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This newsletter update is to wish you the best of the season and to let you know about some of the work happening in Ausable Bayfield watersheds.
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World Soil Day

Ausable Bayfield Conservation to offer five free soil tests to first five farms for World Soil Day
The local celebration of World Soil Day is one of the year’s last actions to mark International Year of Soils 2015 but the focus on healthy soils is to continue after this year.
World Soil Day is the day the United Nations asks people around the world to reflect on the key role healthy soil plays in the future of our food and water. Ausable Bayfield Conservation is marking the occasion by providing five free soil tests as prizes. Each prize includes the free collection of soil samples, analysis, and interpretation of results for a farm up to 100 acres in size. These valuable soil tests are prizes to be awarded to the first five farms that call and reach Healthy Watersheds Technician Abigail Gutteridge at 1-888-286-2610 starting at 8:30 a.m. local time on Friday, December 4, 2015. Farms must be located in the watershed area of Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA).
For more information visit World Soil Day news item.
 

Ausable Bayfield Conservation seeks nominations for Conservationist of the Year

You are invited to nominate person, farm, business, or group as nominee for award that pays tribute to work that protects water, soil, and living things in the watershed. Ausable Bayfield Conservation has announced that it will once again honour a person, business, farm, or organization doing positive work in the local watershed community with the Conservationist of the Year Award. For more information click on Conservationist Award news item.

Lake Huron project spearheaded by Healthy Lake Huron partnership one of projects highlighted in provincial report

Ontario has released a final report about communities in the province that have developed new water management tools with support of Ontario’s Showcasing Water Innovation program. A project by Ausable Bayfield Conservation and the Healthy Lake Huron: Clean Water, Clean Beaches partnership is included in the document. For more information on this local project visit the stormwater management news item link.
 

Program to support local wetland creation to receive funding support through Environment Canada’s National Wetland Conservation Fund

Ausable Bayfield Conservation has announced that it is a recipient of funding from Environment Canada’s National Wetland Conservation Fund for its work helping landowners in Huron, Middlesex, and Lambton counties to create and protect wetlands. The total funding amounts to $190,000 over two years to support the Healthy Headwaters Wetlands Initiative.
For more information visit the wetlands news item link.

Local people showing their interest in shoreline issues by their participation in survey, Steering Committee

Shoreline residents and other interested people are showing an interest in shoreline management issues by taking part in an electronic survey and subscribing to a newsletter about the Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA) Shoreline Management Plan Update. We are at the start of a Plan Update process that will take more than a year to complete. Public open houses are to be held in the summer of 2016 so all residents, including seasonal residents, are able to attend. Staff members expect technical work to be ready by summer of next year so the public will have the latest mapping and shoreline information to review at that time. No drafts or recommendations have been prepared yet. An electronic survey is one of the first opportunities available for people to provide input about shoreline issues of concern to them. Local people have already started to respond to the survey and to subscribe to a free electronic newsletter with updates about the project. For information on the survey and the Plan Update visit the Shoreline Management Plan news item link.

Bayfield’s Ray Letheren finalist in Hometown Heroes Awards

The Earth Day Canada Hometown Heroes Award Program named Bayfield’s Ray Letheren as a finalist in the Individual category. The national award program recognizes and celebrates environmental leaders who foster meaningful, long-term community awareness and action. “I am humbled and honoured to have been recognized as a finalist in the Hometown Heroes Award Program,” said Letheren. He said being named as a finalist for the award is really a recognition of the many people with whom he has worked over the past 20 years. The award finalist said he is proud of the work the Bayfield and area community has done to increase awareness of the need to protect “our most valuable resource, water.” He thanked his fellow community members for their commitment to water protection. He also thanked his wife Paula for “enduring” throughout his efforts and supporting his “other passion” – water quality. Read more at the Ray Letheren Hometown Heroes Award Finalist news item link.

Tom Prout wins Latornell Leadership Award

The Latornell Conservation Symposium presented awards for conservation leadership to Tom Prout, Muriel Andreae, Ian Buchanan, and Bob Rogers. The honorees received their awards on Tuesday, November 17 at Nottawasaga Inn Resort and Convention Centre in Alliston, Ontario. Tom Prout is an Exeter-area resident who retired in early 2014 after four decades of service to protect and improve local watersheds. During his 40 years of conservation work, he did everything from attending camp, to cutting grass, to serving for 32 years as General Manager and Secretary-Treasurer of Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA). For more information read the Tom Prout Conservation Leadership Award news item link.

Family Day free snowshoeing to return

The weather may have seemd so mild it might be hard to think of winter and snow but warm temperatures didn’t stop community groups in the South Huron area from thinking ahead to the annual Family Day WinterFest South Huron event. More than a dozen people from Exeter-area community groups met to start plans for the Holiday Monday winter celebration to be held in Exeter on February 15, 2016. The Friends of the South Huron Trail volunteers are back with free family snowshoeing with snowshoes courtesy of Ausable Bayfield Conservation. For more information visit the Family Day WinterFest South Huron news item.

Stay up-to-date on low water advisories

The Water Response Team and Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA) remind you to stay posted to the ABCA website at www.abca.on.ca for updated low water advisories.
Low water advisories can be found by clicking the dynamic levels tool on the home page or visiting the Low Water Advisories link.
For information on Low Water and Drought in the Province of Ontario visit the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry site.
Copyright © 2015 Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA), All rights reserved.


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