{"id":11611,"date":"2022-08-25T20:59:15","date_gmt":"2022-08-25T20:59:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/?p=11611"},"modified":"2022-09-14T13:23:09","modified_gmt":"2022-09-14T13:23:09","slug":"biodiversity-on-the-farm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/en\/biodiversity-on-the-farm\/","title":{"rendered":"Biodiversity on the Farm"},"content":{"rendered":"

The spring and summer are always a special time on our hobby farm.<\/h2>\n

Nesting birds, nesting snapping turtles, night air full of frog calls, duck families and a Great Blue Heron on the pond, and on moonlit nights, a visiting Whip-poor-will singing near the house. It is a time replete with biodiversity.<\/p>\n

Bearing a Mystery<\/h3>\n

A few weeks ago, I saw two unusually large holes that had been dug near the house \u2014 each about the circumference and about one-third of the depth of a bucket. These holes were too large to have been dug by a skunk. I found nothing of note in the first hole. In the second hole, however, there were several hornets milling around at the bottom of the hole. A bit of apple tree root was exposed.<\/p>\n

At first, I wondered if the root had attracted the interest of the wasps. After more careful observation I noticed that the hornets were coming and going from a small hole under the root.<\/p>\n

Aha!<\/p>\n

The animal that dug the hole had likely been trying to access the larvae of the hornets. I now had a guess on the species of mammal that had dug the hole, and two more clues were provided subsequently in the form of a loud crashing in the woods and then a fair-sized scat with bits of apple in it.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Bear scat with apple pieces. \u00a9 Carolyn Callaghan | CWF<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If I hadn\u2019t yet strung the clues together, my dogs helped the following day when they flushed a small Black Bear. Given that no Mama bear was in sight, I thought it may be the first year this bear was making its way in the world on its own.<\/p>\n

Spilt Milk<\/h3>\n

While doing chores in the paddock last weekend, I was surprised by a very special creature. I had moved two loads of sand with the tractor, had just begun to level the sand with a rake when the head of an Eastern Milk Snake popped up out of the sand. It reared its head back in a threatening pose.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Eastern Milk Snake.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I was nonplussed by the snake\u2019s attitude. Milk snake are harmless, but they can put on a bluff aggression with gusto. I was more concerned about the well-being of the snake, given that it had just been scooped up by a tractor. It didn\u2019t appear to be injured. I used a shovel to gently pry the sand loose from under its body. When its full body emerged, I saw that it was an adult, about 30 centimetres long.<\/p>\n

It exited the paddock with as much grace as it could muster. I was quite relieved I had not injured this animal, which is listed as an at-risk species in Canada.<\/p>\n

Farms Can Help Conserve At-risk Wildlife<\/h3>\n

Farms in Canada provide habitat for many species, including many species at risk. Farmers who are good stewards should be recognized for their work in sustaining biodiversity. Their work is a public good from which we all benefit. Agriculture and Agri-food Canada is now penning the Green Agriculture Plan, which is designed to have a long term view of environmentally-sustainable farming. I am hopeful that rewards for good stewardship of species and the land is built into this new policy.<\/p>\n

Learn about the work the Canadian Wildlife Federation is doing with Agriculture and Wildlife<\/a>.<\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The spring and summer are always a special time on our hobby farm. Nesting birds, nesting snapping turtles, night air full of frog calls, duck families and a Great Blue…<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":11665,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[959,4424,7181],"class_list":["post-11611","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-endangered-species","tag-biodiversity","tag-endangered-species-biodiversity","tag-farming"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11611","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11611"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11611\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11703,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11611\/revisions\/11703"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11611"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11611"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11611"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}