Burkhard Metzger, who is the new director representing the Municipality of Central Huron, Dave Frayne, who is the returning chairman representing the Municipality of South Huron and Perth South; and Mike Tam, new vice-chair representing the Municipality of West Perth took part in the Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority’s annual general meeting recent.

The board of directors of Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA) re-elected Dave Frayne as chair at the Feb. 21 annual meeting and the board elected Mike Tam as vice-chair. Frayne, a councillor with the Municipality of South Huron, represents South Huron and Perth South on the board of the local conservation organization. Tam is a councillor with the Municipality of West Perth and represents that municipality on the board.

The conservation authority also welcomed Burkhard Metzger to the board as the new representative for the Municipality of Central Huron.

Ausable Bayfield Conservation works closely with landowners and residents in the watershed to protect soil, water, and living things by creating awareness and taking positive action together. The local agency is unveiling the new Watershed Report Card, which is released every five years, at the annual Conservation Awards evening on Thursday, March 21. For more information, phone the office at 519-235-2610 or toll-free 1-888-286-2610 or visit abca.on.ca for information.

The Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority is an independent, corporate body established under Ontario’s Conservation Authorities Act. Local municipalities identified the need for such an organization in 1946 to deal with serious problems of flooding, soil erosion, water supply, and water quality. Twelve member municipalities appoint the members of the local board of directors that governs ABCA.

This local conservation agency is the first of 36 conservation authorities formed across Ontario. Ausable Bayfield Conservation’s area encompasses the drainage basins of the Ausable River, Bayfield River, Parkhill Creek, and the gullies that drain directly to Lake Huron, from an area north of Bayfield to an area south of Grand Bend. The 2,440-square-kilometre area of jurisdiction is largely rural with a population of about 45,000. A group of 34 community members met over a 12-month period to create a Conservation Strategy to guide the organization and blaze the trail for a mission and vision for the work in the watershed. Its mission is to protect, improve, conserve, and restore the watershed in partnership with the community and its vision is for healthy watersheds where our needs and the needs of the natural environment are in balance.

Members of the organizing committee, Larry Wein of the Exeter Lions Club and community volunteer Janet Clarke, presented Louise Rether-Kopp with her prize at Morrison Dam Conservation Area east of Exeter on Thursday, Feb. 28.

The Conservation Dinner committee has announced that Louise Rether-Kopp is the winner of the early bird prize, which was drawn on Feb. 25.

The Exeter long-time patron of the Conservation Dinner wins a limited-edition print by popular artist Elisabeth Tonner-Keats. The work of art is called Midday Pause and the framed print is number 168 of 475.

The Conservation Dinner is organized each year by the Exeter Lions Club, Ausable Bayfield Conservation Foundation, and other community members on the dinner committee. The support of businesses, donors, patrons, volunteers, and artists has helped the annual event raise more than $650,000 for local projects in the event’s history which spans almost two and a half decades. The Conservation Dinner supports accessible trails for environmental health and human health, conservation education and recreation opportunities for young people and the young-at-heart, and commemorative woods that improve forest conditions and remember loved ones, among other important local conservation work that could not happen without this kind of public generosity.

The 24th Annual Conservation Dinner takes place Thursday, April 18 at South Huron Recreation Centre in Exeter.

To purchase a ticket, or to donate, phone 519-235-2610 or 1-888-286-2610 or visit online. Tickets are $60 each, with a charitable gift receipt for income tax purposes for $30. The volunteer committee welcomes donations of financial support, art, sports and entertainment memorabilia, crafts and furniture, travel packages, jewelry, and other items.

This year’s event should be very special indeed with Canadian theatre icon Peter Smith, interim artistic director of the Blyth Festival, as the special guest for 2013 and with Goderich artist Madeleine Roske, an acclaimed painter who has five works in the permanent collection of the Huron County Art Bank, creating this year’s feature piece. The gala event also features the dinner, a lively live auction, silent auction, special raffles, general raffles, a ticket for a wine tasting, great fellowship, and much more. Items available for bidding that evening include fine original art, carvings, sports and entertainment memorabilia, jewelry, travel packages, one-of-a-kind items, and much more.

