A note of gratitude

Our Saskatoon Businesses and those who are passionate for the environment, go the extra mile for the afforestation areas!~

A huge word of thank you to the dignitaries who were in attendance at this auspicous event.

Robert White BSA, MES (Env. St.) Board Member Friends of the Saskatoon Afforestation Areas, who personally knew Richard St. Barbe Baker was the Recipient of the first Men of the Trees Prize at the University of Saskatchewan. Robert was an excellent host and Master of Ceremonies

Councillor David Kirton brought greetings on behalf of the City of Saskatoon

Parks Department from the City of Saskatoon said a few words in honour of World Environment day and these anniversary celebrations.

Andrea Lafond CEO of Meewasin which is notably recognized world-wide for its leadership in conserving the natural resources of the 6,700 hectares of the Meewasin Valley.

Author and Environmentalist Candace Savage from Wild About Saskatoon has written more than two dozen books on nature and cultural history honoured the occasion with greetings and spoke on behalf of the environment.

Elizabeth Bekolay teacher, biologist, environmental author and founder of One School One Farm Sheltberbelt Project has a long history of championing the environment.

Dr. Henrike Rees representing Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) and the PaRx program which just came to Saskatchewan introduced these two environmental programs for health and the environment.

Barbara Biddle Montgomery Place President Community Association brought forward greetings as their community association have been the guardians of the two Saskatoon afforestation areas celebrating their 50th anniversary planted to trees in 1972.

Gift Marufu, Dip. (For.); B.Sc. (Hort.); M.Sc. (Soil/Plant);AAg University of Saskatchewan Grounds Manager also graced the ceremony with a few words about the excellent composting environmental project ongoing on campus, and conduct a campus tree tour.

Scouts Canada and troops will be present at this auspicious occasion. “The environment is central to Scouting and is a key element in the development of engaged citizens. Through Scouting, we never miss out on the opportunity to experience and build a relationship with nature. Environmental exploration has played a prominent role in the Scout Movement since it was founded.”

We should like to express our thank you to Dutch Growers for helping out with the 50th Anniversary of World Environment Day. It was great to have a Bur Oak planted on the University of Saskatchewan campus near the Richard St. Barbe Baker memorial in honour of Richard St. Barbe Baker’s last ever tree planting 40 years ago to the day!

Thank you kindly to Nestor’s Bakery who helped out with amazing refreshments which were enjoyed by many!

It is wonderful to also extend appreciations to the Real Canadian Superstore for their assistance also with refreshments.

Thank you to the City of Saskatoon and Mosaic for your amazing support in helping to make this day happen! Thank you to the community who offer assistance with donations and on bottle drives. It is truly appreciated.

Once again, thank you kindly for celebrating World Environment Day on its 50th anniversary.

In celebration of the afforestation area 50th anniversary there is hereby four new pages from the 50th Anniversary Living Legacy Book with place based learning activities released for your enjoyment. More new pages will come online in download pdf format for every round of financial or in-kind support received. Thanks so very much!

1. Page 41
2. Page 4
3. Page 11
4. Page 48

June 5 Tree Planting Ceremony University of Saskatchewan World Environment Day 50th Anniversary Celebration

June 5 Tree Planting Ceremony University of Saskatchewan World Environment Day 50th Anniversary Celebration

For directions as to how to drive to “George Genereux” Urban Regional Park
For directions on how to drive to Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area
For more information:
Blairmore Sector Plan Report; planning for the Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area, George Genereux Urban Regional Park and West Swale and areas around them inside of Saskatoon city limits
NEW P4G District Official Community Plan
Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area is located in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada north of Cedar Villa Road, within city limits, in the furthest south west area of the city. 52° 06′ 106° 45′
Addresses:
Part SE 23-36-6 – Afforestation Area – 241 Township Road 362-A
Part SE 23-36-6 – SW Off-Leash Recreation Area (Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area ) – 355 Township Road 362-A
S ½ 22-36-6 Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area (West of SW OLRA) – 467 Township Road 362-A
NE 21-36-6 “George Genereux” Afforestation Area – 133 Range Road 3063
Wikimapia Map: type in Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area
Google Maps South West Off Leash area location pin at parking lot
Web page: https://stbarbebaker.wordpress.com
Where is the Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area? with map
Where is the George Genereux Urban Regional Park (Afforestation Area)?with map
Pinterest richardstbarbeb
Blogger: FriendsAfforestation
Tumblr friendsafforestation.tumblr.comFacebook Group Page: Users of the George Genereux Urban Regional Park
Facebook: StBarbeBaker Afforestation Area
Facebook for the non profit Charity Friends of the Saskatoon Afforestation Areas Inc. FriendsAreas
Facebook group page : Users of the St Barbe Baker Afforestation Area
Facebook: South West OLRA
Reddit: FriendsAfforestation
Twitter: St Barbe Baker Charity Twitter:FriendsAreas
Mix: friendsareas
YouTube
Please help protect / enhance your afforestation areas, please contact the Friends of the Saskatoon Afforestation Areas Inc. (e-mail / e-transfers )Support the afforestation areas with your donation or membership ($20.00/year). Please donate by paypal or by using e-transfers Please and thank you! Your donation and membership is greatly appreciated. Members e-mail your contact information to be kept up to date!
Donations can be made through Paypal, Canada Helps, Contact Donate A Car Canada, SARCAN Drop & Go 106100594 for the Friends of the Saskatoon Afforestation Areas Inc.
United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration
Use the UN Decade’s Visual Identity
Make it your own
Spread the word about the UN Decade
Let’s Bring Back Forests
Let’s Green Our Cities
“Be like a tree in pursuit of your cause. Stand firm, grip hard, thrust upward. Bend to the winds of heaven..”
Richard St. Barbe Baker

