Wentworth Valley receives protected area designation from Nova Scotia government
Published on Nov 26 2018
Photo: Irwin Barrett
HALIFAX – The Nova Scotia Chapter of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS-NS) welcomes today’s announcement by the Nova Scotia government that it has established a legally-designated protected wilderness area in the Wentworth Valley.
“This wilderness area contains all sorts of old forest and important ecosystems,” says Chris Miller, Executive Director of CPAWS-NS. “We are glad to see that this very significant site in the Wentworth Valley has now received legal protection.”
The area was first identified as a candidate protected area by the Nova Scotia government way back in 2011. After two years of public and stakeholder consultations, the Wentworth Valley was declared a ‘pending protected area’ by the Nova Scotia government in 2013, when the Our Parks and Protected Areas Plan was publicly released. Today’s announcement means that the designation process is now complete.
“It’s been a long road to get to this point,” says Miller. “Many thanks to the Minister of Environment for completing the designation process for Wentworth Valley and for ensuring that the species and ecosystems that call this place home will be properly protected.”
Wentworth Valley Wilderness Area is approximately 2,000 hectares in size. It contains large intact forests, habitat for the endangered mainland moose, several significant stands of old hardwood forest, and is a site important for landscape connectivity in the Cobequid Hills. There is strong local support for its protection and there are opportunities for low impact wilderness recreation in this protected area, in a valley known for year-round outdoor activities.
A large portion of the new protected wilderness area was previously owned by Neenah Paper Ltd. and was acquired by the Nova Scotia government for conservation way back in 2010.
“If those lands were not purchased at that time, it’s likely that the forest would have been clearcut by now,” says Miller. “Acquiring those lands created the opportunity to protect them, and the Nova Scotia government is to be commended for being proactive with their large land purchase program back then.”
Also included in today’s announcement are two other protected areas in Northern Nova Scotia, including “Chase Lake Wilderness Area” and “Steepbank Brook Nature Reserve”. In total, about 3,000 hectares of land were announced as protected by the Nova Scotia government today.
These are the first new protected areas created by the Nova Scotia government since March 2017. At the moment, about half of the sites from the Nova Scotia Our Parks and Protected Areas Plan have been officially established, covering about two thirds of the total area. That still leaves about 100 pending protected areas still awaiting legal protection.
“It’s been five years since the protected areas plan was finalized,” says Miller. “That’s more than enough time to have completed the designation process for all of the pending protected areas in the plan. We hope that the protection of the Wentworth Valley is a signal of things to come, but with a renewed sense of urgency”.
We look forward to additional protected area announcements before the end of the year.
Contact:
Chris Miller, PhD.
Executive Director
CPAWS Nova Scotia
cmiller@cpaws.org
High-resolution photos of Wentworth Valley Wilderness Area available upon request