Take Action for Community Conservation

Planting to restore nature. Photo: Ontario Nature Collection.

As individual citizens, each of us can make real contributions to nature conservation in our own local communities. Whether you’re concerned about wetlands, woodlands, subdivisions or gravel pits, community action for nature protection has never been more critical in Ontario. Recent government cutbacks to staff and budgets, as well as "downloading" of provincial responsibilities for land-use planning to municipalities, mean that increasingly your township, county, region or city is the place to focus conservation activities.

Here are eight ways you can take action for conservation in your community:

1. Join Ontario Nature. Your support of Ontario Nature through membership will help us continue to protect critical habitats and species at risk.
2. Join a naturalist club. Ontario Nature is all about community conservation - we're made up of 135 community nature groups across Ontario. Join the club nearest you - there's strength in numbers!
3. Become an Advocate for Nature and receive important conservation Action Alerts by email.
4. Read and use the Ontario Nature citizen's guides. We have produced a series of practical citizen’s guides that give you the tools you need to protect nature in your area. Our citizen’s guides cover wetlands and woodlands protection, provincial park management, forest management and land trusts.
5. Join or start an environmental advisory committee in your municipality. This is an excellent route to make an impact on what your municipal government is doing–or can do–to protect natural areas in your community.
6. Find out if there is a land trust in your area. Work with the land trust to protect land with important natural areas using the many creative tools available to landowners.
7. Find out important information about setting up a new conservation group with Ontario Nature Fact sheets.
8. Learn about the natural world in Ontario. There are many exciting, accessible natural places to explore. Read about them in the Nature Network Regions section of the website.
9. Learn more about the environment in your community and what you can do to help by reading Ontario Nature's brochures on Natural invaders, Backyard habitat (PDF 527k), Urban sprawl (PDF 656k).