Birds winning park fight

The points of views represented by the anglers and hunters association and the naturalist groups fighting for the cormorants at Presqu'ile, while interesting, present a narrow and incomplete picture of the problem. Presqu'ile Park is, in reality, largely a recreational facility rather than a nature preserve, and is used annually by thousands of campers as a vacation retreat and by many thousands of single day visitors. The greatest attraction of the park is access to lake Ontario for swimming and boating. The biggest asset the park offers, as a recreational facility, is a superb campground and a magnificent natural sand beach. High Bluff island, which is where the cormorants are nesting is part of the park and forms the south shore of Popham Bay. The beach forms the east shore, and the mainland the north shore. In summer, the stench from the island, at times, is indescribable and pollution created by the excrement of the birds causes the beach to be closed many days. Forget about the trees, or the fact that the island is being turned into a desert island, forget about the fish and the herons. The real fight is between the people to whom the park is a tremendous asset, and the birds. So far, the birds are winning.

Dave Jagger
Brighton

This letter to the editor appeared in The Brighton Independent on April 7, 2004