Afforestation; City Honoured as Pioneer

It is wonderful to be part of the City of Saskatoon, a city that at once is a pioneer in the world afforestation efforts. Saskatoon, was way ahead of the times in 1972.  The parks department showed incredible foresight by implementing this “Green Survival” programme as it was called in its inception.

 

Northern Leopard Frog

A bit of fog and hoar frost in the Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada

SONY DSC

 

“We’ve got to realize we live in a biosphere.  When the trees go, the people go.  It’s a question of survival now.  We’ve got to plant trees within the  next 10 years to save our lives.  We’ve been eating into our forest cover faster in the last 50 years than ever.  If we want to enter the new century with forests, we will have to start planting trees for our lives now.” ~Richard St. Barbe Baker reported by Zeina Cleigh.  Tribune Staff Writer.

‘Afforestation’ is the establishment of a forest or stand of trees (forestation) in an area where there was no previous tree cover.

‘Deforestation’ which means cutting of forests or trees.

‘Reforestation’ is the natural or intentional restocking of existing forests and woodlands (forestation) that have been depleted, usually through deforestation.

The Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area was planted by the City of Saskatoon parks department in 1972.  The three afforestation areas, 660 acres, were preserved in perpetuity that same year by City Council.

Wayne Buckle, a tree planter in that year, says ” I have always enjoyed travelling over the train overpass on Highway 7 to watch my forest grow – that’s probably the best vantage point to view it” ~ Leslee Newman

Paul Hanley also wrote the best selling book Eleven speaking the time when the planet reaches Eleven billion people ~ echoing the following sentiments of Richard St. Barbe Baker.  What are the choices facing this  generation for the future survival of our planet?

A few of the many and several articles written about afforestation and the benefits to the planet are; Afforestation and Reforestation for Climate Change   and Climate change mitigation through afforestation / reforestation These, of course, are just two of over 1,510,000 scientific articles on the importance and value of afforestation to mitigate climate change.

Will the human race fail, fizzle, give out, go out, peter out, run out, break, break down, collapse, conk (out), crash, cut out, die, expire, stall, stop, run down, wane?

It is up to you, personally, to help your grandchildren and all of  humanity to hold out, hold up, keep up, last, prevail, bear up, carry on, cope, endure, fare, get along, get by, get on, go, hang in, make out, manage, persevere, abide, continue, draw out, hang on, hold on, linger, persist, remain, run on.

What can you do?

1. Plant a tree, nay plant ten trees a year as requested by St. Barbe.
2. Support afforestation efforts around the world.
3. Care for trees everywhere.
4. Do a good deed.
5. Read Eleven, and the need to become a Sylvan economy as requested by St. Barbe

It is wonderful to be part of the City of Saskatoon, a city that at once is a pioneer in the world afforestation efforts. Saskatoon, was way ahead of the times in 1972.  The parks department showed incredible foresight by implementing this “Green Survival” programme as it was called in its inception.

Paul Hanley, a personal friend of St. Barbe, a freelance writer, and environmentalist,  has written a biography on this internationally known forester, Richard St. Barbe Baker.  Contact Paul Hanley for more information about this book in order to learn more about the afforestation area namesake, Richard St. Barbe Baker.

