The Coast

Photo by Nicole Tomasic

The Birds of Owls Head Need a Wingman

Love will soon be in the air—for barn swallows, that is. Courtship during the upcoming mating season will feature elegant aerial displays. Cobalt blue, cinnamon and chestnut-coloured, the barn swallow is a striking species. But it’s in flight that these birds go from interesting to incredible. Barn swallows are aerial acrobats, which have been recorded at speeds of up to 74 km/hour. They zip and zoom through the air, performing impressive manoeuvres to catch flying insects. Who knew that you could look so graceful while eating bugs all day?

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By Lindsay Lee, ago

Meet the super-plant from Nova Scotia’s shorelines: eelgrass

The carbon converter found by Owls Head protects against storms and gives fish and lobster a safe place to grow up

Mira Dietz Chiasson
The Coast
February 27, 2020

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Dive below the waves somewhere along Nova Scotia’s coastline and you might encounter a thriving ecosystem that is vitally important to our fisheries, our ways of life and our climate: An underwater eelgrass meadow.

See the play of sunlight in the meadow’s swaying underwater forest, fish darting between the blades of grass and discover other creatures feeding and clinging to the vegetation. Eelgrass may resemble a seaweed, but it’s actually a plant, complete with flowers and roots, that spends its life under the waves.

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By Save Owls Head, ago
Chris Trider, photo Peter Barss

Group marches to the legislature to protest proposed sale of Owls Head

Covert delisting of the land from park protection rallies community members.

The Coast
Mira Dietz Chiasson
February 21, 2020

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A determined group of Nova Scotians gathered yesterday at Grand Parade Square to protest the sale of Owls Head, a planned provincial park that was recently de-listed by the provincial government. Despite cold temperatures, approximately 120 people were in attendance, wearing hats and mittens, chanting “Stop the sale, save Owls Head.”

“Development would be welcome. But none of it should come at the expense of a rare ecosystem”

–Pam Baker

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By Save Owls Head, ago

RICHARD BELL: Eastern Shore rallies behind Owls Head parklands

A behind-the-scenes move by the province to sell the land has the community pushing back.

Originally published here 

Richard Bell
January 30, 2020
The Coast

More than 200 people packed into the Ship Harbour Community Centre in the afternoon on Sunday, January 26 in the latest escalation of a land-use dispute over the selling of protected Crown land to a private developer to build three golf courses—a dispute that also jeopardizes the province’s reputation as a safe place to invest.

… The reaction to Gorman’s revelation has been explosive. Opponents formed the Facebook group, Save Little Harbour/Owls Head from Becoming a Golf Course, on December 19, and it had garnered 2,219 members by January 29. The Nova Scotia branch of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) started an online letter-writing campaign calling on Premier McNeil to cancel the sale of Owls Head. That campaign produced more than 1,000 letters in a few days.

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By Save Owls Head, ago