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This is a multipart message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_0029_01D156AA.FD04BBF0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Excellent points, Bev and Donna. I, too, am amazed at the political influe= nce enjoyed by ATV=E2=80=99ers. I also agree that there are more than enou= gh trails already in existence. This pragmatist suspects that we might be more effective if we agreed with = the =E2=80=9Cgood guys=E2=80=9D in the ATV fraternity that the =E2=80=9Ceej= its=E2=80=9D are a problem for all of us, and encourage them to feel an obl= igation to help deal with the problem. Said encouragement may be something= that may gain more traction with government. Just thinking out loud. Another possible lesson: TREPA owns a piece of land on a lake which harbou= rs a number of Atlantic Coastal Plains flora, including a respectable growt= h of Plymouth gentian. An old trail allows vehicular access to the lakesh= ore, and gets used, despite discouraging words from us. The shoreline is a= lso accessible from crossing an adjacent stream. (I know, I know, but who= =E2=80=99s gonna stop the eejits? This is a remote place) Anyway, a series of concrete blocks, placed near the shore in 2007, discou= raged access for a little while, but things deteriorated, and by 2014, a la= rge chunk of the shoreline was seriously chewed up. Enter DNR and MTRI, who did a rare plant survey in the area in 2014, and we= re appalled at the damage. On the advice of DNR, we posted the land (one e= xtra offence if we had trespassing), and agreed that DNR could set up camer= as wherever they saw fit. Said cameras caught three interlopers crossing t= he stream and not wearing helmets, and my recollection is that the provinci= al coffers increased by $3,600, as a result. The incursions we had last year were much more modest. Let=E2=80=99s see h= ow 2016 goes, but DNR is welcome to put up those cameras on the nature rese= rve any time they want! My conclusion: Video cameras are a great way of deterring offenders. We ne= ed more of =E2=80=98em. Maybe ATV associations would be willing to help the government pay for some= , and be part of a team suggesting possible placement sites. DNR can decid= e on its own where to put them, and the rest of us don=E2=80=99t need to kn= ow. I suspect camera locations would need to be rotated periodically=E2=80=A6 Just thinkin=E2=80=99 and sharin=E2=80=99 =E2=80=A6 From: naturens-owner@chebucto.ns.ca [mailto:naturens-owner@chebucto.ns.ca] = On Behalf Of bev wigney Sent: January 24, 2016 10:27 AM To: naturens@chebucto.ns.ca Subject: Re: [NatureNS] Protected areas; ATV use-some thoughts for moose an= d trout Donna, and all, Very much agree with what Donna has written. For several years, I was invo= lved with a forest services committee in the Ottawa area. There was an ATV= -snowmobile club that continuously lobbied to claim access to almost all of= the large municipal managed forest. The leaders of the club attended ever= y meeting and I expect they themselves were well meaning and no doubt ethic= al with their own use of the trails, but unfortunately, they had no true co= ntrol over other members or non-member ATVers who also used the trails. In= my time spent at the forest, I saw a boardwalk through a bog destroyed by = ATVers who drove large machines onto it, breaking slats and causing it to f= lip over for its entire length. A neat little rustic x-country ski shelte= r was burnt up by a party fire made with old junk such as foam mattresses h= auled into the woods by ATV. Several ATVers pretty much destroyed the wetl= and area just below the dam on a small lake funded by Ducks Unlimited by dr= iving back and forth through it doing "mud crawls" (look that up if you don= 't know the term). A hiking trail intended as a "pedestrian-only nature wa= lk" around the same lake was ripped all to hell by ATVers who just *had* t= o go there instead of staying on the dozens of ATV-permitted forest trails.= A colony of fairly rare Walking Ferns was destroyed by ATVs that used the= rock face they grew from as a place to try rock-face climbing and also as = a detour to bypass a barrier that blocked off a pedestrian trail. ATV barr= iers were repeatedly jerked loose from pedestrian trailheads by people usin= g 4x4s and chains and/or winches. I could go on at length, but what's the= point? I have tried to be open to the idea of ATV use on public lands, bu= t it is difficult to feel any degree of support after seeing incredible act= s of destruction, not just in Ontario, but in Nova Scotia, and most certain= ly down in the southwest US where ATVs proliferate by the thousands. No ma= tter where I have travelled, if there is an area of natural trails intended= to be restricted to non-motorized use - there will I find barriers torn do= wn and senseless habitat destruction. I just can't feel much optimism that= things will be different in Nova Scotia. And, much like Donna, the rail line through the Valley goes past my place t= oo. ATVers already use this section of trail and the noise on weekends in = spring and autumn, and often many weekdays in summer, is absolutely appalli= ng at times. I rarely walk on that trail with my dogs as the ATVs come ra= cing through too fast and it is hard to crush off into the dense brush on e= ither side of the trail to get out of their way. In the earthier sections = of trail, after a rain, the mud is churned up as deep as my ankles. All in= all, it makes the trail quite useless for pedestrians or bicycles. Oh wel= l. If this is what people want, I guess this is what we will get. Bev Wigney On 2016-01-24, at 10:33 AM, Donna Crossland <dcrossland@eastlink.ca> wrote:= Sadly, there is a minority among the ATV groups who have carelessly littere= d remote locations, and far worse, can fish out previously hard-to-get to r= emote streams with healthy trout populations. Fires have been carelessly s= tarted that led to wildfires (e.g., one that I have noted on the =E2=80=98f= ire roads=E2=80=99 recently, which we taxpayers must pay to put out. There= is no =E2=80=98let it burn=E2=80=99 policy in place, as NS is too small fo= r this concept which is more appropriate for other ecosystems such as the v= ast boreal). --- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. https://www.avast.com/antivirus ------=_NextPart_000_0029_01D156AA.FD04BBF0 Content-Type: text/html; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable <html xmlns:v=3D"urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml" xmlns:o=3D"urn:schemas-micr= osoft-com:office:office" xmlns:w=3D"urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word" = xmlns:m=3D"http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/2004/12/omml" xmlns=3D"http:= //www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40"><head><meta http-equiv=3DContent-Type content= =3D"text/html; charset=3Dutf-8"><meta name=3DGenerator content=3D"Microsoft= Word 14 (filtered