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Paid Youth Internship – Spring Break – Apply NOW

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We are so excited to invite youth aged 15 to 20 to apply for a paid restoration internship this Spring Break!

From March 21st to 25th at Bright Angel Park, youth will gain valuable work experience in ecological restoration techniques that will help propel them into employment fields such as Environmental Sciences, Biology, and Ecology. Each 5-hour day will be a mix of invasive species removal, native species planting, and daily Lunch-and-Learns where they will be mentored by local experts.

Position: Restoration Intern
Organization: Cowichan Estuary Nature Centre
Location: Bright Angel Park

Compensation: $18/hr

Hours: 9:00am-2:00pm (27 hrs total)

Position Type: Temporary, March 21st to 25th, 2022 (with paid 2hr orientation Friday, March 18th)

Application Deadline: March 11, 2022

Skills gained:

  • Invasive species identification and removal techniques
  • Native species identification and planting procedures
  • Ecological restoration techniques and theory
  • Daily Lunch-and-Learn workshops from local experts
  • Restoration monitoring and surveying skills
  • Valuable work experience to help propel you into a related field

Skills/Qualifications needed:

  • Enthusiasm for environmental restoration
  • Strong work ethic
  • Ability to perform physical duties of the job in all outdoor weather conditions
  • Leadership skills
  • Excitement to learn
  • Youth aged 15-20

What you’ll bring

  • Snacks/Lunch for the day
  • Your all weather clothing

To Apply:

Email us your resume to restoration@cowichanestuary.ca by March 11th, 2022

Big Huy ch q’u (Thank you) to our collaborator, Cowichan Watershed Board and partners.

“Luschiim’s Plants” Indigenous Plant Talk & Book Signing Oct 3rd, 3pm

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Join us October 3rd at 3pm outside on the lawn under the tent at the Nature Centre for an Indigenous Plant Talk & Book signing, with authors Quw’utsun Elder Luschiim Arvid Charlie and local ethnobotanist Nancy Turner, and a chance to purchase a signed copy of their gorgeous new book “Luschiim’s Plants”.

More info and a place to sign up and reserve a spot at https://www.facebook.com/events/1297594733992642

 

We are hiring a Restoration Coordinator/Educator!

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HALF-TIME RESTORATION COORDINATOR/EDUCATOR – WE ARE HIRING!

Are you experienced in restoration and teaching children and youth in grades 5-12 and beyond? We are looking for an inspiring Restoration Coordinator/Educator to join our team! Join us and get a chance to delve into an amazing community doing great work here in the Cowichan Valley.

Job Title: Cowichan Estuary Nature Centre Restoration Coordinator/Educator

Hours: 18 hours a week (can vary from week to week)

The restoration season tends to be Sept-Oct and February-May with school programming in development for November and March See:  https://www.cowichanestuary.ca/programs/school-programs/

Rate: starting $20/hr.

Start Date: September 2021 (2022 funding for this contract position is dependent on grant applications in process)

Program Description: Our “Youth Watershed Conservation and Restoration Program for a Climate Resilient Future” engages youth in the  Cowichan Valley in learning about conserving and protecting local watersheds and building climate resilience in the Cowichan Valley through hands-on riparian restoration, school programs, leadership training, educational workshops, awareness-­raising activities, and effective hands­-on water conservation and restoration projects especially focused on the Cowichan and Koksilah Watersheds that converge at the Cowichan Estuary.  Program for upper grades includes monitoring the success of plantings to see measurable results.

Job Description: The CENC Restoration Education Coordinator will create on-the-ground conservation and restoration programs working in collaboration with CVRD Parks and local conservation partners, deliver school programs, community workshops and water conservation and restoration action days, do program communications and outreach, support students and volunteers, and track data to measure project success.  This program is flexible, with room for creativity and to make it your own!

For the full job description click Restoration Coordinator/Educator Job Description 2021

How to Apply: 

Email your resume and references to Amy Clinton-Baker (coordinator) at amy@cowichanestuary.ca with subject heading: Nature Centre Educator 2021. Applications close midnight September 30th.

Thank all those who apply for your interest in our organization!

