Volunteer for Nature

Ontario Nature would like to thank everyone who generously donated their personal time to help us conserve Ontario’s habitats and species during the 2007 Volunteer for Nature field season. Your support and efforts have helped us accomplish important conservation work in the province, including native tree plantings, invasive species removal, at-risk species inventories, and visitor access improvements at several of our nature reserves. Thank you for your dedication to the preservation of Ontario’s nature, and we look forward to working with you again in the coming year.

Help Protect Ontario’s Vulnerable Habitats and Species

Ontario Nature’s Volunteer for Nature program gives citizens like you a chance to take an active role in preserving our province’s precious nature. Join stewardship professionals, students, field naturalists and other conservation-minded individuals as they conduct wildlife surveys, restore and enhance habitats, and reduce human impacts in sensitive natural areas.

The 2008 Schedule of Events is now available! Register now!

In 2007, nearly 200 Volunteer for Nature participants helped Ontario Nature stewardship staff, the Niagara Parks Commission, Wye Marsh Wildlife Centre, and the Friends of the Don East complete important conservation work in southern & central Ontario. Approximately 0.5 km of derelict livestock fencing was removed from Cawthra Mulock Nature Reserve allowing wildlife to freely traverse the reserve without risk of entanglement. And in Queenston Heights Forest near Niagara Falls, more than 0.5 km of the forest periphery was cleared of invasive European buckthorn to allow for the re-establishment of the native species that once flourished there.

Volunteer for Nature originated in 2001 as a partnership between the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) and Ontario Nature. Both organizations continue to offer a diversity of outdoor conservation volunteer opportunities in 2008.

This year, we’ll be expanding our suite of Volunteer for Nature events to include events tailored for youth and family participants. Young naturalists of all ages are invited to join us to help plant native trees and wildflowers, count amphibians and freshwater shellfish, and remove invasive plant species that are damaging our vulnerable habitats.

The Volunteer for Nature program is run in partnership with The Nature Conservancy of Canada’s (NCC) Conservation Volunteers program. To see what conservation volunteering opportunities NCC has on offer this year, please visit www.conservationvolunteers.ca.