Back to nature in Rosenthal

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This article was published 11/04/2015 (3302 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A lagoon and the land surrounding it is often not an attractive sight, but that standard is not stopping the RM of Hanover from making the habitat neighbouring its lagoon in Mitchell into a public attraction.

Luc Lahaie, then the newly-minted chief administrative officer at the RM of Hanover, figured something should be done with this land northwest of community limits when he first toured the area in 2012.

There were two borrow pits next to a forest, resulting from the top soil being ripped away to mold the berms surrounding the lagoon.

“I remember saying, ‘Wow, they really ravaged a piece of land close to the bush,” recalled Lahaie.

He took on the idea of changing this as his pet project. Discussions with the Seine Rat River Conservation District were fruitful but the groups held off until the money materialized.

Both parties were able to commit financially this year so the Rosenthal Nature Park will begin taking form in the coming months. Native grasses will be planted this summer, helping develop sustainable wetlands, and afterwards a landscaper will focus on the upland portion, the portion the municipality is overseeing. The RM’s vision includes trails, park benches and birdhouses.

As the limits of the LUD of Mitchell expand northward in the decade or two, Lahaie said he wants a walking path to meander through the new developments, leading to the intersection of Randolph Road and Road 30E, a mile north of Highway 52, which is a short walk east from the new nature park.

In some respects, this new nature park will be an abbreviated version of the Tourond Creek Discovery Centre, a six-ecosystem haven northwest of Kleefeld.

“I have a love of this kind of stuff,” said Lahaie, who sits on the St Malo Wildlife Association. “I’m all for conservation. Rather than a solution of bringing in soil from other places and filling that hole, we could do something nice. I think having a nature park is great for school outings or family outings for picnics.”

Native Plant Solutions has been contracted by the conservation district to manufacture the watershed. They will hand-picking native plant species to construct a wetland that would purify the water.

“It’s actually fairly intricate to reconstruct what we take for granted as a very natural ecosystem,” said Seine Rat River district manager Jodi Goerzen.

She explained there would be educational signage on-site to inform the public of what a constructive wetland is and its importance.

Interestingly, the park will pay tribute to the defunct East Reserve village of Rosenthal. Local historian Ernest Braun told the RM the park would essentially be located where Rosenthal once blossomed. According to Braun’s research, 25 or 26 families established themselves in the community in the mid-1870s, making it one of the largest on the East Reserve. But by the time the census of 1881 was computed, most of those families had relocated to the West Reserve.

Rosenthal’s life span was five or six years, maximum.

“It’s a neat way of commemorating the failed hopes and aspirations of an entire village group,” said Braun.

The RM’s financial commitment to the Rosenthal Nature Park hovers at a little more than $60,000. Lahaie said the municipality had cash left over from the $3 million it budgeted to construct the lagoon and parked the remaining $112,000 in a Mitchell utility reserve, which they reached into for this endeavour.

What the municipality hopes, as does the conservation district, is this will be an opportunity to get the community out into nature, he said.

“We want to educate them while they’re there, just getting them to enjoy it,” said Goertzen. “It’s a really gentle introduction to a nature park.”