Random Access

If you read The Toronto Star this morning, you’ll see an alarming article about yet another invasive species that is about to put us back on our heels.
The round goby fish, which has been devastating the Great Lakes for years, has found its way into Lake Simcoe and threatens the native gaming fish there and, by extension, the sport fishing industry that relies on those fish.
It’s just another in the long line of invasive insects and plants that seem to be turning our landscape into a horror movie that is, unfortunately, a reality show.
Dutch Elm Disease. Inchworms. Garlic Mustard. Leafy spurge. Zebra Mussels. Gypsy Moths. Asian Longhorned Beetles (does that include Sean Lennon?) Even killer algae a couple of weeks ago.
In this sea of depressing assaults, there are actually are some good news stories on the Invasion of Our Environment Snatchers front.
One of them is here in Mississauga where a program to use bugs that naturally feed on the beautiful, but bedevilling, purple loosestrife has shown some remarkable success.
Purple loosestrife is an extremely aggressive plant that, if left to its own devices, would choke out our native plants and leave a sterile monoculture.
It wasn’t that many years ago that Rattray Marsh, the natural treasure trove of birds and plants that is the only coastal wetland from Oshawa to Hamilton, was taking on a decidedly mood indigo.
Credit Valley Conservation and the City of Mississauga expropriated the land in the mid-1970s after the gentle veterinarian Dr. Ruth Hussey led a long public campaign for acquisition. (A memorial stone at one of Rattray’s entrances said it best — “Ruth Hussey Because of Her, Rattray Marsh is Ours.”)
Hussey’s spiritual descendants, the dedicated souls of the Rattray Marsh Protection Association, pulled loosestrife by hand but it was only when scientists started importing beetles from Europe that were the natural enemies of the plant that real progress was made.
An initial “seeding” of the bugs in the marsh in the 90s didn’t seem to take hold but a second one did.
“It’s now come under very good control,” says Bob Morris, the long-time CVC employee who is now its aquatic biologist. “At one time, we were used to seeing seas of purple and you still see the odd plant. But nothing like the way it was invading. The beetles really worked out great.”
Morris and the CVC are now preparing to embark on an overhaul of the environmentally sensitive area to see if they can restore it to its former glory. Cattails, reed grass, carp, siltation, changing flooding patterns and upstream development have all changed its character to the extent that some of the plants and species that once made it so special seem to be disappearing.
As that challenging exercise begins, it’s instructive to remember that you can sometimes save Mother Nature from herself — as long as you understand and play by her rules.