Teaching Wonder...With an Entrance Fee

 

                                                       Swan family at the Frink Conservation Area

1 Teach me, God, to wonder, teach me, God, to see;

let your world of beauty capture me.

Praise to you be given, love for you be lived,

life be celebrated, joy you give.

                                              Voices United 299

This morning we headed out early to the Frink Conservation Area north of Belleville for a contemplative stroll along the marsh boardwalk. We were a little early for the solar-powered turtles and snakes which are there in abundance but there was a fair amount happening. 

This mute swan family was a big deal, even though they are an introduced species and they are everywhere in our region. According to a guy who is there nearly every day these swans have been nesting on the marsh for the past eight years but have never raised a single cygnet to maturity. The carefully tended eggs hatch, the young start swimming with the parents, then they're soon gone, likely gobbled up by snapping turtles. It's a grim reminder that the web of life depends on the web of death. This year they began with nine little ones and the number gradually diminished. As you can see, there is one left and it may be large enough to survive now.

We saw other critters as well, including a young beaver and a Virginia rail which was calling furtively to young hidden in the cattails,invisible to us but cheeping in response. A green heron and a blue heron were on the prowl as well. It was all beautiful, for us a lovely reminder of Creator and Creation.

Today was a first though. As we arrived there was an automated gate at the parking lot entrance which we opened using our Quinte Conservation card in a matter of seconds. We paid $60 for the yearly pass, otherwise it would have cost us six dollars to get in. We thought of the many young families and others who take in the simple wonders of the boardwalk and realize that the cost may now be an deterrent. 

We can't blame Quinte Conservation for charging an entrance fee because the current government has drastically reduced funding to our conservation authorities and they must make up the shortfall in other ways. I've written before that Ontario's conservation system is a jewel and that representatives from countries around the world have visited to discover how it works. Now it is being strangled to death with its powers for protection reduced and funding cut. Of course these reductions have gone hand in hand with opening up portions of the Greenbelt for development in Ontario despite the premier's repeated promise that this wouldn't happen. 

How do we teach our young people to wonder, to protect, to cherish if their access to the natural world is curtailed? We have taken our grandchildren here many times and their sense of delight is always heartening for us. 

We're grateful that our congregation, Trenton United, made lawn signs available which are a statement about what we need to do and how this Ford government which is supposed "for the people" simply isn't, unless they happen to be wealthy developers.