ALGONQUIN DEFINING MOMENTS

Episode 45: Chat with Dr. John and Mary Theberge  -  What Good is a  Wolf? Part VI   In this, the final episode of my six-part series on wolf research in Algonquin Park, I have the pleasure of chatting with long-time wolf researchers Dr. John and Mary Theberge. Today we talk about their sense of where things are at these days regarding the plight of wolves both in Ontario, British Columbia, and th...

Episode 44: Dr. John Benson's Algonquin Wolf Research  2007-2011 (What Good is a Wolf Part V) In this episode, (Part V of a six-part series on wolf research in Algonquin Park), I chat with Dr. John Benson, who picked up the Algonquin Park wolf research baton in 2007, as part of his PhD studies at Trent University. Much of John’s work focused on taking a look at wolf-coyote hybridization and its im...

Episode  43: What Good is a Wolf PT4  - More of John and Mary Theberge's Great Leap Research This episode continues by sharing the 1987-1999 work of Dr. John Theberge and his wife Mary Theberge. In this episode, I’m going to focus on the uncovering of the annual deer migration and the collective freak-out that this caused amongst the people of the Round Lake area, the Ministry officials, the Thebe...

Episode 42:What Good is a Wolf  PT3 -  John and Mary Theberge's Great Leap This episode focuses on the  1987-1999 groundbreaking work of Dr. John Theberge and Mary Theberge. A student of Douglas Pimlott in the 1960s, John Theberge was a professor and researcher in the Faculty of Environmental Studies, University of Waterloo, from 1972 until his retirement in 2000. His initial interest in wolves in...

Episode 41:Remembering Dan Gibson's Wings in the  Wildeness In the mid 1970s Dan Gibson award winning wildlife film maker, sound recording artist, inventor of the Dan Gibson Sound Parabola recoding device, founder of Dan Gibson’s Solitudes music label, Juno award winner and a recipient of the Order of Canada decided to venture into doing a  feature length film. Filmed on Canoe Lake during the summ...

Episode 40: Remembering Dan Gibson - Nature Film Maker Extraordinaire In this episode Holly Gibson Stewart, one of my long-time Canoe Lake friends, joins me in sharing stories of her father, Dan Gibson, and her perspectives about his extraordinary film and music career. One of the key founding members of Pimlott’s Algonquin Wildlands League in the 1970s, Dan Gibson was a Taylor Statten Camps Camp...

Episode 39: What Good is a Wolf? PT2 More of Pimlott's Myth Busting In this episode, I share more o Douglas Pimlott and his researcher's ground-breaking and myth busting research on the wolves of Algonquin Park.  Topics of interest include details as to how wolves move, what they eat, how they establish territory and of course wolf vocalization and the history of Algonquin's premier public wolf ho...

Episode 38: What Good is  a  Wolf! Pimlott's Early  Myth Busting This episode is the first of a series on the Algonquin Park wolf research that began with Douglas Pimlott's early work from 1958-1962. Prior to that time, Algonquin Park wolves had mostly been seen as vermin out to destroy all other Park wildlife.  This episode's musical interlude comes from Dan Gibson's Solitudes Algonquin Suite and...

Episode 37: Lake Water Rising Part 2: The Gilmour Tramway   In this second of two episodes on the Gilmour great misadventure, I focus on Gilmour’s great tramway adventure. where the company tried to haul and float logs from the Algonquin Park Highlands to  Trenton. On a completely different river system and uphill for a fair amount of it, the adventure was an engineering marvel but a practical dis...

Episode 36: As I noted in the last episode one of the really interesting aspects of Chief Ranger Peter Thomson’s first Algonquin Park report, was the almost nonchalant way he described the fact that the newly constructed dam at Tea Lake was expected to raise the water level by nearly four feet.  In this first of two episodes on the Gilmour's great lumbering misadventure, I wanted to give you a sen...

Episode 35: Algonquin’s Early Beginnings: The first Official Canoe Trips Summer-Fall 1893 In 1893 the Algonquin National Park Act was passed and soon after Peter Thomson was appointed Chief Ranger. In this episode I share his first report of his activities in the summer of 1893. As well is another provided by Mr. James Wilson Superintendent of Queen Victoria Niagara Falls Park who was asked to tou...

Episode 34:  The Amazing World of the Canada Jay Ever since I was a child, I’ve been enamoured by what my family used to call Whiskey Jacks - now called Canada Jays. I and my brothers would sit on our front deck holding our hands out whilst these little gray darlings would come and, with a little coaxing, take pieces of bread and other goodies from our hands. In this episode, I am joined by Dan St...