Drip Irrigation Workshop in the Koksilah Watershed – July 24th, 9am – 1pm

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Hands-on DRIP IRRIGATION WORKSHOP – Back by popular demand!
We are going to build a drip irrigation system from the ground up in the Koksilah Watershed!
Saturday, July 24th, – 9 am -1pm
Ages: Adults and Youth 15 and up. The workshop is limited to 15 people so we can effectively social distance for the full workshop.
Register for your spot soon!
This 1-day workshop will support you to learn or refine skills in building a drip irrigation system. Permaculture expert, Jason Greenwood from Greenwood Earthcare, will lead us in building a drip irrigation water system together to learn the skills to each build our own in our own backyards. Drip irrigation saves you money, time and most of all water, which is a scarce resource here in our Valley in the summer months when gardening!  Water-saving gardening also means gardening without guilt, because you can be confident you are protecting our aquifers and salmon bearing streams. Jason is a Permaculture Designer, Earth Care Provider & teacher with lots of experience with drip irrigation systems and he’s passionate about re-connecting people with the power of nature and plant allies.
Cost: free – you donations are gratefully accepted. Our goal is to help you be a watershed warrior and conserve water without barriers!
Closer to the event you will be sent the details of the workshop location in the Koksilah Watershed near Bright Angel Park. The workshop is outside, so bring your hat, sunscreen and/or rain gear and dress for the weather.
TICKETS: https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/drip-irrigation-workshop-grow-your-own-food-save-water-money-tickets-161245273955

2020 Volunteer of the Year Award

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2020 Volunteer of the Year Award

We are proud to give our Volunteer of the Year Award for 2020 to Stephen Bishop who we thank for consistently helping us through Covid closures, with school groups and the care and maintenance of our touch tank.  We thank him for building our fantastic display board in the Centre and for bringing in nature themed cards to raise funds for our work. Thanks Stephen, we appreciate you!

Restoration Workshop with Dave Polster

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Do you want to help restore wild spaces? To feel a part of nature, your community and make a difference? Join us for a 1.5 day workshop.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Workshop Details:

Where?

Day 1 online, using Zoom, focusing on theory (1-5pm) *sounds long but Dave’s presentation is very engaging and there will be a break midway through!*

Day 2 will be spent in the field  (9-3pm)

ALL AGES. minors 16 and under must be accompanied by a parent/guardian.

This is a 1.5 day workshop to learn and refine skills in the field of Ecological Restoration. By renewing and restoring degraded, damaged, or destroyed ecosystems and habitats in the environment we will work as a group to learn the skills and transfer them into key techniques out in the field.

The goal is to bring together people who are already working in the field of restoration or are excited to learn more about it. No experience is necessary for this course.

The first day will be spent on Zoom setting the context. The second day we will travel to a field site (likely Stoltz Bluffs – but TBD) and take part in learning some key bioengineering techniques to enhance the success of restoration projects.

Our teacher, David Polster, is a plant ecologist with over 35 years of experience in vegetation studies, reclamation and invasive species management. He graduated from the University of Victoria with an Honours Bachelor of Science degree in 1975 and a Master of Science degree in 1977. He has developed a wide variety of reclamation techniques for mines, industrial developments and steep/unstable slopes as well as techniques for the re-establishment of riparian and aquatic habitats. He has authored numerous papers and teaches graduate level courses on these topics.

 

Cost: $89 per person (includes Dave’s restoration workbook)

 

REGISTER HERE 

Remembering Eric Marshall

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Eric on weekly rounds with the Swan & Goose counters – photo Derrick Marven

Eric Marshall lived his life in service to community and the natural world, with a deep knowledge and love of creatures large and small, from the tiniest nudibranch and all things aquatic in the Cowichan Estuary, to birds of all kinds and the giant Humpback Whales that travel up and down our west coast waters. He had a great gift for sharing his knowledge and love with others, to the special delight of children at our touch tank. This love of the natural world was a love he also shared with his wife Dorothy, his long-time partner in his life’s adventures. We celebrated Eric’s 90th Birthday at the Centre on October 25, 2020 and on December 17th he left us. Eric, thank-you for your gifts. We miss you. It is hard to even begin to say how much.

