NSRVCS News - September 23, 2021

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September 23, 2021

Remember river valley when considering municipal election choices
The municipal election on October 18 is when voters will elect a Mayor, City Councillor and Trustee of Edmonton Public Schools or Edmonton Catholic Schools. Find the complete list of candidates at
https://data.edmonton.ca/Elected-Officials/2021-Edmonton-Election-Candidate-Contact-Informati/fuad-mxit

Our society encourages you to consider candidates who will work towards the protection and preservation of the river valley and its natural areas. Several groups have created surveys to help voters make their choices.

Taproot Edmonton invited candidates to complete a survey drawn from issues it heard about through its People’s Agenda project. Questions include “Do you think city council should have approved the Epcor's E.L. Smith Solar Farm?” Candidate responses at
https://edmonton.taproot.news/news/2021/09/20/nominations-close-for-2021-municipal-election

Edmonton River Valley Conservation Coalition has reached out to council candidates on issues specifically relating to the river valley. Candidate responses at https://www.ervcc.com/council-candidate-interviews

In dark times, gardens build kinship and hope
From the fur trade to now, gardens of varying scale have been maintained throughout this river city. Early on, large scale gardens blanketed valley and cliff on both sides of the river. Beata Humberstone was a renowned gardener whose cabbages were said to be the diameter of a wooden oxcart wheel.

Her gardens fed local families, newcomers, and mine workers living at the Humberstone rooming house. The 200 hundred acres of fertile lands were eventually taken up by the Prins family who also had a penchant for horticulture, introducing Edmontonians to the illustrious cauliflower!

As the grand gardens of old were intersected with roadways, backyard gardens soon became the norm. In 1909, the Edmonton Horticulture Society was founded to encourage the growing of flowers, fruits, and vegetables citywide. This troupe of green thumbs also demanded vacant lots be planted, as well as public spaces and municipal properties.

When the first World War began and food shortages became the norm, governments promoted at-home plots. Pamphlets on the basics of gardening were printed and distributed to households. Backyard veggie beds kept the demand for commercial produce low, thereby ensuring the troops adequate food supplies.

When the conflict was over, Edmonton’s backyard gardens were well-established when we needed their small mercies, for on the heels of war came the 1918 Flu Pandemic. During this time, Edmontonians continued to treat public health as a community concern; citizens cared for one another by redistributing their already limited stocks of tinned and canned goods to those in need; cold cellar items were shared between neighbours.

From fort to riverside village to metropolis, gardens have been foundational to Edmonton’s growth, character, and sense of unity. Read more at https://citymuseumedmonton.ca/2021/05/26/in-dark-times-go-to-the-garden-part-2/

Great Blue Heron benefits from beaver’s engineering skill
The Great Blue Heron is the largest and most widely distributed heron in Canada and holds the record for the largest wading bird in North America. Herons are migratory birds and arrive in Alberta in late March to early April and fly south in October to early November.

Herons can be found in meadows or in open shallow water at the edges of lakes, streams, rivers, ponds, sloughs, ditches, marshes, and mudflats. Look in these areas for a tall slender figure. They stay statue still for great lengths of time while searching for food, making them difficult to spot.

Herons eat fish, frogs, salamanders, water snakes, large insects, mice, small birds or even plant seeds. Eagles, bears, raccoons, vultures, and hawks, prey on young birds and sometimes even the adults.

Great Blue Herons benefit from beavers’ engineering skills. Beavers stop the flow of water by building a dam which creates a pond. This can eventually lead to the creation of a meadow. These ponds and meadows are prime feeding grounds for Great Blue Herons. Learn more at https://www.ealt.ca/species-spotlight-list/heron

Insects more like friends or neighbours, than pests
It has been said that the weight of insects consumed annually by spiders exceeds the weight of the human population of the world. People have a very poor perception of insects and arachnids in our culture. This is unfortunate because all terrestrial ecosystems depend on insects and spiders to work properly.

About 80% of the plants in Edmonton are pollinated by insects so if even the “nuisance insects” were not around, we would be short a lot of plants. Any flying insect that lands in a flower is potentially a pollinator. Things like wasps, flies, and mosquitoes that we may not think of as helpful, do have an important role as a pollinator.

Considering the importance of insects in ecosystems, think of them as friends and neighbours and helpers, rather than pests. Watch YEG urban critters video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDPJIjakXlg

Newsletter helps us fall more in love with this place
Heather writes “Thanks for gathering this information and producing such a wonderful newsletter. It is helping us fall ever more deeply in love with this place in which we live!”

