2019-Feb-27
Magnetawan First Nation Lands & Resources Dept. - Guardian of the Bay
What’s your name and what’s your connection to Georgian Bay?
Cory Kozmik, Anthony Laforge, Samantha Noganosh, Chevaun Toulouse. We are the Lands and Resource Department for Magnetawan First Nation, in Britt, Ontario.
Our connection to the Bay is the dense biodiversity that it hosts and the role its ecology plays in our lives, including the environment. It is also where ancestors of the Anishinabek Nation walked and practiced each day what it means to live with the land in reciprocity. The connection to the land and water is sacred to the Anishinaabe culture, and held very close to the communities that inhabit the area.
Why is being a Guardian of the Bay important to you?
We take great pride in being “Guardians” because it is our responsibility to this earth. This earth gave us life and all of the sustenance we require to survive and flourish. With this understanding, we also know that we are responsible to care for and ensure that it remains safe, clean and able to persist and thrive for years to come.
What’s your story that exemplifies the Guardians of the Bay ethic?
Magnetawan First Nation (MFN), like all other Indigenous peoples in our area, are all “Water People”, as rivers, streams, wetlands and lakes were – and still are – highways to our way of living and the health of our water is paramount to our survival. This is reflected in the work we do and the communities we share these values with. Our story is to bring people back to understanding their responsibility to this earth through the way we manage the land and support others in doing the same.
MFN has been conducting road, population and spatial ecology research on reptiles for almost 8 years now to inform mitigations for all land use and development, while also carrying out intensive outreach and education to our community and others. Our program has now grown to study more than just reptiles, as we address climate change, bats, aquatic animals, monarch butterflies, moose and more.
We host an annual conference each year called the Indigenous Lands and Resource Management Conference, that fosters relationships among First Nations, Academia, NGOs, Government and other organizations to discuss and present on a wide variety of topics. We train local contractors on species at risk (SAR) identification and jobsite requirements with regards to SAR.
We also successfully opened our incubation program in 2018, which collected turtle eggs from active construction sites. The hatchlings were incubated and released back into those sites to maintain the population and improve recruitment of local turtle species. We are able to tend to injured turtles as “first responders” to stabilize them for transport to the Ontario Turtle Conservation Centre, among other initiatives.
We believe our initiatives promote good stewardship, conservation, research and education along the Georgian Bay Coast. The work we accomplish on Georgian Bay, alongside our valuable project partners and active community participation, allows us to strengthen the ties the human race has to this earth, while collaboratively improving the way we manage our Biosphere.