Garbage

 Stepping Back

In our last issue, we introduced the term "biodiversity", the diversity of living things in our environment. In this issue we'll discuss biodiversity from a broad lake-wide perspective, and how plant life in particular contributes to the health of our lake environment.

 When we observe environmental problems showing up at the beach, like excessive algae washing ashore, or posted beaches due to high bacteria, often these problems originate beyond the local beach area. Some of these issues are compounded by the state of our watersheds.  The Lake Huron watershed covers roughly 134,000 square kilometres.  Since European settlement of the Lake Huron region, the watershed has undergone significant changes, particularly south of the Bruce Peninsula, and along southern Georgian Bay. Forest cover, for instance, has been reduced from  an estimated pre-settlement extent of 90% to around 18%, and as low as 6% in some of Huron's river systems.