SOUTH HURON – Huron OPP officers are investigating an early morning break, enter and theft that occurred at Country Corners Rent-All located on Main Street South in Exeter.

On Feb. 24, 2013 at approximately 6:15 a.m. thieves pried open a south entry door and left with several snowmobile jackets and pants.

Approximately 20 racing style jackets and four pairs of black snowmobile pants were stolen.  The jacket brand names are Drift Racing, Castle and Arctic Cat.  The total value of the stolen property and damage to the door is estimated at approximately $7,000.

Police believe the suspect vehicle is similar to a GMC Envoy.

Anyone with information is asked to contact the Huron OPP at 1-888-310-1122 or (519) 524-8314.

Should you wish to remain anonymous, you may call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS, where you may be eligible to receive a cash reward of up to $2,000.

STICK TO THE TRAIL

HURON COUNTY - On Feb. 25, 2013 Huron OPP officers attended a farm property located on Saratoga Line to investigate a trespassing complaint.  The property owner reported snowmobilers have been driving off the clearly marked Ontario Federation of Snowmobile Clubs (OFSC) trail onto his private property.  The trespassing snowmobilers caused damage to some newly planted trees along the fence line.

Every winter, Huron OPP receives complaints from property owners who report damage caused by snowmobiles and all-terrain vehicles that venture onto private property.  Huron OPP would like to remind operators to stay on the trail base.  Snowmobilers are urged to use the OFSC trail system for a safe and enjoyable riding experience.  These trails form an extensive Ontario wide network of trails, which are groomed, signed and patrolled.

Snowmobilers must not operate on private property without a property owner’s permission. Violators may be subject to a fine up to $2,000 for trespassing.

SNOWMOBILER RECEIVES WARN RANGE SUSPENSION

CENTRAL HURON – A 46-year-old man from Huron East received a three-day driver’s licence suspension after registering a warn reading on a roadside breath test last Saturday night.  At approximately 11:40 p.m., a Huron OPP officer stopped the driver of a Polaris snowmobile on Huron Street in Clinton.

The officer noted the driver had been drinking alcohol and a roadside test was administered.  The driver provided a breath sample, which registered as a warn range suspension.

Drivers of snowmobiles and all-terrain vehicles are subject to the same drinking and driving laws and penalties as all other drivers of motor vehicles.

The Crown of Thorns is from the 1940s and symbolizes the cross with the crown of thorns from the crucifixion. Jane Egan purchased it at the Christie Antique Show, initially attracted by the colours. “Yellow orange and red don’t usually don’t work together but in this quilt they do because of its graphic appeal and unusual pattern,” she said.

EXETER – Antique dealer Jane Egan has kept an eye out for careful stitching, bold patterns and unique colour combinations to compile a collection of antique quilts over the past four decades.

The owner of Galt House Antiques in Goderich has amassed more than 100 quilts, with half of them coming from Huron County. Over the years, they’ve been harder to find. While she used to buy two good quilts a week at local auctions, she says she is lucky to find one or two quality quilts a year now.

Fifteen of those quilts will be displayed at the second annual Heritage Quilt Exhibit, April 11 to 13, at Trivitt Memorial Anglican Church in Exeter. Admission $6.

Besides the collection, the Heritage Quilt Exhibit will also showcase heirloom needlework with hooked rugs and christening dresses. The heirloom needlework is an added feature this year, with samplers from the 1800s, petit point, tatting, and crochet. Avid collector Margot Kearney, of London, will display some of her favourites.

A tea room, merchant mall and quilt appraisals will be available throughout the three days.

Questions and call to entry forms can be obtained from Michele Haberer at (519) 236-4905 or Bonnie Sitter (519) 235-1909.

Peter Smith

EXETER – The Blyth Festival’s artistic director will share his story with guests at the upcoming Conservation Dinner.

Peter Smith’s artistic success, combined with his lifelong interest in conservation, make him an ideal choice as special guest for the 24th Anniversary Conservation Dinner, said Bob Laye, who is chair of the dinner committee.

