Rondeau, then and now, Part II

 A few weeks ago I decided to share some photos of what Rondeau Provincial Park was like several decades ago. It seemed to get a lot of interest, so I have decided to do a second post.

Rondeau was known for its forest values even back in the 1800s, and was at least part of the reason it was established as a provincial park in 1894. The U of Toronto forestry class came to visit periodically. This first photo is one of the class members standing beside what was the biggest tree known for the park at the time, a Sycamore, which measured about 155 cm in diameter. This was dated 1908.

It was situated within sight of Rondeau Road, just a bit south of the current Spicebush Trail entrance and on the west side of the road, so it was relatively easy to keep track of it. Unfortunately it died in about 1968, and fell over in about 1972. This next photo show what it looked like in 1988.....

.....and in 2014....

....and in March, 2020.

With the continued decomposition of this massive tree, and the ongoing falling of branches of other trees, plus the growth of many new saplings, it is next to impossible to find any convincing sign of it now.

The park's vegetation wasn't always so lush. Deer were always a part of the ecosystem, and a crowd-pleaser for the public. The area just south of the maintenance area, adjacent to Harrison Trail, was set up as a deer enclosure, so visitors could always see one or more deer, and even feed them.

The increasing deer population outside the enclosure was eventually playing havoc with the vegetation. Deer culls were regular, to keep the population at a healthy level. But for political reasons at the time, the cull was stopped for several years, and the population expanded considerably. As the winter population approached 600 animals, the vegetation was severely impacted, with browse lines showing up everywhere. This next photo was typical of what much of the forest looked like in the late 1970s. The food availability decreased as you might expect.

Well meaning individuals would bring buckets of corn to spread along the road sides, making it look more like a feedlot.

If you drove slowly along the road, rolled down the window and put your hand out, you sometimes got deer coming right up to you! Clearly they were hungry. Some deer thrived, as this monster buck shows. It is a12 pointer, and had a massive neck, the latter likely due to the rutting season. I took this photo from my vehicle window along Harrison Trail, and the buck could hardly be bothered even looking at me it was that sure of itself and it status in the park, at least amongst the deer population.

Eventually a cull was re-instated in the mid-1990s, and ever since, the deer population is lower but much healthier now, as is the forest vegetation. Compare the third photo above, with these next few.

Harrison Trail

Harrison Trail

Black Oak Trail

Changes occurred in the area of the marsh as well. There was a single lane road established in the late 1950s to provide access for marsh maintenance as well as for duck hunters, but not open to public vehicles. It made a great hiking and biking trail. In four different locations, an observation tower was erected. They were quite handy to get a view of the marsh. Two of them were still accessible in the late 1970s. Here, I photographed one of my staff members enjoying the view and sunset.

They eventually got to the point of needing to be taken down for safety reasons. They were all well out along the marsh trail, and not all that accessible unless one was willing to bike or hike for quite a distance. So in the 1990s, this more elaborate one was established much closer to the trail entrance, only about a kilometer or so away. It was quite popular......

...and gave this kind of a view of the marsh, shown below, looking south. But to anyone who has been out along the marsh trail in recent years, the base of this observation deck was damaged by ice, and with the ongoing increase in water levels, the structural safety of this tower was in question, so it was removed as well. Given the sad state of the marsh trail over the last couple of years with the wash-outs, etc., it isn't surprising and the trail is officially closed. Quite sad to know it has gotten to this stage, as the marsh trail was one of my all-time favourite places to explore at Rondeau.

Related to the natural history theme, there have been some other changes as well. Nature interpretation became popularized in the 1950s. Since Rondeau had, and still has, a major natural history theme about it, a former ice house was converted to be the first museum.

It was located in the area more or less across from where the picnic area and swings are currently located. The next photo shows R. D. "Dick" Ussher, the first park naturalist, who was the driving force behind all things nature in that era. He was the park naturalist at Rondeau from about 1954-68. His education was focused on forestry, but in reality he was interested in many things of nature. I remember going on a guided hike with him out what was known as the 'Eagle's Nest Trail' when I was in about Grade 3.

He was also the driving force behind getting a new, modern museum, and the building shown below was opened in 1963. I started working there as a summer naturalist while attending U of Guelph in 1973, and continued after University as the park naturalist up until December, 1985.

The photo below is what it looks like in early 2023. The insides have undergone major changes since that time as well.

Just like in my early school years, school class hikes and nature education was offered regularly, any time of the school year. Here is what part of Tuliptree Trail, which starts at what is now the Visitor Centre, looked like. The boardwalks over the wetter spots were pretty basic, but functional.

In all of the hundreds and hundreds of school kids we took out on the trail, I don't think we ever had a student fall off into the water.

Kids would enjoy getting on their bellies and peer into the water, or whatever was below. These photos were taken in the 1970s and 1980s.

Fast forward to the mid-1990s, and extensive new boardwalks were installed, complete with railings. Kids don't have the ability to get down closer for a look, but I expect the teachers are a little more comfortable with taking their class across the slough areas.

Jumping back to a much earlier time, in the really early 1900s, you might have been able to spot an elk roaming around the park. An elk, you say?? Yep.

At the time, wildlife exchanges were not unheard of at all. In a previous post I mentioned about some of Rondeau's black squirrels being shipped off to Washington, D. C., where the colour of squirrels there were predominantly grey (and both blacks and greys officially are referred to as the Eastern Grey Squirrel) And a few Algonquin area deer were sent to Rondeau early last century. I'm not sure where this elk came from but it was present at the park for a few years, and known as Tommy the Elk. 

