education Archives

Conservation Tools

The Stewardship Pledge The Stewardship pledge is a voluntary commitment of landholders to: Conserve the natural elements in the area and be sensitive to the wildlife (both plants and animals) that live there. Keep to a minimum any disturbance to the natural features and seek conservation assistance, if required. Encourage a diversity of native plants and animals, especially those that are rare and threatened, where possible. If transferring your property, notify the new landholders) or manager(s) of the commitment and encourage a fellow Steward to contact them. The strength of the pledge rests on the landholder’s personal commitment Conservation Covenants One of the main activities of the CCLT is to help private landholders protect their land through the use of conservation covenants. A conservation covenant is a voluntary, written agreement between a landholder and a conservation organization such as CCLT. In such an agreement the landholder promises to protect the land in specified ways. The covenant can include all or just a portion of a landholder’s property. It may include provisions to protect natural, historical, cultural, architectural, environmental, heritage, scientific, wildlife, or plant-life values. More on conservation covenants: Land Trust Alliance of BC Turtle Island Earth Stewards Westcoast Environmental Law Public Education CCLT is committed to providing educational workshops to the community at large on a varitey of topics including. CCLT will also assist special interest groups organize their start-up activities. Visit Westcoast Environmental Law for excellent descriptions of: Donation of funds or land Land Acquisition More Look for a number of publications including: “Greening Your Title: A Guide to Best Practices for Conservation Covenants” (pdf — text version available at site) West Coast Environmental Law announces the second edition of Greening Your Title: a Guide to Best Practices for Conservation Covenants Additional information can be found at: The Green Lane: [Backgrounder] — Ecological Land Donations – Qualified Registered Charities in British Columbia Canadian Wildlife Service – Ecological Gifts: A Checklist for Donating Ecologically Sensitive Land in Canada

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conservation, covenants, education, stewardship

Best Water Ways

Best Water Ways: Watershed Literacy, Stewardship, and Restoration Place-Based Learning Initiative. The Cowichan Community Land Trust (CCLT): Friends of Cowichan Creeks program is excited to be spearheading the Best Water Ways (BWW) initiative with the aim to accelerate fresh water and fish habitat literacy, stewardship, and active restoration within our schools. In order to meet curriculum requirements, the program will be directed towards students in grades nine to twelve in science and social courses. As of May 2019, we are developing the project and place-based learning resources and will begin piloting the program in Cowichan Valley’s schools in the fall of 2019. Over the next two years, BWW will be refined and made accessible online for use throughout the region and the province. Participating teachers will guide their students through several activity sessions. These lessons begin by introducing the concept of watersheds and the interconnection of people, ecosystems, and water. The sessions then introduce and explore the negative impacts of humans and climate change on our watersheds, and what students can do to help mitigate these impacts. Finally, students will participate in an active restoration activity at a local creek, lake, or other water source, where students will learn how to protect, restore, and care for their local watersheds. Activity sessions include Watersheds- Wading In Mapping our watersheds Watershed Detectives Watersheds under Stress Watershed SOS Riparian Restoration Workshop The BWW initiative aims to provide teachers and students with sufficient resources to run the learning sessions independently. The resources in development include a downloadable educator’s guide, a downloadable learner’s guide, and web-based audio-visual tools. Links to conservation organizations, ecological restoration specialists, and Indigenous knowledge support in each region provide help with the riparian restoration activities and other specific local elements. We are excited to launch pilot runs of this program in the Cowichan Valley in fall 2019. The learning resources will be available and accessible to educators in BC (and beyond) in 2020. Let’s inspire stewardship and active restoration of our watersheds through education! If you are a teacher interested in running part or all of this program in your classroom, please contact us for more information regarding how BWW meets parts of the required curriculum, how you can use the resources available, etc. We can be contacted with any inquiries about the project by email at info@cowichanlandtrust.ca or by phone at (250) 746-0227. With acknowledgement and gratitude to our project funders:

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education, freshwater, restoration, watershed