Smith is the local theatre’s interim artistic director, replacing Eric Coates in time to choose the 2013 playbill. He was the theatre’s artistic director from 1990 to 1993 and went on to work with other Canadian theatres, and write for television, film, and stage.

Smith has worked in Canadian theatre from coast to coast in his career spanning three decades. He has written for several television series, including The Guard. His screenplay writing includes co-authoring the movies Tripping the Wire and Eight Days to Live. Smith has also written a mystery novel, After the Dying Fall, and is at work on his second book.

Smith grew up with a lifelong “love of story” but his road to a life in professional theatre began at the end of his final year of theatre studies at the University of Victoria. He was asked to play Pat Garrett in a Phoenix Theatre adaptation of Michael Ondaatje’s Governor General’s Award winner, The Collected Works of Billy the Kid: Left-handed Poems. That experience showed him that theatre was his calling and it was the start of a fascinating journey.

It is perhaps fitting that Smith hails from the farming crossroads community of Utopia, just west of Barrie, because he says he is hopeful this generation and future generations can conserve resources and be good stewards of land and water.

“Conservation is really important to me,” he said. Smith’s family farmed in Simcoe County and, he said, a person learns on the farm about the importance of woodlots, preventing soil erosion, and conserving land and water resources.

When asked about the importance of the Blyth Festival, he said, “I think it’s a treasure.”

“It’s different from any other theatre – Blyth is unique – it’s a special place,” he said.

It has been two decades since Smith has lived and worked in Huron County but he said, “I’m inspired, once again, by this community.”

The veteran of Canadian theatre is energized by the upcoming 2013 season at the Blyth Festival as well as the festival’s 40^th anniversary taking place in 2014.

The 2013 Blyth Festival season sees: the return of the smash hit Dear Johnny Deere, running from June 11 to 22; a world première about farm life in modern Huron County, Beyond the Farm Show, directed by Severn Thompson (daughter of the original Theatre Passe Muraille pioneer Paul Thompson, of the original Farm Show), from June 26 to Aug. 16; a musical, Yorkville, rather like Green Acres only in reverse, with two step-dancing country gals going to the Big Smoke, July 3 to Aug. 11; the return of Ted Johns’ hit comedy Garrison’s Garage, which was first performed at Blyth in 1985, playing this summer from July 31 to Aug. 31 and sure to be a fan favourite; and a play with a can’t miss premise inspired by a real-life situation, Prairie Nurse, by Marie Beath Badian, a comedy of errors about two young nurses from the Philippines who arrive in a small rural hospital in the tiny Saskatchewan community of Arborfield where they are courted by the local hockey goaltender who can’t tell them apart, running from Aug. 7 to 31.

The 24th Annual Conservation Dinner takes place Thursday, April 18 at South Huron Recreation Centre in Exeter. To purchase a ticket, or to donate to the charity gala and auction, phone 519-235-2610 or 1-888-286-2610, visit online, or e-mail [email protected]. Tickets are $60 each, with a $30 income tax receipt. The volunteer committee welcomes financial support as well as donations of art, sports and entertainment memorabilia, crafts and furniture, travel packages, jewelry, and other items.

The Conservation Dinner is organized each year by the Exeter Lions Club, Ausable Bayfield Conservation Foundation, and other community members on the dinner committee. The support of businesses, donors, patrons, volunteers, and artists has helped the annual event raise more than $600,000 for local improvements in the event’s history spanning almost two and a half decades. The Conservation Dinner supports accessible trails for environmental health and human health, conservation education and recreation opportunities for young people and the young-at-heart, and commemorative woods that improve forest conditions and remember loved ones, among other important local conservation work that could not happen without this kind of public generosity. The dinner includes a live auction, silent auction, complimentary wine tasting, general raffles, special raffles, and more.

The Conservation Dinner Committee has selected the Early Bird Draw prize print for 2013. The limited-edition print is by popular artist Elisabeth Tonner-Keats and the print is called Midday Pause. It is number 168 of 475. People who purchase their ticket by Feb. 22 will have a chance to have their name selected, in a draw, to win the print. The draw for the print will take place on Monday, Feb. 25.

