Invasive Species Removal at Knockan Hill Park, View Royal, July 29, 2023!
Group photo of the amazing community members who joined us for this activity!
The Greater Victoria Green Team spent the day engaging 31 community members from all over the Greater Victoria region to remove invasive Himalayan blackberry and English Ivy in Knockan Hill Park! Ecological restoration is a team effort that provides many wonderful opportunities for community engagement. It was a great day with a ton of teamwork and smiles!
Before… and After!
Although we found some pretty dense work areas (shown above), there were also lots of younger invasive plants that were starting to sprout up again, so having community members tackle these tricky areas ensured that the plants weren’t continuing to develop intricate root systems in the ground.
Evelyn came across a Garry Oak seedling amongst the invasive Daphne seedlings! We were able to remove the majority of the invasive seedlings in this area, providing space for this little native tree to continue to grow.
Highlights from the day!
- In total 34 community members participated and contributed a total of 105 volunteer hours!
- We removed 11.1 cubic metres of invasive plants and revitalized 388 square metres of the park!
- 26 community members were introduced to this location for the very first time!
- 12 community members learned about and removed invasive plants for the very first time!
Thank you to everyone for participating: Alan, Annie, Asher, Ayla, Bruce, Changwen, Chloe, Corrine, Devin, Elena, Elizabeth, Evelyn, Fernanda, Gordon, Iris, Joey, Jonathan, Kiersten, Layanna, Lina, Maria, Mitch, Nancy, Nataliya, Nate, Ray, Sara, Thanh, Tina, Tsuyoshi, Wayne, Xiangmei, Xu, Yu, Yvonne!
Thank you very much to the Town of View Royal for partnering with us and contributing to our Green Team activities! Thank you for recognizing the importance of collaboration in community engagement and ecological restoration!
A big shoutout to Chris Junck, an ecological expert and View Royal Parks’ volunteer coordinator, for providing us with direction for this activity and valuable insight about the park’s restoration efforts!
By being out in nature doing something positive as a team, our community members:
- Develop a sense of belonging to community and place
- Have improved mental and physical health
- Connect to nature, which leads to environmentally responsible behaviour
- Learn about local environmental issues and actions they can take
- Learn the value of bringing together people to work towards a common goal
- Become leaders in their communities
- Increase confidence, resilience and perseverance
Community In Action!
What Participants Are Saying..
“It was my first time joining this activity, so I felt very excited until now! I joined a wonderful volunteering activity that surpassed my expectations. …I met some nice people and felt very welcomed so I hope I can join other activities in the near future.” – Xu (Nicole)
Thank you to the fantastic local eco-friendly businesses Elate Cosmetics, and Tru Earth that donated In-kind products for our hard-working community members to take home!
Our community members took home a thank you gift from one of our in-kind supporters! If you have any suggestions for sustainable/eco-friendly rewards, know of or own a business who would like to provide in-kind to our Green Team, please contact Kaitlin at kaitlin@greenteamscanada.ca