Going back in time even further, here is a scene from Erieau, looking across the channel to the lighthouse at the tip of the Rondeau peninsula. It was probably in the late 1800s, as the pier was initially build in the mid to late 1800s.

That lighthouse no longer occurs there. You can see that there were several buildings associated with it,  as part of the lighthouse operation, no doubt. The story goes, as I heard it anyway, is that the Harrison Trail that runs the length of Rondeau was the route that Thomas Harrison took as he traveled through the park and out the south beach to manage this lighthouse. That was at a time when the sand spit was connected to where that lighthouse was located. It would be at the north end of the channel, where the white V is shown in the next photo. I took this aerial photo in April, 1989, and clearly the tip of Rondeau has become separated from the short pier where that lighthouse was situated. It had been separated for quite a few years before, and was the result of decades of erosion caused by the main pier interrupting the water currents. But that is a topic for a whole other post or two.

At any rate, this is what the current view is from the same general vantage point.

Thus ends Part II of the Rondeau story. Maybe there will be a Part III.

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Rondeau, then and now

 Things are a little quieter out in the field these days, so I will take the opportunity to interject a post that readers might find interesting, especially if there has been any history with Rondeau. It will attempt to show some of the changes that have taken place, mostly within the last four or five decades.

Rondeau has long been known as a great spot for birding.

There are many species which, either for a short time or a much longer time, show up at Rondeau. The current list is slightly more than 360 species. One of the lwell-known high priority species that birders come to see is the endangered Prothonotary Warbler. It was first discovered breeding in Canada at Rondeau, back in the early 1930s, and the park remains a hot spot for it even now.

Woodland sloughs are the prime habitat for this species, and Rondeau has several kilometres of good quality habitat of this type. This next photo shows Phil, a former staff member of mine while I was at Rondeau, looking in a slough as he scanned for birds. The presence of water that was a metre or more deep in places, numerous dead trees in various stages of decay and the extensive openness were all important for Prothonotaries.

They like a bit more canopy cover than what these photos show, but will make use of fairly open habitat. As do other birds. I photographed this Northern Flicker at its nest in a dead tree right close by where the previous photo was taken, and also a Brown Creeper nest under some bark on the same tree, a fairly rare breeding species at Rondeau.

Anyone of a certain age who had an interest in nature might recall the TV series To the Wild Country, filmed by John and Janet Foster, and partially narrated by Lorne Greene. One of the episodes was entitled Wild Corners of the Great Lakes, and it featured a bit of Rondeau, and in particular the Prothonotary and its nesting habitat. If you are interested, you can see this episode here. The Rondeau segment starts at about minute 17. It is interesting that when it was filmed, back in 1974, the water levels of Lake Erie were at almost record high. Part of the segment shows a former Rondeau colleague of mine, Howard Coneybeare, canoeing through a slough, and discovering a nest of a Prothonotary. With the high water levels, and the openness of some of the sloughs, canoeing was quite possible. Some sloughs were extremely open, as the first photo shows. It was taken in about 1974.

This next photo shows a fairly typical large slough, as in about 1985. Canoeing was quite possible, with a little care.

But since then, conditions have changed. Water levels have had their ups and downs both seasonally and annually. These next few photos were taken in just the last few days, and while the overall lake levels have dropped a bit, they are still above average. However the local drought conditions have caused the sloughs to look quite different, especially with the aggressiveness of the non-native Phragmites. This next photo was taken at almost the same vantage point as the ones showing Phil the birder above.

And from about the same vantage point, but looking south towards the lake, is what the scene looked like in August, 1985.

There were always lots of turtles sunning here, along with a few snakes, and it was good habitat for nesting birds as well, such as Eastern Kingbird. But fast forward to 37 years later, and this is what the same area looks like, taken from about the same vantage point.

There is no water in what remains of this slough, no logs other than what has washed up along the beach, just sand and grasses, as the erosion of the southern part of Rondeau has caused movement of the shoreline inland more than 50 metres. And just a 100 metres or so east of this spot, used to be a fairly large picnic area, with parking and a large picnic shelter. All that is gone now, and has been for several decades. This next photo shows where it would have been, but now well out in the lake.

And these next few photos show what a wet slough looks like in early 2023. It would be impossible to canoe in them!

Here are a few more items, illustrating some changes over the last 50 plus years. Some readers may well remember the days when there was a beautiful campground at the south end of the park. It was generally well-wooded, unlike the very open campground that remains at the north end of the park. It was established back in the 1950s, I believe, and when I was growing up, I remember our family camping there back in about 1963. There were four or five substantial washroom facilities to service the campground as well as the picnic area mentioned above.

South Point campground washroom

There also was a campground office, to service requests for camping. It was located on the left hand side of what is now the South Point Trail, formerly a road to and from the campground, right at the corner of the sharp S-bend.

 The campground closed for good, in about 1973 due to the very high water which flooded the campgroun, other than for a couple of months in late summer and early fall of 1985. The building gradually deteriorated and I remember quite a few Barn Swallows nesting in the open structure that remained.

In 2023, this is all that is left.....what I presume is the septic tank of the campground office.

More on some other historical changes in a future post!

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