Comment or contribution
If you have a comment, concern, or question, contact us at nsrivervalley@gmail.com Please also email us river valley photos or event information. Your friends, neighbours and colleagues can sign up for this newsletter on our web site.

Sincerely yours,
Harvey Voogd
North Saskatchewan River Valley Conservation Society
780.691.1712

Guest User

September 16, 2021

NSRVCS News - September 16, 2021

Guest User

September 16, 2021

Yellowjackets and wasps here until the first frost
While the hot, dry summer meant fewer pests like mosquitoes in Edmonton, it has created ideal conditions for the worst year for wasps and yellowjackets the city has ever seen. The city does not have exact data on how many of the pests the region sees each year, but pest management coordinator Mike Jenkins says no one can remember a season with more calls to deal with nests on city property.

Most wasp species in the Edmonton area do not construct paper nests and generally do not or cannot sting. Yellowjackets can sting multiple times and are attracted to meats and sweet beverages. They may be inside empty pop cans, poking around in poorly tied garbage bags or in the immediate proximity of fruit trees, especially in the fall.

The peak for these pests is usually mid to late August but expect the populations to continue to grow until at least the first frost. Read more at https://www.edmonton.ca/programs_services/pests/yellowjacket-wasps

Edmonton has one of the world’s last stands of healthy elms
Rows of stately elm trees once proudly lined boulevards across North America. Then, in 1930, a furniture company in Cleveland imported elm logs from England infected with a pathogen known as Dutch elm disease. Millions of elm trees have fallen to the disease, stripping cities of their presence across the continent.

Alberta has almost completely succeeded in keeping out the disease. Efforts led by the Society to Prevent Dutch Elm Disease (STOPDED) mean that the province today counts about 600,000 healthy American elms. Edmonton alone boasts about 80,000 elm trees.

But elm bark beetles, which carry the disease, have been found in our province since 1994. In other areas, disease arrived 3 to 7 years later, which is why the City of Edmonton has invested in a preventative strategy to protect one of the world's last stands of healthy elms.

Be on the lookout for these symptoms of Dutch elm disease: drooping and yellowing leaves in summer, branches with smaller leaves than rest of the tree, branches with no leaves, and brown wilted leaves that remain on the tree. If you suspect disease on any public or private elm tree, please call 311 or email treebugs@edmonton.ca Learn more at https://www.edmonton.ca/programs_services/pests/dutch-elm-disease

Chinese market gardens part of river valley history
In an early map of Fort Edmonton, twice the land is given to cultivation as to all the first four buildings combined. An 1872 traveller remarked that “the same land has been used for the farm for thirty years, without any manure worth speaking of being put on,” which suggests the fertility of the loamy soil.

A series of Chinese gardeners leased land from the J.B. Little Brickworks, north of Riverdale School between 88 and 92 Streets at 101 Avenue. Yet You is remembered for adding gates to the fences for children to walk past “row upon row of lovely cabbages, radishes, lettuce, corn and carrots” as a shortcut to the school.

By 1935, there were fifteen Chinese gardens “strung out along the North Saskatchewan River valley from Beverly in the east to Government House in the west.” An Edmonton Journal commentator enthused about “a veritable Chinese tapestry worked out in rectangles of harmonious greens, sea green, sage green, olive green, and the delicate apple green of lettuce beds.”

Chin Lock’s gardens were on the former site of John Walter’s lumber business. Jung Suey and Gee Gut cultivated the riverfront now occupied by Kinsmen Park. Hong Lee developed Groat Flats until the expansion of Victoria Golf Course and the Groat Bridge.

Hop Sing and another man, remembered as extremely hard workers, operated a huge market garden before and during the war that spanned over six city blocks in Belgravia. Previously, these fields may have served as a Depression relief garden, because the Edmonton Journal reports 35 acres in five communities, 15 acres in Belgravia, cultivated by “work parties of men on relief” in 1933. Read more at https://citymuseumedmonton.ca/2021/07/13/early-market-gardens-in-edmonton/

Thanks for the newsletter
Andrew writes “As always, I'm enjoying the newsletter this morning very much. Thank you for these well written and fascinating treasures.”

Comment on photo
Burns says “I read each of your emails every time you send one. Thank you for that. I thought the picture in your last one was of four Yellow Jackets gathered together. I know there are many wild bees, but I’m not sure about the insects in the picture.”

