We are fortunate to spend the summers (or some of us all year) in one of the most beautiful and largest bodies of fresh water in the world! Love for Our Bay can include activities and practices that will promote our own health, well being, and enjoyment of the area and help preserve, protect, and enhance our water quality for future generations.
So, what can you do?
Cleaning Near the Water
Try limiting the use of harmful chemicals and cleaning products that might end up directly in the water or by surface runoff. Are you looking for eco-friendly cleaning alternatives?
The Georgian Bay Association (GBA) has endorsed an organization called “Sailors for the Sea” that has a list of more environmentally friendly non-toxic commercial products and homemade cleaning recipes that are safer for use near the water.
Greener Cleaning Products
Visit the David Suzuki Foundation website for more non-toxic homemade recipes and recommendations on how to shop for greener cleaning products.
Greener Boating
All of us in the Bay have at least one boat and in many cases several boats to get to our cottages or simply enjoy the waters around us for work, pleasure, fishing and sport. Paying attention to greener boating practices can protect the quality of our water. Simple things like placing oil-absorbent pads under your engine, using bilge socks, and fueling your gas tanks properly to avoid spillage can help. Some useful information concerning greener boating can be found in the following links.
Septic Systems
Our water quality can be seriously compromised if your septic system is not designed well, not functioning properly, or maintained, as it should be. Rocky outcrops, fissures in the rock and lack of soil in some cases can potentially allow effluent to escape into our water and introduce bacteria, viruses, parasites and nutrients. It is vitally important to check your system regularly, pay attention to out of the ordinary field bed indicators, and get pump outs on a regular schedule. More information about septic systems can be found here.
Clean Up Your Bay Day
Loving your Bay means protecting and enhancing its beauty and ecosystem health. Cleaning up our waterways and shorelines is one way that we can do this. BICA, through the efforts of Celesta Bjornson and Sheila Williams have organized several Love Your Bay Day events, which started in 2018. Over the course of several campaigns and weeks of work by community volunteers, we have eliminated most of the Styrofoam and derelict docks in the Bay of Islands. In the first year of the shoreline clean up the community was able to eliminate 27 cubic yards of plastic and Styrofoam as well as 5000 pounds of metal, propane tanks and car tires. In the ensuing years, we have encouraged continual shoreline clean up and the removal of any docks still containing Styrofoam. Due to the prevailing winds and the location of the Bay of Islands at the end of the North Channel, we will always have the need to be vigilant with our shorelines to keep them pristine.
You don’t have to wait for the next “official” Clean Up Your Bay Day to make a difference – if you see garbage floating on the water or on the shoreline while you’re boating or kayaking or canoeing, pick it up and dispose of it. Every bit helps set an example for others, keeps our natural habitat free of litter and pollution, and reduces the introduction of harmful micro plastics into our ecosystem.
Dock Foam
Styrofoam has been used as a flotation product for docks for decades. Initially seen as a relatively inexpensive and easy material to work with, it has since been found to be a major source of plastic pollution as it breaks down due to water and weather conditions, animal destruction and sunlight. As these fragments get smaller and smaller they contribute to the volume of micro plastics in our drinking water. The Ontario Government in 2023 banned the use of unencapsulated foam for flotation in all of Ontario’s lakes and rivers but this legislation does not apply to existing docks. If you have a dock with foam flotation, at the very least, try to ensure that pieces are not breaking off, and preferably, consider environmentally safer options as your dock rebuilds occur.
Further information about the legislation and better alternatives for your dock can be found here:
Report Spills and Other Threats to Water Quality
If you see or are aware of an event that poses a risk to our water quality, whether it emanates from land, air or something in the water itself, it is important to alert authorities as quickly as possible to contain and mitigate the risk. There are a number of organizations that can be contacted.
Government of Ontario – Report Pollution Online
Canadian Coast Guard (Particularly for stranded vessels posing an environmental hazard)
Bay Of Islands Community Association