Wow! What a busy September we have had! The weather has been great, and we have had lots of visitors coming out.
We would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who made it out to the Monarch Butterfly Migration Festival this year. The event was a huge success with just over 800 people in attendance! I would like to personally thank the Friends of Rondeau and all of our amazing volunteers who helped the day run so smoothly.
I thought I should also update you on the success of our recent shoreline cleanup. We are very grateful to the 30 volunteers who came out and roved our beach for garbage. They collected many items including car tires, plastic bags and old fishing nets. In total just over 1200 pounds of garbage was taken off our beach! Combine that with the stats that are pouring in from 1,600 other cleanup sites across the country and we will have some truly astounding numbers. A big thank you to everyone for helping keep Rondeau’s shoreline beautiful!
If you happen to be in the park and notice some pesticide signs along the South Point Trail, don’t be alarmed. We are working to eliminate a highly invasive, non-native plant Phragmites australis or Common Reed. This plant was introduced to the Eastern Seaboard sometime during the 19th Century and made its way to Lake St. Clair and the Detroit River in the mid 1980’s. Growth of phragmites is extremely aggressive and the plant will quickly form dense colonies which severely alter wetland habitats and out-compete native plants. The resulting loss of habitat for dependant wildlife, including species at risk, increases each year as phragmites continues to colonize and expand.
Here in the park we are working to eliminate some of these large colonies that have worked their way into our forested sloughs and wetlands.
Once the phragmites has been removed, the newly opened habitats recover very quickly and native species flourish and biodiversity is restored. Check out these before and after shots!
