Today’s post comes from Jill Legault, Information Specialist at Quetico Provincial Park.
Have you been paddling for years in Minnesota’s Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW) and are looking to change up your route?
On February 23, 2021, Quetico Provincial Park was officially designated as an International Dark Sky Park by the International Dark Sky Association!
The opportunity to look up into a beautiful starry sky has forever been a part of the Quetico Provincial Park camping experience.
Imagine yourself lying on your back gazing up into a wide-open sky filled with a million points of distant light (like the sky captured above by David Jackson!). You take a deep breath of clean air and stare upwards in wonder.
This post comes from Jill Legault, a Park Information Specialist at Quetico Provincial Park.
It’s the time of year to celebrate love.
Today’s post comes from Quetico Superintendent Trevor Gibb.
Quetico Provincial Park is primarily known for its world class backcountry canoeing opportunities.
However, once the lakes freeze and snow blankets the forest, the park transforms into a wilderness winter wonderland.
Today’s post comes from Carter Morash, who has worked as a backcountry warden in Quetico Provincial Park since 2015.
The north end of Quetico is a beautiful place.
There are quiet lakes, great fishing spots, wildlife viewing opportunities, and a variety of routes to try out.
Did you know that the north end is also paddled less than the southern end of the park? That makes it a great area of the park to explore in the fall!
Happy International Day of Women and Girls in Science!
Danni Gartshore, Master’s of Biology candidate at Lakehead University
Danni is currently researching the impacts of the invasive Spiny Water Flea on the growth of fish. She conducted her field work in Quetico Provincial Park in the summer of 2021, and is also looking at historical data dating back to the early 1970s.
It was another different year for the program with the pandemic continuing to affect travel at the border and within Canada. This year 2 artists in residence were successfully scheduled for the month of August for 2-week residencies at the park.
Unfortunately, circumstances made it so that both artists canceled their residencies just before arriving. One artist canceled due to a family emergency and another canceled because of the fire and smoke situation at the park in late August. We are hoping to offer the artist in residence program for all of the peak season in 2022 after another unusual year this year.
by: Kelly Brigham (letter from this year’s winner of the Shan Walshe Bursary)
Dear Selection Committee,
This fall I will be attending the University of Guelph, as I have accepted my offer of admission. While just beginning my post-secondary education, I look forward to completing my Bachelor of Science specializing in Environmental Sciences. This is a four-year program, and I couldn’t be more excited to attend and learn more about our environment. I knew I was interested in environmental sciences as my career path because of how much I love the outdoors. I grew up living on a lake where I developed my love for hunting, fishing, camping, horseback riding, hiking, snowshoeing, canoeing and so much more at a very young age, much like Shan Walshe. Some of my favourite memories of these activities took place in Quetico Provincial Park.
by: Michael Rennie, Associate Professor Lakehead University; Canada Research Chair in Freshwater Ecology and Fisheries
We are now into our second year of work in Quetico Provincial Park to investigate the impact of spiny water flea (or Bythotrephes to us scientists). Thanks to generous funding from the Quetico Foundation, we initiated our first full year of fieldwork in Quetico, with some different approaches than originally planned and modifications due to COVID, but were highly successful in gathering critical information to answer our research questions. Much of the fieldwork this summer was focused on collecting aging structures for walleye from lakes that will help us to answer questions about the potential negative impacts of Bythotrephes on early growth rates of Walleye, being led by MSc student Danielle Gartshore.
by: Katie Tripp
Most of the summer was spent working on the Ontario Breeding Bird Atlas and moving songbird meters around the park. In addition to this work, other projects completed this summer include collecting depth and water clarity information from lake trout lakes so that each individual lake trout population’s risk from climate change can be assessed; sampling lakes for the presence of invasive Spiny Water Flea and monitoring trends in salamanders in the park. We also assisted the Lakehead University Quetico Foundation Research Partnership students in data collection for their thesis.
