ATHABASCA — Ducks Unlimited made a splash at town council with an educational presentation for councillors on the importance of wetlands in flood mitigation, after heavy rains saw the Tawatinaw River flood near Highway 2 in June.
Bart Muusse, provincial policy specialist for Ducks Unlimited, teleconferenced into the Sept. 19 regular council meeting to give councillors and other individuals present a detailed reminder of the role wetlands play in responsible land management and flood prevention. Councillors voted unanimously to accept the presentation as information.
“You’re having to deal with some flooding issues, and unfortunately you’re not the only ones; this is something that I’m hearing across the province,” said Muusse, who joined Ducks Unlimited last autumn.
In a follow-up interview Sept. 28, Muusse said much of his role with the organization focuses around engaging with towns, cities, and even counties as “municipalities are really key player(s) in conservation.”
Muusse’s presentation pointed to the significant loss of wetlands in Canada over the years, a result of urbanization, agricultural expansion, road construction, but also shifts in the collective perception of wetlands.
“If we look at the settled areas of Alberta, which includes the area you’re in, over time, almost 70 per cent of wetlands that were in place about 100 or 150 years ago have been lost,” said Muusse.
“Underlining that is more of a values conversation; wetlands were maybe seen as nuisance lands and people wanted to get rid of them because they were in the way,” Muusse told council, adding this attitude is changing, but wetland loss is still ongoing — a problem Ducks Unlimited is aiming to address in “a pragmatic but also somewhat timely fashion.”
“It’s important to emphasize — we call it an ecosystem service — of wetlands. Wetlands can help municipalities in certain cases with flood mitigation, because what they do is they capture runoff from the watershed and store that water and slowly release it over time,” said Muusse.
“Within a one year time period, our river has been at its lowest level ever and its highest level ever,” said mayor Rob Balay. Referencing the high number of severe storms and forest fires this summer, he asked if the changing weather patterns have “factored into any of your strategies (and project maintenance)?”
“In the north, I know that, for example, our projects and the water that was held there were used for firefighting. There’s not much we can do directly, of course, about the external environment,” said Muusse, adding the organization does monitor water levels on an ongoing basis.
“Overall, we’ve come to a realization that we need to protect the areas that are left,” said Balay in a Sept. 29 interview.”
Muusse, given his profession, tends to agree: “You can’t put a price on nature,” he said.
Lexi Freehill, TownandCountryToday.com
