Showing up at City Hall
by Lynn Ovenden Expo at City Hall with Brenda McCrea and Barbara Riley Backyard Biodiversity was the theme last Friday night (April 11) at City Hall. As part of the City of Ottawa Wildlife Speaker Series, the evening featured talks by two guest speakers. Sarah Kirkpatrick-Wahl from Nature Canada spoke about features that make a garden attractive to wildlife. Bill Dowd, CEO of Skedaddle Humane Wildlife Control, demonstrated how numerous mammals gain entry to our homes and how [...]
Stories from Australia’s waves, caves, and animal graves
by Natalie Sopinka On April 8, OFNC members met for the third time at the new meeting location at the Central Experimental Farm. Murray Citron recited his first-ever published poem (in Trail & Landscape!) which captured all elements of an Ottawa spring: wind, snow and sun. On that note, as spring temperatures rise, so do the number of OFNC events and excursions! All upcoming events are posted on the OFNC website. Anouk Hoedeman updated attendees on the work of the new Ottawa [...]
Ottawa Regional Science Fair: and the awards go to…
by Natalie Sopinka This year the Ottawa Regional Science Fair was held April 4-5 at Carleton University. With over 200 students from grades 7-12, the event was filled with young bright minds asking questions about energy, the environment, human health, and natural resources. Kathleen Conlan and Natalie Sopinka were on hand to judge projects that demonstrated "knowledge of some aspect of natural history, field ecology, or wildlife conservation." From brachiopods and ducks to mushrooms as oil absorbents and wort plants in motor [...]
Birds for beginners
by Bev McBride Editor's note: In the interests of full disclosure, this Red-winged Blackbird was not photographed during this excursion, nor was it photographed at Mud Lake. However, Bev says this species was "emblematic" of the morning's very successful field trip. Photo by Gillian Mastromatteo About 20 people came out for this morning's bird trip to the Britannia Conservation Area / Mud Lake. The most obliging weather meant birds were singing and moving about, making them easy to [...]
Glimpses of wildlife II – a collection of short videos
by Sandy Garland Collage of some of Jeewa's many photos of local wildlife We see thousands of snow geese take off from a field near Winchester, a stunning scarlet tanager calling to a rival from the top of a spruce tree, a nest of baby blackbirds developing to fledgling size, a pair of trumpeter swans, and a coyote staring curiously at the woman behind the camera - who, we are told, was howling wildly at the time. Jeewa Mendis [...]
Here we are, with Paul Keddy
Paul Keddy (left), with OFNC friends Paul Catling and Dan Brunton by Lynn Ovenden Dr. Paul Keddy drove to Ottawa last Tuesday from his home deep in the forest of Lanark County to speak to a large meeting of OFNC members in the Neatby Building. He drove from forest on the marble and gneiss of a Precambrian continent, across the Ordivician limestone of an ancient sea, to the recent sediments of a post-glacial delta and seabed that underlie [...]
Visit to Canadian National Collection of Insects, Arachnids & Nematodes
By Barry Cottam Dr. Owen Lonsdale, Collection Manager for CNC On Saturday afternoon, February 15, about two dozen of us gathered in the foyer of the Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada's Neatby Building in eager anticipation of a tour of the Canadian National Collection (CNC) of Insects, Arachnids and Nematodes. The CNC is one of the largest insect collections in the world, with 17 million pinned specimens stashed away in cases piled high in special cabinets. The collection is so [...]
Flower flies!
Written on the fly by Lynn Ovenden The OFNC monthly meeting on Tuesday (February 11) last week was a big one, actually a joint meeting with the Ottawa Entomology Club. There were well over 100 of us in the salons of the Neatby Building (our new meeting location) buzzing with news and renewed acquaintances. Murray Citron opened the program with his poem inspired by a mating pair of Dragonflies. We listened rapt in silence to his ode and the sober [...]
Macoun Club snowshoes through forest and swamp
By Rob Lee Macoun Club members identifying signs of Emerald Ash Borers On their February 8th field trip, the Macoun Field Club snowshoed across their Study Area's biggest cedar and ash swamp in Ottawa's Greenbelt. We crossed deer, hare, and fisher tracks so often that most of the kids came to know them on sight. Ermine and shrew tracks, each seen only once or twice, required a good deal of prompting. From time to time we looked overhead [...]