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On June 5th, we sent an email to each of the 42 resort villages in Saskatchewan. We asked each resort village to FORWARD THE NEWSLETTER to each of the cottage owners in their resort village. Several resort villages wrote back to PARCS saying that they could not forward our message because they did not have a complete list of residents' emails (BECAUSE THEIR RESIDENTS HAD NOT SIGNED THE RELEASE giving them permission to send emails to a group - Unlike when PARCS sends an email newsletter to a group via Constant Contact which preserves the privacy of the email addresses).
PARCS IS ABOUT TO USE ANOTHER VEHICLE FOR REACHING OUT DIRECTLY TO COTTAGE OWNERS - IT'S CALLED FACEBOOK.
PARCS is about to open a PARCS FACEBOOK PAGE with the financial assistance of Ducks Unlimited in Saskatcewan. The page will be set up and managed by Alice Davis. The main purpose of the page will be to provide information about HOW WE CAN ALL FOSTER SAFE CLEAN LAKES. We asked Alice to introduce herself to all of our PARCS newsletter readers:
My name is Alice Davis and I am the Watershed Manager with the Lower Qu’Appelle Watershed.
I started as a committee member while the watershed plan was being created, then moved to a board member position, then to my current role as manager.
It has been an exciting opportunity to build the LQWS watershed to where it is today. It was clear that our local stakeholders, whether it be business or concerned citizens who realized our lakes are not healthy. We have six recreational lakes within our watershed, all of which are stressed.
Our first task was to find out why and how can we start to “fix” the problem? Together, we decided that first we must educate ourselves, then educate others. Secondly, science…. we needed to know the science! Where are our nutrients coming from? We undertook two studies: lagoons that drain into our tributaries and agricultural practices. We also looked into the City of Regina new lagoon upgrade but the best was research was about lakeside cottage residents: they are the best land managers of their land. We have come a long way in cottage country in developing a healthy shoreline, like removing railway tie retaining walls, less fertilizer on our lawns, making sure we don’t have leaking septic tanks, and caring for a healthy shoreline to ensure that nutrients coming off our land isn’t ending up in the lake but is instead captured by healthy riparian shorelines called the Ribbon of Life.
Through our research, it has been determined that phosphorous and nitrates are contaminating our lake waters, by means of runoff from our agricultural lands. How can we fix this? How can we ensure that producers are using best management practices?
Wetland loss and drainage is an enormous factor in our province, with the biggest concern of nutrients, pesticides, and chemicals flowing into the waterways. It is a sad to say that our province is the only province without a wetland policy to manage and preserve our wetlands that continue to be drained to accommodate agriculture. We could and should become leaders in acting to preserve wetlands that provide environmental services for wildlife habitats, acting as carbon sinks, recharging aquifers, purifying water, and retaining nutrients
I currently reside on the shore of Round Lake. Like other lakeside dwellers, we face many challenges here in all our recreational lakes and I am proud to be part of “changing with challenge” along with many others. Let’s do our part and keep on caring for our environment - for us, for our grandchildren and for future generations to come.
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