Episode 33: More Fish Fun Facts and Harkness Fisheries Lab Research Gems In this episode I'll continue my journey through the world of fisheries research in Algonquin  and hope to bring to life some of the really interesting and fun fish facts that I've been able to ascertain. Also of course, introduce you  to a few  more  of the Fisheries researchers and  there work.  This episodes musical interl...

Episode 32: Fish-Fish and More Fish: Early Years of the Harkness Fisheries Lab Not being that into angling, except when my twins were young and fishing off of our Canoe Lake dock a regular pass time, it's been seriously enlightening to learn all about the Harkness Laboratory for Fisheries Research on Lake Opeongo. This is the first of two episodes that explores the history of fisheries research in...

Episode 31: More Cool Algonquin Wildlife Station Research This concludes a 3-part series on the history and research that is going on at the Wildlife Research Station. My focus in this episode is more recent work on moose, salamanders, Canada Jays, hemlock tree regeneration, sapsuckers and beaver as well as another wonderful collection of Wildlife Research Fun Facts. This episode’s musical interlu...

Episode 30: The Wildlife Research Station In this episode I’m going to focus on a number of really interesting research projects that have been going on – some for many, many decades and along with more stories of the researchers and their experiences. A Big shout-out to Patrick Moldowan, the Station's Communications Director who has been an incredible partner. Not only did he make sure that I was...

Episode 29: The Wildlife Research Station - The Early Years Park Superintendent Frank MacDougall was the force behind much of the early efforts to increase public awareness of the importance of ecology and to do so on a scientific basis.  After the success of the Harkness Laboratory for Fisheries, in 1944, he pushed for the establishment of a Wildlife Research Station that would focus on terrestri...

Episode 28: Don Lloyd, Algonquin's Renaissance Man - an Interview with grandson Mathew  Thivierge   Don Lloyd, who died in 2013, is I think the closest that Algonquin Park has come, to creating a true Algonquin Park Renaissance man.   Don wasn’t just an Algonquin Park wildlife and landscape illustrator, he also turns out to have been also been a geography teacher, a receiver of a Bachelors, Master...

Nature interpretation activities have been part of the Algonquin Park experience for a long time. In this episode, I’ll take you down memory lane and share with you the origins of what used to be called the Algonquin Park Interpretive Program, now called the Discovery Program, and introduce you to some of the incredible people who made it all possible. Note that the sources for much of this conten...

Episode 26: Wilderness Adventurers Part III In this episode, I’ll be continuing my recollections of some of the wilderness  adventurers who settled  on leaseholds in Algonquin  Park in the early  20th Century. Here I'll be introducing you to a few more interesting characters who became the heart and soul for the leasehold community.  Virtually all of the stories I share, come from two of my books...

Episode 25: Interview with Wilderness Adventurer Sandy Lewis In the last episode I shared some of the origin stories of a few Algonquin Wilderness Adventurers whose ancestors, some as many as five generations back, were invited by the Ontario Government to lease small plots of land on a specific set of Algonquin Park lakes and build summer cabins.  In this episode I’m thrilled to be chatting with...

Episode 24: Early 20thC Wilderness Adventurers Part 1: In this episode I bring to share with you some of the stories of another  part of the Algonquin Park community - those whose ancestors – some, as many as five generations back, were invited by the Ontario Government to lease small plots of land on a specific set of lakes and build summer cabins. The belief then was that visitors wouldn't come...

Episode  23: Caretaking in the Bush - the Hamilton-Haskin Family Experience In this final episode on the lives of full time Algonquin Park residents, I wanted to share with you stories that I’ve collected from the Hamilton-Haskin family from Madawaska. The family’s original matriarch and patriarch, Wilmot and Victoria Hamilton lived just outside the eastern boundary of Algonquin Park from 1897 to...

Episode 22: Bring on the Fall Colours In this episode I've shifted my focus a bit and have decided to concentrate on the most spectacular of Algonquin Defining Moments, ‘The Fall Colours', which are taking place as they do every year around this time.  First I’ll share some interesting facts about what the fall colour process is all about from a scientific perspective, then I talk about some inter...

Episode 21: More Stories of Algonquin Park Full Time Residents In this episode I continue my sharing of stories that I have collected about the lives of Algonquin Park full time residents. First are stories about the The Dufonds and Dennison’s who farmed in the area before it became a provincial park. Then are some  amusing anecdotes from Robert Taylor about his grandfather William McCourt who was...