Publications

March 15, 2022 Our land offers us beautiful native plants that play a crucial role in our ecosystems. However, urban sprawl, landscaping practices, and forestry activities continue to threaten and fragment their habitats.   A report published in the spring of 2018 by Canada's Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development highlighted the "significant decline" of critical ecosystems, including a major reduction in wetlands, natural prairies (now only a "fraction" of their original size), and deciduous forests. In some regions, more than 90% of these wooded areas have been altered by human activity.1   Yet, when it comes to planning their landscapes,...

February 23, 2022 It was near the sunny wetland that flows into this calm stream where we encountered our painted turtles last summer. This little turtle, the most abundant one in North America, enjoys stagnant waters and slow-moving streams close to land areas where dense vegetation grows. [YouTube Video https://youtu.be/hynmU7VaH2I] Turtles are ectothermic reptiles, meaning their body temperature changes with the surrounding environment. But while you can see painted turtles basking in the sun on rocks or tree trunks in summer, what do they do in winter to avoid freezing? Among our native species, adult turtles hibernate at the bottom...

January 20, 2022 Many native and wild plants, such as anise hyssop or common milkweed, need a period of cold stratification to germinate in spring. In nature, some plants have developed brilliant mechanisms to protect themselves and avoid germinating in the fall before the onset of winter or too early in the spring. These self-seeding plants will remain dormant until the right conditions for germination are present.  As you can imagine, the easiest way to stratify seeds is to plant them in the fall and let nature do the work.  
However, since we often plan our crops and order seeds...