Editor - Yes those were Yellowjackets. Photo was confusing as it followed a story on bees collecting pollen from Manitoba Maples.

Guest User

September 9, 2021

NSRVCS Newsletter - September 9, 2021

Guest User

September 9, 2021

Cat-faced spider helps balance bug populations, especially mosquitoes
Some think the biggest, scariest looking spider in Edmonton is the Jewel or cat-faced spider. These spiders are orb weavers that appear in late summer and spin large, circular webs seemingly overnight. While many people believe most spiders spin webs, the opposite is true. Webs are very visible, so orb weavers get all the press.

You may find them near porch lights and windows on buildings. These higher traffic areas tend to have more flying insects and often have safe places for egg sacs. This spider is harmless to humans, biting only if their life is threatened, but their bite is very mild. They are not passive to mosquitoes however, and on high skeeter years their webs spring up everywhere. Celebrate every web you see, because Jewel spiders can eat their own weight in bloodsuckers every day.

Cat-faced spiders do have many natural predators. The weirdest predator might be the black and yellow mud dauber wasp. These wasps will sting cat-faced spiders and then use them as part of their construction materials while building their mud nests. Learn more at https://salisburygreenhouse.com/cat-faced-spider/

Edmonton ward Sspomitapi honours the Buffalo Old Man meteorite
Sspomitapi means star person in Blackfoot. This ward name is given in honour of the Buffalo Old Man meteorite that was located within Blackfoot territory. They permitted all tribes to share and perform ceremonies before the meteorite was taken away in 1866.

Methodist missionary George McDougall felt the stone hampered his ability to convert Indigenous people to Christianity. So, he stole it and moved it to his churchyard near Smoky Lake. It sat there for nearly 10 years before he donated it to his alma mater Victoria Methodist College. For almost a century, it remained in Victoria College, which became part of the University of Toronto.

Studies determined the 145-kilogram rock was more than four billion years old. It returned to Alberta in 1972 when the UofT loaned it to the Royal Alberta Museum, and it was renamed the Manitou Stone. In 2002, the UofT transferred stewardship of the stone to the museum.

In Blackfoot cosmology, the sun is the father, and the moon is the mother. There are many stories acknowledging the sky beings which include the stars. Sspomitapi was sent to earth by the creator for the Blackfoot and the bison to have a reciprocal relationship. It is also brought sacred teaching which are still used today. Watch video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmUhuqbGIJY

Learn more about YEG wildlife in less than 2 minutes
A coyote eats around 1,800 mice a year. Additionally, they eat various types of different dead animals that they come across. They provide a cleaning service as they remove these dead animals form the city.

Canada geese can nest in all sorts of different areas. Under the Migratory Birds Convention Act these are federally protected birds, and it is illegal to touch a nest or move their eggs. Watch video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dz8QGgKb-TI

Renaming is not a new practice in Edmonton
Renaming in Edmonton is far from new. Instances that may be well known to Edmontonians are Mayfair Park being renamed Hawrelak Park, or city roads being renamed in recognition of Edmonton Oilers hockey players, part of St. Albert Trail is now called Mark Messier Trail and Capilano Road now bears the name Wayne Gretzky Drive.

While Indigenous place names have long been a part of Edmonton history, the word Saskatchewan derives from the Cree word Kisiskatchewanisipi which means swift-flowing river, renaming has occurred in recent decades, such as replacing the city’s numerical ward designations with Indigenous names, to reflect a renewed appreciation and recognition of local Indigenous communities and history.

This part of history was long sidelined by the settler society that held control of naming places at the official level. Much of the place-naming in Edmonton’s early urban history was the product of its British associations, which certainly reflected the sentiments of the city’s political leadership at the time.

Renaming has occurred for a variety of reasons and with differing motivations. People refer to Edmonton as The River City, The Festival City, and in a cheekier spirit, as Deadmonton. The nickname City of Champions still lingers, despite its formal removal in 2015. Read more at
https://citymuseumedmonton.ca/2021/08/24/place-renaming-in-edmonton-a-constant-in-the-citys-history/

Manitoba Maple tolerates both flooding and drought
Patty writes “Though Manitoba maples are wind pollinated, their pollen is still collected by honeybees and possibly other bees, though I haven’t personally observed them, early in the season. It is an important source of nutrition because they bloom earlier than other flowers. They are usually full of bees around Mother’s Day! Here is a video link of a Manitoba Maple buzzing with bees https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=781607836048419&ref=sharing “