For directions as to how to drive to “George Genereux” Urban Regional Park

For directions on how to drive to Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area

For more information:

Blairmore Sector Plan Report; planning for the Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area,  George Genereux Urban Regional Park and West Swale and areas around them inside of Saskatoon city limits

P4G Saskatoon North Partnership for Growth The P4G consists of the Cities of Saskatoon, Warman, and Martensville, the Town of Osler and the Rural Municipality of Corman Park; planning for areas around the afforestation area and West Swale outside of Saskatoon city limits

Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area is located in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada north of Cedar Villa Road, within city limits, in the furthest south west area of the city. 52° 06′ 106° 45′
Addresses:
Part SE 23-36-6 – Afforestation Area – 241 Township Road 362-A
Part SE 23-36-6 – SW Off-Leash Recreation Area (Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area ) – 355 Township Road 362-A
S ½ 22-36-6 Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area (West of SW OLRA) – 467 Township Road 362-A
NE 21-36-6 “George Genereux” Afforestation Area – 133 Range Road 3063
Wikimapia Map: type in Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area
Google Maps South West Off Leash area location pin at parking lot
Web page: https://stbarbebaker.wordpress.com
Where is the Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area? with map
Where is the George Genereux Urban Regional Park (Afforestation Area)? with map

Pinterest richardstbarbeb

Facebook Group Page: Users of the George Genereux Urban Regional Park

Facebook: StBarbeBaker

Facebook group page : Users of the St Barbe Baker Afforestation Area

Facebook: South West OLRA

Twitter: StBarbeBaker

Please help protect / enhance your afforestation areas, please contact the Friends of the Saskatoon Afforestation Areas Inc. (e-mail)

Support the afforestation areas with your donation or membership ($20.00/year).  Please donate by paypal using the e-mail friendsafforestation AT gmail.com, or by using e-transfers  Please and thank you!  Your donation and membership is greatly appreciated.  Members e-mail your contact information to be kept up to date!

Paypal

Payment Options

Membership : $20.00 CAD – yearly Membership with donation : $50.00 CAD Membership with donation : $100.00 CAD

1./ Learn.

2./ Experience

3./ Do Something: ^***

 

“The future of the planet concerns all of us, and all of us should do what we can to protect it. ” Wangari Maathai.

 

“I believed that God has lent us the Earth. It belongs as much to those who come after us as to us, and it ill behooves us by anything we do or neglect, to deprive them of benefits which are in our power to bequeath.” Richard St. Barbe Baker

 

 

Hibernal Labyrinth

Were you there?

 

The snowstorm provided atmosphere in a glance; a subtle nuance which the snow covers as if the forest possessed an iniquitous or gentle soul. Within the forest enraptured within the illusion of time, and the dance of snowflakes are never at rest; even within the narrow compass of the forest they develop a scene; growing in captivating, spell-binding wonder and beauty, the landscape continuously transformed; the trees and snow swirl together in “sync,” and ideality unites thus the blanketed forest vision with that of the humans.

For is it not on such a day that we do, indeed create our world? Wonderfully wrought, rich yet dim was the day, as if God himself had dipped his artistic brush in mist and not in reality. Time and space died that day. The mysticism of the day revealed itself in a spell-bound trance, all of nature was settled, serene, and the pattern wove a splendour of moods and tonalities.

The blizzard brought a new way of seeing, the rhythm of the wind as a cinematograph carrying the eye to a point of distraction. As the trees danced about in their newly donned snowy robes, we tread about the snow drifts as the wind blew on and on. Under the snow blanket hidden deep, the squirrels, and mice uttered not a peep. The pine boughs laden under the bevy of snow, held fast the chickadee and waxwing, for in the blizzard no song of bird across the woodlands was ever heard. So it is thus to tell the story when the pale glow of the northern Canadian sun faded behind the gathering snow.

Step by step walk now through the snow, enveloped in this seemingly endless wilderness. The day revealed snow stretching out before the travelers unbroken by track, or footprint of any living creature. The outset of the day ’twas quite impossible to look or see for a pace around, the snow fell thick and fast. The big snow caressed the earth, and upon the woodland trees fell whispering through the wind, catching on the top of the swaying spruce-tops. And such was the day, the day of the big snow that transfigured the spirit, and aligned a new rhythm within the landscape creating new perspectives.

Little snowflakes, insignificant at first, ranging themselves into complex and grand atmospheres which can transfix melodramatic eyes. The multiplicity of details now hidden create new notes of nature revealing breathtaking scenes of dramatic power, creating vivid visions of silent peace. The day has now passed, and with it, too, the sun has taken the vision.

The harmony and symphony of the blizzard, the sense of serenity has played out in the vanishing seconds down the corridor of time. And yet there is a delightful consolation captured ~ the alluring mystery hovering around the woodlands that day when the north wind danced with the woodlands Grace.

