Canada Rivers Day
Sunday June !0
Let's celebrate the Salmon and show how much we value it. Everyone is welcome but each event has a capacity limit that is set by the leaders. Youth are particularly welcome . Please contact the leader of your chosen event several days in advance to assure your spot. You will be outdoors all day. Protection from sun and biting insects advised.
Hike the Top End:
Explore the very beginning of the Salmon, from Cloyne to the Mazinaw Lake watershed
Leaders: Bernie Dertinger and Glenn Pearce berniekd [at] xplornet [dot] com 613 293 1795
Capacity: 8
Meet: 10 a.m. Parking lot next to Cloyne Community Hall east side main street
Bring: boots, your lunch, water, (optional: GPS, compass, topo maps)
Focus on the Feeder Streams:
Photograph Beaver Creek, Dead Creek and Crooked Creek, all feeding into Kennebec Lake and the Salmon
Leader: Gray Merriam. gmerriam [at] xplornet [dot] ca 613 335 3589
Capacity: 3 OR 7 if second car call or email to reserve
Bring: Camera (any type, with charged batteries), tripod, your lunch, water (1 litre)
Meet: 10 a.m. Parking lot, on right before bridge on Henderson Rd., north of #7 (Henderson is continuation of Arden-Tamworth Rd)
Paddle and Picnic
Kayak or canoe from mid-Kennebec Lake west to Head of Salmon R., climb north shore to panoramic view and lunch. Paddle back to Beaver Creek and up creek as allowed by fallen trees, return to boat launch.
Alternative for rough wind conditions: paddle inshore to east, picnic in the east end, return launch site.
Leader: Noreen Dertinger. catmuse [at] xplornet [dot] com 613 292 5773
Capacity: 10 boats
Meet: 10 a.m. Boat launch east side Henderson Rd. south of bridge (Henderson is continuation of Arden-Tamworth Rd.)
Bring: your lunch, water, hat, paddlecraft, PFD & all legally required gear
Panoramic view of Salmon Watershed from Bear Naked Ridge
Hike from Pit Road, off the Arden-Tamworth Road, along Friends of Arden Trail to the bald crest of Bear Naked Ridge for a 360 degree panoramic view across the Salmon and the Clare to Kaladar Ridge and across Gull Creek to the scarp of the Salmon River Fault.
Leader: Dugald Carmichael, Geologist, Advisor to FSR
Dcarmichael1 [at] cogeco [dot] ca 613 542 8628
Capacity: 15
Meet: 10 a.m. Pit Rd. at intersection with Arden-Tamworth Rd. to convoy to trail head
Bring: boots, hike sticks, hat, your lunch, water, camera, binocs
Sheffield Long Lake Tour and Picnic Afloat
Tour Sheffield Long Lake by pontoon boats. Visit top of the "canyon" and the junction with the Clare watershed.
Leader: Digger Macdougall digger [dot] mcdougall [at] sympatico [dot] ca 613 862 2458
Capacity: 10
Meet: 10 a.m. Civic address 2458 Arden-Tamworth Road, follow gravel road for 800 yards (avoid rocks). At fork (MacDougall sign) keep left. At lake, turn right, (M. MacDougall sign) park at cars.
Bring: Your lunch, water,hat, your PFD
Paddle and Picnic on the Salmon
Paddle flatwater upstream from Roblin, view riverine habitats and wildlife, shoreline picnic.
Leader: Susan Withers susan [dot] withers [at] gmail [dot] com 613 354 5765
Capacity: 6
Meet: 10 a.m. Parking lot east side Road 41, south of Salmon Bridge in Roblin
Bring: your lunch, water, hat, your paddlecraft, PFD and all legally required gear.
Sketch, Paint or Photograph the Salmon
Choose your favourite spot on the Salmon from the options below and capture its beauty!
Bring: Artist or photography supplies, your lunch, water, hat, andfolding seat
Following these events participants will be invited to display their work at the BonEco Design gallery in Tamworth (dates to be announced)
Upstream:
Locale: Head of the Salmon downstream from Kennebec Lakeriver and marshes
Leader: Aileen Merriam amerriam [at] xplornet [dot] ca 613 335 3589
Capacity: 8
Meet: 10 a.m. at 1309 Blue Heron Ridge (off Henderson Road just north of Highway 7)
Midstream:
Locale: Salmon in Tamworth and Forest Mills
Leader:Carolyn Butts cbutts [at] bell [dot] net 613 379 3074
and Tim Nimigan
Capacity: 15
Meet: 12 p.m. parking lot opposite "The Bakery" (south end of main street in Tamworth)
Downstream:
Locale: Salmon River near Milltown and Shannonville and Lonsdale waterfall
Leaders: Mora File morawildorchid [at] gmail [dot] com 613 396 3893 and Maureen Walton 613 396 3262
Capacity: 12
Meet: 10 a.m. main intersection in Shannonville (Roads 7&1)
Celebrate the Salmon – It's a Jewel
Blackfly Power
Long ago, Aldo Leopold, an early and long-lasting guru of the environment, wrote "The Odyssey of Atom X". In this saga of a Carbon atom, Leopold illustrated how difficult it is for any atom to oppose the forces moving it steadily towards the sea and instead to find some way to climb back up the hills. Leopold used a fox to consume Atom X in its food and using its power as a livng being, to carry it uphill against the inexorable seaward forces. Certainly the forces of living beings are the outstanding opposition to gravitational and erosional flow of all matter that can not take on a gaseous state.
Of all the forces carrying Atom X uphill, blackflies must surely be among the greatest. The larvae hang suspended from rocks by their bungee cords taking up enough particles of organic matter from the water to produce the tons of adult flies that fill all the spaces among all the trees on the Canadian Shield each summer. How many tons of Atom X are in all those flies?
Surely the oceans would soon shallow up with all that particulate matter if the blackflies did not intercept it from our streams before it got into the big rivers and out onto the continental shelf of the ocean.
If it takes 25 adult blackflies to make one gram then a million flies would make 40,000 grams. Two and one-half million flies would be one tonne. If, allowing for efficiencies, it takes about two grams of particles to result in one gram of actual fly, then 2.5 million flies would have removed two tonnes of particles from our streams.
These are serious amounts of matter being flown uphill and thus kept on the land by these flies for us instead of being lost into the ocean for geological time.
Next time you swat a palmfull of blackflies, remember that they are moving lots of good stuff uphill for us and and you are just doing your part with the swatting. The higher up you get them before you swat, the better.
