Brewer Park Pond is an artificial
pond
A pond is a small, still, land-based body of water formed by pooling inside a depression (geology), depression, either naturally or artificiality, artificially. A pond is smaller than a lake and there are no official criteria distinguishing ...
located in
Brewer Park in the neighbourhood of
Old Ottawa South
Old Ottawa South is an older urban neighbourhood in Capital Ward in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Old Ottawa South is a relatively small and compact neighbourhood, located between the Rideau Canal (to the north) and the Rideau River (to the south). ...
in
Ottawa
Ottawa is the capital city of Canada. It is located in the southern Ontario, southern portion of the province of Ontario, at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the cor ...
,
Ontario
Ontario is the southernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Located in Central Canada, Ontario is the Population of Canada by province and territory, country's most populous province. As of the 2021 Canadian census, it ...
,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...
. It is connected to the
Rideau River
The Rideau River (, ) is a river in Eastern Ontario, Canada. The river flows north from Upper Rideau Lake and empties into the Ottawa River at the Rideau Falls in Ottawa, Ontario. Its length is .
As explained in a writing by Samuel de Champl ...
via a
culvert
A culvert is a structure that channels water past an obstacle or to a subterranean waterway. Typically embedded so as to be surrounded by soil, a culvert may be made from a pipe (fluid conveyance), pipe, reinforced concrete or other materia ...
.
History
The pond was constructed in the early 1960s as a "swimming hole" from an area that had previously been a wetland of three small islands, known as the Bathing Islands, with channels between them in the Rideau River. The pond, which was completely separated from the river, was used for swimming until the pond was infected by bacteria and the spread of
algae
Algae ( , ; : alga ) is an informal term for any organisms of a large and diverse group of photosynthesis, photosynthetic organisms that are not plants, and includes species from multiple distinct clades. Such organisms range from unicellular ...
.
The provincial health department ordered the pond's swimming facilities closed in 1971. During the 1970s, the pond was used for
model yacht regattas.
Naturalization
In the 1990s there was a large-scale community project to naturalize the area. The project, under the leadership of ECOS (the Environment Committee of the Ottawa South Community Association) saw the planting of thousands of trees and shrubs by local residents, the transformation of the hard-pack parking lot into a meadow, the construction of the pedestrian bridge between the park and Carleton University, and numerous other projects. For a number of years the pond area served as the location of Earth Day Ottawa activities. The naturalization project culminated in 2000 with a major federal government Millennium Grant to dredge a fish nursery on the river's edge, develop interpretive materials, and other undertakings.
Restoration
Following funding from developers
Richcraft and
Minto
Minto may refer to:
Places Antarctica
*Mount Minto (Antarctica)
Australia
*Minto, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney
** Minto railway station
* Minto County, Western Australia
* Parish of Minto, New South Wales
Canada
* Minto City, British ...
, the pond was restored in 2014 by the
Rideau Valley Conservation Authority
The Rideau Valley Conservation Authority (RVCA) is an inter-municipal environmental protection and advisory agency that works with local municipalities, government agencies, special interest groups and the general public to protect the natural reso ...
, when it was re-connected to the river via a culvert. The funding came as a result of compensation for the loss of a habitat in a new development project in
Orleans. The restoration project included creating a wetland with shoreline plantings, and habitats for breeding birds, amphibians, turtle nesting beds and basking logs. The culvert allowed fish from the Rideau River to use the pond.
Ecology
The bottom of the pond is made of
clay
Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolinite, ). Most pure clay minerals are white or light-coloured, but natural clays show a variety of colours from impuriti ...
and organic content, and it is surrounded by a large amount of
water lily
Water lily or water lilies may refer to:
Plants
* Members of the family Nymphaeaceae
Nymphaeaceae () is a family of flowering plants, commonly called water lilies. They live as rhizomatous aquatic herbs in temperate climate, temperate ...
tubers and grasses.
Plants in or around the pond include
white water lily,
water celery,
pond weed,
yellow water lily,
bulrush
Bulrush is a vernacular name for several large wetland graminoid, grass-like plants
*Sedge family (Cyperaceae):
**''Cyperus''
**''Scirpus''
**''Blysmus''
**''Bolboschoenus''
**''Scirpoides''
**''Isolepis''
**''Schoenoplectus''
**''Trichophorum''
...