The 2012 dinner raised $53,664 in net proceeds for accessible trails, conservation education, conservation recreation opportunities for youth, stocking of fish in the Morrison Reservoir for an annual family-friendly fishing derby, commemorative woods, and more.

EXETER – Goderich artist Madeline Roske, well known for oil paintings in bold strokes and vibrant colours, has been named feature artist for this year’s Conservation Dinner.

“We are very honoured to have someone of Madeleine’s talent bring her skills for this year’s event,” said Bob Laye, who is chair of the Conservation Dinner Committee.

Roske has five paintings in the permanent collection of the Huron County Art Bank, a collection of 36 contemporary works by county artists that depict Huron County.

Each year the Conservation Dinner selects an artist to create the feature art as one of the highlights of the live auction portion of the evening.

Roske said it was a “pleasant surprise” and honour to be announced as the 2013 Feature Artist.

“I do care about the earth, and the air and the water, and I think to be associated with the Conservation Dinner is really a good fit,” she said.

Roske was born in Wales and lived in several places in her youth, including stints in Scotland and Montreal, Quebec. She came to Ontario, with her family, as a teenager.

She has enjoyed visual arts her whole life but her painting began to flourish after she became a member of the Goderich Art Club in 1985. She later began to develop her lifelong interest in art as she attended classes at the Southampton School of Art during several summers. The former public health nurse gained a whole new vision of what art can be when she started a two-year art therapy program at the University of Western Ontario in 1989. She saw performance art and the work of new artists with a “totally different view of art” and it expanded her vision of what visual arts could say. Painting has given her a way to “express the joy I feel in nature and my responsiveness to the natural world,” she said.

Painting requires skills and technique but Roske said “there is a part that comes from inside” and the art that people love exhibits “an intangible quality.” She paints with the desire to combine the technical proficiency with the emotional impact that resonates with the viewer. Some art inspires appreciation for the artist’s technical skills, Roske said, and some art (like the work of Rembrandt, for example) can “bring you to tears.” The viewer’s relationship with her paintings is not just what they see, but also what they feel when they see her work and the personal relationship they have with the painting’s story.

Her main artistic medium is oil painting although she has also painted with watercolours and acrylics. Roske finds rich colours even in “the between seasons.” Her themes are diverse but she draws inspiration from the natural surroundings of Huron County, which she has called home since she moved to Goderich in 1976.

“Huron County provides an inexhaustible source of material and it is my privilege to record it,” she said. Her artistic inspiration often happens when something “catches her eye” in her environment, whether it be some flowers, the back of a building, beach scenes, cows in a pastoral setting, or a farmer’s market.

Roske’s paintings can be found throughout Canada and farther afield, including international destinations such as the United States, Hong Kong, and Germany. Her work can be seen at Goderich Co-op Gallery and Artworks etc. in London. For more information on the work of artist Madeleine Roske visit mroske.com

The Conservation Dinner is organized each year by the Exeter Lions Club, Ausable Bayfield Conservation Foundation, and other community members on the dinner committee. The support of businesses, donors, patrons, volunteers, and artists has helped the annual event raise more than $600,000 for local improvements in the event’s history spanning almost two and a half decades. The Conservation Dinner supports accessible trails for environmental health and human health, conservation education and recreation opportunities for young people and the young-at-heart, and commemorative woods that improve forest conditions and remember loved ones, among other important local conservation work that could not happen without this kind of public generosity.

The 24th Annual Conservation Dinner takes place Thursday, April 18, 2013 at South Huron Recreation Centre in Exeter. To purchase a ticket or to donate to the charity gala, please phone 519-235-2610 or 1-888-286-2610, visit conservationdinner.com, or e-mail [email protected]. Tickets, $60, include a $30 charitable gift receipt for income tax purposes. The volunteer committee welcomes financial support as well as donations of art, sports and entertainment memorabilia, crafts and furniture, travel packages, jewelry, and other items.

