On Sunday, April 30, there will be an afternoon hike of the Admiral Lake loop. Meet between 12:30-1 p.m. on the Musquodoboit Valley Rail-to-Trails parking lot, in Musquodoboit Harbour. The hike is expected to take 5-6 hours, with plenty of time at the look-offs and watching for mayflowers in bloom.
This event is not part of the Halifax Field Naturalists program, but an informal / social walk. As a courtesy, would you contact burkhardplache@gmail.com if you are planning to join?
The Halifax Field Naturalists are now on Twitter. The handle is @HfxFieldNat, and our first tweets have already gone out. If you are using Twitter, please follow us.
Clearcuts and planned clearcuts on Crown land in Halifax Co.
View Impacts of forestry in Nova Scotia on conservation of biodiversity: Concerns and Questions
At our regular meeting, long-time HFN member Peter Webster will share experiences and images from his December 2015/January 2016 trip to the Antarctic.
All welcome, 7:30 pm at NSMNH on Summer Street. View Details under Walks & Talks
Also, Sydney Bliss will make a short presentation on the Landbirds at Risk in Forested Wetlands Project.
A draft of the Halifax Green Network Planning and Implementation Strategy and “Plan Primer” have been released by HRM and go to Regional Council today (March 23, 2017) to be approved for upcoming public consultations. It is expected those consultations will take place in April. The Primer provides a good overview of the Green Network plan, with lots of maps. It’s recommended reading!
Join us, 7:30 pm on Thursday Feb 2, 2017 at the NS Museum of Natural History on Summer Street for a very Canadian presentation. Gavin Mason, coastal geoscientist at BIO, will talk about our 300,000 km of coastline, elaborating on the geomorphology (the study of the origin and evolution of the earth’s landforms, both on the continents and within the ocean basins), the processes, and the characteristics of Canada’s coasts. Enter by the side door by the Parking Lot. Read more
At our first regular meeting of 2017, award-winning author Bob Chaulk talks about the historic seal hunt during the period of the ‘wooden walls’, after the steamships SS Bloodhound and SS Wolf brought wholesale change to an old industry, beginning in 1863. Bob tells about the dangerous and desperate lives of the men – young, ill-clad, brave and cheery men of iron who pursued the seals, and the ships which carried them, too often, to their deaths. Many of the ships figure prominently in the Arctic and Antarctic exploration activities of men like Shackleton, Scott, and Nansen. One of them even became the logo for a chain of popular boutiques!
7:30 p.m. at the Nova Scotia Museum of Natural History, 1747 Summer Street, Halifax. All welcome
A lengthy article in the LocalXpress includes interviews with local birding authorities Eric Mills, David Currie and Ian McLaren to give a local context to the continent-wide declines in songbirds and seabirds which have been highlighted recently. It’s informative if somewhat sober reading. View PAUL SCHNEIDEREIT: Is this the global swan song for seabirds and songbirds?
Kristina Boerder, a PhD student from Dalhousie University, will tell us about how she is making movements of fishing vessels visible (even when they are out of sight!) using satellite technology in ecologically important areas of our world’s oceans.
7:30 p.m. at the Nova Scotia Museum of Natural History.
Read more
GOOD NEWS: Halifax regional council moves ahead with proposed Purcells Cove park.
See Metro News
“It is recommended that Halifax Regional Council direct staff to:
1. Proceed with negotiations to acquire the lands (PID 00052407) and return to Regional Council for consideration of the key terms and conditions for the 379 acres that address the following:
a. Suitable acquisition terms… Continue reading
Halifax council will be presenting a recommendation Sept 20 on whether to approve a proposal by the Nature Conservancy of Canada to acquire almost 400 acres of land in the Williams Lake backlands and set it aside indefinitely as a wilderness preserve.
Please visit the Urban Wilderness Park Website for more about the proposal and how to support it by writing to Mayor and Councillors.
The 1500 letters paid off…”Regional councillors roundly rejected a June report that would have allowed development in the Blue Mountain Birch Cove Lakes area.” Read more in Global news Report