,
sedge
The Cyperaceae () are a family of graminoid (grass-like), monocotyledonous flowering plants known as wikt:sedge, sedges. The family (biology), family is large; botanists have species description, described some 5,500 known species in about 90 ...
s,
willow
Willows, also called sallows and osiers, of the genus ''Salix'', comprise around 350 species (plus numerous hybrids) of typically deciduous trees and shrubs, found primarily on moist soils in cold and temperate regions.
Most species are known ...
and
silver maple
''Acer saccharinum'', commonly known as silver maple, creek maple, silverleaf maple, soft maple, large maple, water maple, swamp maple, or white maple, is a species of maple native to the eastern and central United States and southeastern Canad ...
s.
Fish in the pond include
yellow perch
The yellow perch (''Perca flavescens''), commonly referred to as perch, striped perch, American perch or preacher is a freshwater perciform fish native to much of North America. The yellow perch was described in 1814 by Samuel Latham Mitchill fr ...
,
muskellunge
The muskellunge (''Esox masquinongy''), often shortened to muskie, musky, ski, or lunge, is a species of large freshwater predatory fish native to North America. It is the largest member of the pike family, Esocidae.
Origin of name
The name ...
,
northern pike
The northern pike (''Esox lucius'') is a species of carnivorous fish of the genus ''Esox'' (pikes). They are commonly found in brackish water, moderately salty and fresh waters of the Northern Hemisphere (''i.e.'' holarctic in distribution). T ...
,
pumpkinseed
The pumpkinseed (''Lepomis gibbosus''), also referred to as sun perch, pond perch, common sunfish, punkie, sunfish, sunny, and kivver, is a small to medium–sized freshwater fish of the genus ''Lepomis'' (true sunfishes), from the sunfish fami ...
,
banded killifish
The banded killifish (''Fundulus diaphanus'') is a North American species of temperate freshwater killifish belonging to the genus ''Fundulus'' of the family Fundulidae. Its natural geographic range extends from Newfoundland to South Carolina, ...
,
northern redbelly dace and
bluntnose minnow
:''"Bluntnose minnows" is also used for the genus '' Pimephales'' as a whole.''
The bluntnose minnow (''Pimephales notatus)'' is a species of freshwater ray-finned fish belonging to the family Leuciscidae, the shiners, daces and minnows. Its natur ...
. Animals include the
calico pennant dragonfly,
snapping turtle
The Chelydridae is a family of turtles that has seven extinct and two extant genera. The extant genera are the snapping turtles, ''Chelydra'' and ''Macrochelys''. Both are endemic to the Western Hemisphere. The extinct genera are '' Acherontemys' ...
,
wood duck
The wood duck or Carolina duck (''Aix sponsa'') is a partially migratory species of perching duck found in North America. The male is one of the most colorful North American waterfowls.
Taxonomy
The wood duck was Species description, formal ...
,
beaver
Beavers (genus ''Castor'') are large, semiaquatic rodents of the Northern Hemisphere. There are two existing species: the North American beaver (''Castor canadensis'') and the Eurasian beaver (''C. fiber''). Beavers are the second-large ...
,
green frog,
bullfrog
''Bullfrog'' is a common English language term to refer to large, aggressive frogs, regardless of species.
Examples of bullfrogs include:
Frog species Americas
*Helmeted water toad (''Calyptocephalella gayi''), endemic to Chile
*American bullf ...
,
great blue heron
The great blue heron (''Ardea herodias'') is a large wading bird in the heron family Ardeidae, common near the shores of open water and in wetlands over most of North and Central America, as well as far northwestern South America, the Caribbea ...
,
painted turtle
The painted turtle (''Chrysemys picta'') is the most widespread native turtle of North America. It lives in relatively slow-moving fresh waters, from southern Canada to northern Mexico, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific. They have been shown ...
,
mudpuppy
''Necturus'' is a genus of aquatic salamanders in the family Proteidae. Species of the genus are native to the eastern United States and Canada. They are commonly known as waterdogs and mudpuppies. The common mudpuppy ''(N. maculosus)'' is p ...
,
muskrat
The muskrat or common muskrat (''Ondatra zibethicus'') is a medium-sized semiaquatic rodent native to North America and an introduced species in parts of Europe, Asia, and South America.
The muskrat is found in wetlands over various climates ...
and the
red-winged blackbird
The red-winged blackbird (''Agelaius phoeniceus'') is a passerine bird of the family Icteridae found in most of North America and much of Central America. It breeds from Alaska and Newfoundland south to Florida, the Gulf of Mexico, Mexico, and ...
.
[Sign at pond]
References
{{reflist
Landforms of Ottawa
Bodies of water of Ontario
Ponds of Canada