The Conservation Dinner Committee has selected the Early Bird Draw prize print for 2013. The limited-edition print is by popular artist Elisabeth Tonner-Keats and the print is called Midday Pause. It is number 168 of 475. Organizers say the chance to win this beautiful print is an extra incentive to buy a ticket early for the gala dinner and auction. People who purchase their ticket by Feb. 22 will have a chance to have their name selected, in a draw, to win the print. The draw for the print will take place on Monday, Feb. 25.

The Conservation Dinner Committee will have a big job to do this year trying to match the previous year’s record-breaking total. The 2012 dinner raised $53,664 in net proceeds for accessible trails, conservation education, conservation recreation opportunities for youth, stocking of fish in the Morrison Reservoir for an annual family-friendly fishing derby, commemorative woods, and more.

Photo courtesy of South Huron Chamber of Commerce. For more information, visit its website.

Sandy Simpson couldn’t believe his eyes when a white squirrel streaked across his lawn and disappeared into the bushes.

After all, while white squirrels are common to parts of Canada and the U.S., it’s a rare sighting in Scotland. It became the subject of the member of the Polmont Horticultural Society’s column for the Falkirk Herald today. In his column entitled Sandy’s Garden … The White Nutcracker, he shares with readers that Exeter, Ont. competes for the title of Home of the White Squirrel with: Olney, Illinois; Marionville, Missouri; Brevard, North Carolina; and Kenton, Tennessee.

“Like the white rabbit’s first appearance in Alice in Wonderland, it ran across the garden and disappeared into bushes, out of sight almost as soon as I caught a glimpse of it,” he writes, before outlining the differences between albino squirrels and white squirrels, and clearing up a few misconceptions about the critters.

To read his full column, please visit the Falkirk Herald’s website.

Bruce Hodge, president of the Exeter Lions Club, and Bob Laye, chair of the Conservation Dinner Committee, hold the limited-edition print Midday Pause, by artist Elisabeth Tonner-Keats.

SOUTH HURON – A limited-edition print by artist Elisabeth Tonner-Keats that captures the scene of a calm day on the river is this year’s prize in the early bird draw of the Conservation Dinner.

Midday Pause, print number 168 of 475, is offered as incentive to buy a ticket before Feb. 22 for the gala dinner and auction. Draw for the print will take place on Monday, Feb. 25. The 24th Annual Conservation Dinner takes place Thursday, April 18, 2013 at South Huron Recreation Centre in Exeter.

The Conservation Dinner is organized each year by the Exeter Lions Club, Ausable Bayfield Conservation Foundation, and other community members on the dinner committee. The support of businesses, donors, patrons, volunteers, and artists has helped the annual event raise more than $600,000 for local projects in the event’s history, which extends well past two decades. The Conservation Dinner supports accessible trails for environmental health and human health, conservation education and recreation opportunities for young people and the young-at-heart, and commemorative woods that improve forest conditions and remember loved ones, among other important local conservation work that could not happen without this kind of public generosity.

The gala event features a well-known special guest, an accomplished feature artist, live auction, silent auction, special raffles, general raffles, dinner, ticket for a wine tasting, and more.

Items available for bidding that evening include fine original art, carvings, sports and entertainment memorabilia, jewelry, travel packages and more.

To purchase a ticket, or to donate to the charity gala, phone 519-235-2610 or 1-888-286-2610 or visit online. Tickets are $60 each, with a $30 charitable gift receipt issued for income tax purposes. The volunteer committee welcomes donations of financial support, art, sports and entertainment memorabilia, crafts and furniture, travel packages, jewelry and other items.

Ian Jean. File photo.

SOUTH HURON – Local landowners in the Ausable Bayfield watersheds are invited to order spring trees.

Property owners are now ordering trees for planting on marginal land and as windbreaks or watercourse buffers and to reforest sloping banks. Trees provide a variety of benefits including reducing heating and cooling costs, preventing soil erosion, improving the look of a property, and marking property boundaries. Ontario studies have shown increases in yields for field crops buffered by windbreaks. Trees along watercourses improve water quality and provide wildlife habitat and travel corridors.