Great Big Bee Garden

Great Big Bee Garden This project restored areas of networked native bee habitat by planting significant areas of a broad range of nectar and pollen producing native plant species, heritage herbaceous perennials and cover crop forages in a number of connected areas. Many of these are species are traditional first peoples food plants that have been pollinated by our 200 species of native bee pollinators for 10,000’s of years and thus a key to sustained food security for coastal first peoples. These plants provide realistic quantities of nectar and pollen for native pollinators and restores a very necessary biodiversity in order to meet the nutritional requirements of pollinators for sustained enhanced immune response to current and future environmental stressors. We were organized to accomplish this through timely community education, participation and engagement of all age groups in diverse venues in both urban and rural landscapes in the Cowichan Valley following the guidelines and coaching from organizations such as the very successful Xerces Society of Invertebrate Conservation. The decline of all species of bees, along with the uncertainties of climate change, significantly threatens the capacity for the sustainable pollination of food crops and native plants which define our local food culture and natural heritage. In the Cowichan Valley there is insufficient food and habitat for honey bees and native bee pollinators. This project addresses the root causes of current and future decline of honey bees and native bees by increasing the area of bee friendly urban and rural habitat essential for sustainable pollination of food crops and native plants. New research across North America and the world confirms that native bees are effective commercial pollinators when suitable habitat is adjacent to and within food producing areas. This requires needed landscape changes in urban centres and on throughout farmland to guarantee effective protection, assessment and restoration of habitat for our 200 species of native bees on Vancouver Island (450 in BC). The new research redefines the value of wild habitat in our ALR, and natural areas in BC as being essential for future sustainable pollination for long term food, seed and biodiversity security. This is especially so since our overstressed honey bees alone can no longer guarantee future pollination of food, seed and native plant pollination. What were the goals and objectives for this project? Goal 1: Increase the community’s knowledge about native bee pollinators and their critical role in the pollination of food crops and native plants. Objective: Hold at least three (3) workshops and four (4) presentations to teach the public, agricultural community and local governments about native bee pollinators and how we can help increase their effectiveness in the pollination of food crops and native plants by planting “Bee Gardens”. Objective: Attend at least four (4) community events to inform the public and general community about the importance and of native bee pollinators. Objective: Create an informational brochure, print material for workshops and publish native bee and “Bee Garden” information on our website. Goal 2: Improve bee habitat by creating and restoring “Bee Gardens”. Objective: Identify best potential “Bee Garden” sites and design layout. Objective: Collect/purchase seeds and necessary equipment and supplies for planting the “Bee Gardens” and building bee nesting boxes to be placed in gardens. Objective: Engage the community and plant the “Bee Gardens” and monitor. Goal 3: Encourage municipal and regional governments to consider bee habitat and pollinator friendly vegetation policies for land planning. Objective: Present to local government environment and planning commissions’ ideas for a new bee habitat and pollinator-friendly vegetation policy for use in municipal and regional land planning.

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bees, education, garden

Cowichan Estuary Nature Centre

Cowichan Estuary Nature Centre 1845 Cowichan Bay Road 250 597 2288 For open hours and the latest program information, please visit the Nature Centre website: www.cowichanestuary.caLocated in beautiful Hecate Park at the west end of Cowichan Bay Village, the Nature Centre offers opportunities for visitors of all ages to learn about the estuary, the bay, and the watershed through informative interactive exhibits and fun hands-on activities. School programs and interpretive programs for other groups can be booked at any available time. We also offer weekly summer science camps, and host films and other special events including facility rentals. The Cowichan Estuary Nature Centre offers exciting volunteer opportunities for adults and youth. These include; nature interpreters when the Nature Centre is open to the public for visitors, educational program leaders, participating in monthly bird counts, working on ecosystem restoration projects, creating and maintaining displays and equipment, and many other volunteers roles needed by all non-profits. Make a donation to the Estuary Nature Centre online by clicking here, or downloading the form below and returning it with a cheque to: The Cowichan Community Land Trust,6 – 55 Station StreetDuncan, BC V9L 1M2 Estuary Nature Centre Management Committee Jane Kilthei, Committee Chair, Cowichan Land TrustKai Rietzel, Cowichan Land TrustJohn Scull, Cowichan Land Trust BoardEric Marshall, Cowichan Valley Naturalists SocietyKerrie Talbot, Chair, Area D Parks CommissionGail Mitchell, CENC VolunteerHaley Guest, CENC Coordinator Previous committee members and ongoing supporters who we would like to thank include: Rod Carswell (Cowichan Land Trust Board), Tracy Fleming (Cowichan Tribes), Graham Gidden (CVRD Parks), Cheri Ayers (Cowichan Tribes), Guy Johnston (Fishermen’s Wharf Assoc), Nan Goodship, Carol Hartwig (CVNaturalists), Norm Olive (CVRD Project Manager), Erin Ward, Shari Willmott, Vanessa Elton, Madeline Southern, and Dwight Milford.

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education, estuary