of operating hours: Monday to Thursday, 9 a.m.-6 p.m. and Friday to Sunday, 9 a.m.-7 p.m.

For the most up-to-date information, boaters can turn to the @TSWBoaterInfo Twitter account.

Categories
Cottage Life

Doctors can now prescribe a Parks Canada discovery pass

Photo by Shutterstock/Stas Moroz

Canadian physicians are prescribing a new treatment for improving patients’ mental and physical health: the outdoors. A collaboration between Parks Canada and PaRx, a national nature prescription program, allows registered physicians to prescribe patients with an annual Parks Canada discovery pass for free.

“We are very lucky in Canada to have a world of beautiful natural spaces at our doorstep to enjoy healthy outdoor activities. Medical research now clearly shows the positive health benefits of connecting with nature,” said Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Environment and Climate Change, in a press release. “This exciting collaboration with PaRx is a breakthrough for how we treat mental and physical health challenges, and couldn’t come at a better time as we continue to grapple with the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on our daily lives.”

The PaRx program was first launched by the B.C. Parks Foundation in November 2020. Throughout 2021, the program expanded to Ontario, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. Physicians, nurses, and other licensed health care professionals in those four provinces, who are registered with PaRx, can now start prescribing Discovery Passes to patients.

The initiative looks to combat an increase in mental and physical health challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. A Statistics Canada survey found that between 2020 and 2021, symptoms of depression, anxiety, or posttraumatic stress disorder jumped by four per cent among Canadians aged 18 and older.

“I can’t think of a better way to kick off 2022 than being able to give the gift of nature to my patients,” said Melissa Lem, a family physician in B.C. and the director of PaRx, in a press release. “There’s a strong body of evidence on the health benefits of nature time, from better immune function and life expectancy to reduced risk of heart disease, depression, and anxiety, and I’m excited to see those benefits increase through this new collaboration.”

An annual Discovery Pass for adults (which costs around $72) provides access to 80 locations across the country, including national parks, historic sites, and marine conservation areas, covering more than 450,000 square kilometres of land and water.

“Research shows that children and adults who are more connected to nature are not only more likely to work to conserve it, but also engage in other pro-environmental behaviours,” said Lem. “I like to think that every time one of my colleagues writes a nature prescription, we’re making the planet healthier, too.”

When prescribing the passes, PaRx is asking physicians to prioritize patients who live close to the sites and will get the most use out of the pass, as well as those who may find the price of a pass a barrier to accessing nature, said Prama Rahman, a spokesperson for the B.C. Parks Foundation.

With 1,000 physicians currently registered, PaRx plans to expand to all Canadian provinces and territories by the end of 2022.

Feature video