“Carolinian” is a term most commonly used in Canada to describe the deciduous or broad-leaf forests that span much of eastern North America, from the Carolinas in the United States northward to Southern Ontario.
Carolinian forests are lush, benefiting from wet summers and mild, snowy winters. They are home to the tulip poplar, a beautiful flower found only in these kinds of woods, as well as migratory birds, tropical cicadas and monarch butterflies, not to mention rare tree species. On the triangular peninsula south of Ontario, a haven for Carolinian forests, there are more rare or threatened species than in any other Canadian biozone. Carolinian Canada makes up only 1 percent of Canada’s total land area – but an estimated 2,200 species of herbaceous plants are found there, including 64 species of ferns, more than 130 sedge species at 110 species of grasses and 70 species of trees, like the American elm, the American chestnut, the red pine and scot pine. In all, the “Carolinian life zone,” contains one third of the rare, threatened and endangered species found in Canada. Some of the most rare species that live in the area include trees like the Pawpaw, Blue Ash, Tulip and the Kentucky Coffee Tree; herbaceous plants like the Green Dragon, Harbinger-of-Spring, Yellow Mandarin and Swamp Rose Mallow; shrubs such as the Burning Bush and the Rough-leaved Dogwood, Canada’s only cactus, the Eastern Prickly Pear; birds such as the Acadian Flycatcher, the Prothonotary and Hooded Warblers, Tufted Titmouse and Louisiana Watertrush; reptiles and amphibians like Blanchards’s Cricket Frog, the Lake Erie Water Snake and the Blue Racer snake; and the rare southern Flying Squirrel. For centuries, humans have inhabited this area and farmed it, including members of the Iroquois Confederacy, whose political philosophy influenced the drafting of the U.S. Constitution. When Europeans began to settle the region in the 19th Century, the forest and its unusual wildlife spooked the immigrants, who cleared the forest en masse, leading to its endangered status today. In the 1800s, hunters killed 400 black bears in the neighbourhood of Point Pelee in a single season! That’s why nature lovers like me have taken it upon ourselves to cultivate old Carolinian forests. I love trees; I maintain an orchard of plum, apple, pear and cherry trees on my 100-acre farm in Ancaster, a historic town in the city of Hamilton, Ontario. But there’s something special and satisfying about raising so-called “antique” trees like Tulip trees and Kentucky coffee trees. When I tend to them, it feels like I’m helping to regrow a part of our region’s past, a past that so desperately needs preserving. |
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AuthorStephen Gleave of Ancaster, Ontario is a lawyer and a nature lover. Archives
January 2023
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