Eric grew up in England. A natural scientist and archivist, he was recruited to come to Winnipeg to create the world-class scientific research collection that bore his name: the Eric Marshall Aquatic Research Library at the Freshwater Institute on the University of Manitoba campus. It was one of seven regional Department of Fisheries and Oceans libraries lost to Ottawa’s cost-cutting in 2013 – a terrible blow not just to Eric, but to the scientific community. The sign from the library, retrieved by his son and brought to Cowichan Bay, was one of the artifacts from his life on display at Eric’s birthday celebration. Eric was our diligent Cowichan Estuary Nature Centre science librarian since we began in 2012.
Eric and Dorothy moved to Cowichan Bay in August 1996. Visiting the floating Marine Ecology Station in Cowichan Bay was early on Eric’s list. As Eric told it, Marine Biologist Bill Austen greeted him and said, “Great to have you as a volunteer – I’m would like to go to a sponge conference in Australia and you can look after the Station while I’m away!” Eric became Treasurer for the Station and when the Station moved to Sidney in 2001, he went with Bill in his boat as it was towed there. He stayed on as Treasurer for a couple of years as the old Board handed over the running of the station to a new one.
When the Cowichan Estuary Nature Centre opened in 2012, we were delighted when Eric volunteered his services and joined our Operations Committee. When we became a separate charitable society, Eric was elected to the Board and served as Vice Chair until his death. Eric was a dedicated volunteer docent and teacher at our fresh and salt water aquaria and touch tank, much loved by visitors of all ages, including our many school groups. He took amazing photographs of the animals and plants in the tanks, labelled and put them in a binder which remains a wonderful resource, with those creatures currently in the tanks at the front of the binder and photos of others at the back, ready to bring forward when a new specimen is added. Ever the meticulous science librarian, Eric also prepared notes on each of these creatures to support other volunteers in providing information to visitors. While he was at the touch tank, his wife Dorothy could often be found on the viewing platform with school groups looking at the birds on the Bay, with notes prepared by Eric to assist her in expanding on the life history of our local birds, along with a long piece of cord with key tags marking the wing spans of common birds that Eric prepared to provide a better idea of their sizes. Eric was both our Estuary Nature Centre librarian and a keen photographer for us and for the many other groups of which Eric was a part. Many of his beautiful photos can be found here on our website. We honoured Eric and Dorothy together as volunteers of the year in 2016.
Eric was a member of the Cowichan Valley Naturalists’ Society (CVNS) since arriving in the Valley. He worked with DFO on surveys of juvenile salmonids in the Bay for a number of years, hauling in the seine net while DFO staff counted the fish in the net. Eric was also a regular on the Valley’s November to March weekly swan and goose counts, soon expanded to include raptors, as well as at the Birds Canada waterbird counts taking place monthly from the south shore of Cowichan Bay. In the winter he also made monthly counts of beached birds on the south side of the Bay for Birds Canada and previously, as a volunteer with DFO’s Cetacean Watch, was called out to check beached seal or sea lion bodies washed up in the Bay. In 1997 he became secretary of the CVNS, served as president from 2004-2019, and edited the CVNS newsletter. He represented the Naturalists on the Cowichan Stewardship Round Table, served on the Board of the Somenos Marsh Wildlife Society and on an advisory committee for the Cowichan Watershed Board. Eric became a CVNS honorary life member in 2019. In 2019 he also took on the role of “caretaker” for the Cowichan Estuary’s Internationally recognized Important Bird Area.

 

Humpback Whale photo by Eric Marshall

Between 2005 and 2008 Eric and Dorothy spent time each winter in Hawaii working with a humpback whale research team based on Maui monitoring the comeback of the previously endangered humpback whales. The many photographs Eric took of humpback whale tails were added to the Happywhale database and he would regularly receive notices from the system telling him where his whales were seen. Most spend the summer months feeding in Alaska, although three headed to Kamchatka one summer to feed. One of the whales he and Dorothy saw in Hawaii was regularly seen feeding in Alaska and one summer decided to head south to Mexico for a change. Eric provided many informative talks throughout the Valley on the Humpback Comeback.

 

Prior to coming to Canada Eric took part in many amateur dramatic performances. Locally he was part of a CBC reading of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol at the Cowichan Theatre, as one of those acting out the story on the stage as it was read, and won prizes for his poetry readings at the Cobble Hill Fair. Eric and Dorothy regularly attended Duncan United Church where Eric was an occasional lay reader, deliverer of “The address to the haggis” at the Robby Burns Night dinner and a reader in the Church’s reading of A Christmas Carol. Eric, along with Dorothy, was also a member and volunteer with the Cowichan Historical Society, the Chemainus Theatre, the Cowichan Theatre, the local Friends of the Library Society, and was a teacher/presenter for Elder College, as well as a member of the Elder College Advisory Committee.

Eric receiving his Simple Generosity Award on behalf of the CENC
Eric was a good, kind and generous human being and will be greatly missed.

Honouring Eric Marshall’s 90th Birthday!

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The Cowichan Estuary Nature Centre is proud to honour Eric Marshall in the event of his 90th birthday!

We are hosting a drop-in birthday “party” at the Nature Centre to celebrate a lifetime of dedication to nature and community. Come and drop by to speak with Eric and Dorothy, view a slideshow of images from his adventures and community work and tour the Nature Centre.

In lieu of gifts Eric is asking that you consider making a donation to the Cowichan Estuary Nature Centre. Click the link below to be redirected to our Canada Helps donation Page.  On behalf of Eric and the Nature Centre, thank you for your donation.

Donate to Eric’s 90th Restoration and Nature Education Fund

We look forward to seeing you here!