“According to ancient mythology, trees were the first living things on earth. This is borne out by scientific reasoning which shows that it is through them that the air we breathe can give life to humanity. Through countless ages trees have been drawing carbonic acid gas from the atmosphere, absorbing and incorporating the carbon, assimilating it; then when they die, bequeathing to soil their carboniferous remains. The consequence has been that eventually the atmospheric oxygen was left sufficiently pure for the requirements of birds and mammals which have replaced the flying reptiles and monstrous amphibians that were able to endure the heavy air of primeval swamps and jungles.”~Richard St. Barbe Baker

 

One of the earliest [memories] is that of the pine forest which came up close to the house. I often sat in the sun there and in the tree tops I seemed to hear the sound of waves breaking on the sea-shore. Those pines spoke to me of distant lands and gave me my first desire to travel and see the trees of other countries. At times I would imagine that these tall pines were talking to each other as they shook or nodded their heads at the whim of the winds.~Richard St. Barbe Baker

For directions as to how to drive to “George Genereux” Urban Regional Park

For directions on how to drive to Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area

For more information:

Blairmore Sector Plan Report; planning for the Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area,  George Genereux Urban Regional Park and West Swale and areas around them inside of Saskatoon city limits

P4G Saskatoon North Partnership for Growth The P4G consists of the Cities of Saskatoon, Warman, and Martensville, the Town of Osler and the Rural Municipality of Corman Park; planning for areas around the afforestation area and West Swale outside of Saskatoon city limits

Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area is located in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada north of Cedar Villa Road, within city limits, in the furthest south west area of the city. 52° 06′ 106° 45′
Addresses:
Part SE 23-36-6 – Afforestation Area – 241 Township Road 362-A
Part SW 23-36-6 – SW Off-Leash Recreation Area (Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area ) – 355 Township Road 362-A
S ½ 22-36-6 Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area (West of SW OLRA) – 467 Township Road 362-A
NE 21-36-6 “George Genereux” Afforestation Area – 133 Range Road 3063
Wikimapia Map: type in Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area
Google Maps South West Off Leash area location pin at parking lot
Web page: https://stbarbebaker.wordpress.com
Where is the Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area? with map
Where is the George Genereux Urban Regional Park (Afforestation Area)? with map

Pinterest richardstbarbeb

Facebook Group Page: Users of the George Genereux Urban Regional Park

Facebook: StBarbeBaker

Facebook group page : Users of the St Barbe Baker Afforestation Area

Facebook: South West OLRA

Twitter: StBarbeBaker

Please help protect / enhance /commemorate your afforestation areas, please contact the Friends of the Saskatoon Afforestation Areas Inc. (e-mail)

Support the afforestation areas with your donation or membership ($20.00/year).  Please donate by paypal using the e-mail friendsafforestation AT gmail.com, or by using e-transfers  Please and thank you!  Your donation and membership is greatly appreciated.  Members e-mail your contact information to be kept up to date!

Paypal

Payment Options

Membership : $20.00 CAD – yearly Membership with donation : $50.00 CAD Membership with donation : $100.00 CAD

1./ Learn.

2./ Experience

3./ Do Something: ^***

You Tube Video Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area

You Tube Video Richard St Barbe Baker presented by Paul Hanley

You Tube Video Richard St Barbe Baker Afforestation Area and West Swale wetlands

You Tube Video Richard St. Barbe Baker Afforestation Area – Saskatoon’s best kept secret.

You Tube Video George Genereux Urban Regional Park Hoar Frost

You Tube Video George Genereux Urban Regional Park Saskatoon

You Tube Video George Genereux Urban Regional Park

 

 

I believe in oneness of mankind and of all living things and in the interdependence of each and all. I believe that unless we play fair to the Earth, we cannot exist physically on this planet. Unless we play fair to our neighbour, we cannot exist socially or internationally. Unless we play fair to better self, there is no individuality and no leadership. ~Richard St. Barbe Baker.

 

“Kind people have been expressing superlatives on my work. But I can assure you that anything which I have been able to achieve has been team work. We have a motto in the Men of the Trees. TWAHAMWE. It is an African word meaning ‘pull together’ and I pass this on to all those concerned with conservation in this country. I would like to call you to silence for a moment with the words of Mathew Arnold:

“Calm soul of all things, make it mine,
To feel amidst the City ‘s jar
That there abides a peace of thine
Men did not make and cannot mar. ”
~Richard St. Barbe Baker

 

Soon the bracken became shorter

 

“I believed that God has lent us the Earth. It belongs as much to those who come after us as to us, and it ill behooves us by anything we do or neglect, to deprive them of benefits which are in our power to bequeath.” Richard St. Barbe Baker

 

There is only one real reason to keep bees, and that is because they are fascinating. If you just want honey, make friends with a beekeeper.
-Australia beekeeper, Adrian the Bee Man

“As I wandered on as in a dream, all sense of time and space lost.  As I continued this mysterious journey, looking up every now and then I could see shafts of light where the sunshine lit up the morning mists and made subtle shadows on the huge bracken fronds which provided a continuous canopy of bright green over me.  Their pungent scent was a delight to me.  Although I could see only a few yards ahead, I had no sense of being shut in.  The sensation was exhilarating.  I began to walk faster, buoyed up with an almost ethereal feeling of well-being, as if I had been detached from earth. I became intoxicated with the beauty around me, immersed in the joyousness and exultation of feeling part of it all.~Richard St. Barbe Baker.”