Many local property owners are taking positive action by taking part, said Ian Jean, who is Ausable Bayfield Conservation’s forestry and land stewardship specialist.

“Local landowners are improving the health of the watershed by planting trees,” he said.  “We could not plant tens of thousands of trees every year without their cooperation and their interest in planting trees on their land.”

Landowners in those watersheds purchased and planted about 13,000 trees through last year’s spring tree orders. Their work helped Ausable Bayfield Conservation’s spring tree planting program plant a total of 61,000 trees.

Grants are available for some projects.

“Funding is available for many projects and depending on size and location, half or even all of the cash costs may be repaid through grants,” Jean said. The federal and provincial governments offer some cost-share programs and in some counties, such as Huron County, a Clean Water Project provides grants.

People are encouraged to call Jean at 519-235-2610 or toll-free 1-888-286-2610 to find out more about grants, about spring tree planting orders, or for advice on planting the right kind of tree on the right site.

The conservation authority has announced that 2013 spring tree orders have started and people are already taking part. Residents can mail in tree orders by the end of January, or make over-the-counter orders by the end of February. (Payment of all orders is due by Feb. 28, 2013). The spring tree order form, and more information, is available online  or by phoning 519-235-2610 or toll-free 1-888-286-2610.

Tree planting for windbreaks can reduce wind-caused erosion. “Topsoil is a very valuable resource,” Jean said. “We had two big windstorms last spring that reminded us how quickly it can be lost.”

Ausable Bayfield residents can order several kinds of tree species through the spring tree program. Species include Norway spruce, white spruce, white cedar, white pine, tamarack, silver maple, red oak, bur oak, black walnut, black cherry, sycamore, tulip tree, red osier dogwood, staghorn sumac, nannyberry viburnum, Austrian pine, serviceberry, autumn blaze, sugar maple and highbush cranberry.

Bonnie Sitter holds a photo of an elm tree she fondly calls The Grand Old Lady.

HEATHER BOA Bullet News HENSALL – A victorious battle that saved a string of elm trees along Hwy. 4 near Hensall from destruction has proven to activist Bonnie Sitter there is power in the people.

Nearly two years after the Ministry of Transportation (MTO) marked five trees for removal because they stood too close to the highway for public safety, it has relented to a local campaign led by Sitter to save the trees. In a letter dated Nov. 29, the ministry acknowledged that four trees would remain while one would be removed because it was not healthy.

“To me it shows that if somebody offers leadership and people say ‘I like that idea, I’m going to help’ then there is power in the people,” she said. “It wasn’t just Bonnie that did it. It was teamwork.”

Sitter first realized the MTO had plans for the trees, two of which are estimated to be more than 125 years old, while heading out for a cross-country ski in early 2011. She was shocked to see the trees were marked for removal, and vowed they wouldn’t go without a fight. By March, she had convinced the ministry to commission the University of Guelph to complete a summer health study of the trees.

“We fought hard enough that they agreed these trees would be assessed,” Sitter said.

In April 2012, the findings were delivered: four of the trees were healthy and one that was unhealthy would need to be removed. However, it also slated a healthy tree for removal, saying it stood too close to the road.

“If it’s finished its life, that’s fine, I don’t mind it being taken down. My protest was taking down this tree, which was at least 125 years old and healthy,” she said, noting research shows that trees contribute $162,000 worth of ecological value to the planet for every 50 years of their life.

When she discovered a healthy tree would be removed, she gathered her supporters, wrapped a banner with her phone number around the tree, relaunched a Facebook site, began a petition, started a letter writing campaign, and contacted media and her local MPP.

“If the tree is healthy and it’s stood there for 125 years and it survived the wind storms and the snow storms and the ice storms and everything else, I think it deserves to live.

The tree works for us every day and asks nothing in return but to be left alone,” she said.

She said trees shouldn’t be removed because drivers on the 80-km/h straight stretch of road risk leaving the roadway as a result of speed or inattention.