Dysart accepts new Glebe Park stewardship plan
Much has changed in Glebe Park in the years since its last stewardship plan.
Jim Blake, chairperson of the Glebe Park and Museum Committee, spoke to Dysart council when it met April 23 about the 175-acre park’s new stewardship plan that will be in effect until 2033.
The township council voted to adopt the park committee’s new plan.
The new plan represents about five years of work by the committee. He said much has happened since the first stewardship plan in 2010.
“It feels like a completely different park now,” he said.
Mountain bike trails have been introduced and a snowmobile trail network now encompasses the whole property. Older trails that had slipped onto private land over the years have been reworked for public access.
The parks wooded thoroughfares are used for walking as well as for cross-country skiing and biking.
“So we have an enormous amount of action in the forest in relation to those things,” Blake said.
Also since the last stewardship plan, beech bark disease has been introduced so that many trees are either dying, dead, or in danger. Growth in the deer population has also had a dramatic impact on Glebe Park’s ecology, he said.
That’s to say nothing of the effects of extreme weather over the years.
“So it made sense for us to, obviously, renew the plan,” he said. “There were a number of features to be considered in terms of uses of the park and also what’s happening with the forest.”
He said the park lands are being managed as unmanaged forest.
“Which sounds like an oxymoron but, if you read the research, it’s not unmanaged,” Blake said.
The group maintains three stewardship values for the park: Its recreational and cultural use, the forest’s ecological integrity, and visitor safety.
There are many kilometres of trails dedicated for various recreational pursuits and the forest around those trails need to be maintained to ensure user safety, he said.
“We’re really feeling like we’re at a capacity for trails in the forest,” he said. “Certainly the double-track trails.”
Segmenting the forest by such means has more of a direct impact on the wildlife than single-track trails would, he said.
The first stewardship plan featured a forest management plan. Initially, little was done in that regard but “danger trees” have since been removed.
“The danger trees didn’t really become an issue until just recently,” Blake said. “The forest changes over time, so we did an entire review of the forest, identified all the hazard trees, and developed an ongoing policy.”
Infected beech trees have been taken down and left where they fell so as not to transfer the bark disease to another area.
“Even though it looks like very desirable firewood, we don’t want to be taking it out of the forest,” he said. “That’s a key thing.”
Mayor Murray Fearrey suggested it may be necessary to obtain the expertise of a qualified arborist to help deal with the felled trees and the beech bark disease.
Blake said there’s a committee member who is a qualified arborist who has been lending his expertise on the matter.
“He’s got an incredible eye on the forest,” Blake said of the committee member.
“So he looks after the management, but who is taking the trees down?” Fearrey said.
Blake said one of the ski clubs that use the trail network has been removing infected trees as part of their trail maintenance.
“Their volunteers are taking down the ones (trees) that you can push over or are easy to take down,” Blake said. “But anything that obviously has a higher risk, we’re bringing in professional foresters.”
Those skilled workers are hired at a reasonable price, he said.
“I know you’re counting those dollars, Murray,” Blake said.
“I’m always counting the dollars,” Fearrey said.
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James Matthews, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Minden Times
