Cootes Paradise

Cootes Paradise Marsh is a wetland at the western end of Lake Ontario, on the west side of Hamilton Harbour. It is located in the city of Hamilton, Canada. It is owned and managed by the Royal Botanical Gardens (RBG), a private charitable status organization. The marsh is part of the Cootes Paradise Nature Reserve, with these lands representing 99% of the unaltered lands along the local Lake Ontario shoreline. The site is a National Historic site, a Nationally Important Bird Area (IBA), and a Nationally Important Reptile and Amphibian Area (IMPARA).

The marsh was named for Thomas Coote, an Anglo-Irish Royal Navy Captain who lived and hunted in the area in the 1700s.

Originally a seasonally flooded river mouth marsh feed by Spencer Creek, it provided habitat to a wide variety of lifeforms. The habitat went into decline beginning in the late 19th century as a result of water pollution, human overuse, and the introduction of carp into Lake Ontario. By 1985, 85% of its plant cover was lost, 90% of the remainder was non-native species, and the carp population numbered over 70,000 fish. As part of ongoing efforts to reverse this ecological decline, the Gardens introduced Project Paradise in 1993, part of the Hamilton Harbour Remedial Action Plan. The plan focuses on removing sources of stress to the marsh by focusing attention on inflowing water pollution, minimizing the number of spawning carp, and re-establishing native plants. There are a number of identified anthropogenic stresses that have led to the unbalanced populations of carp and Canada geese. These are water quality and quantity based. Poor water clarity is a result of extremely high nutrient and sediment levels derived from sewage and urban runoff. Rapid sediment accumulation is the result of unmanaged land use patterns in the watersheds, while the regulated water level in Lake Ontario has dramatically altered the flooding pattern. Project Paradise is one of the largest wetland rehabilitation projects in North America.

Controlled burns have also been conducted in an effort to restore some of the old field areas to their original Oak savanna ecosystem, a rare grouping of Carolinian plants and animals. Cootes Paradise Marsh is connected to Hamilton Harbour via the Desjardins Canal, which was dug through Burlington Heights in the early 19th century in an effort to connect Dundas, Ontario with shipping on the Great Lakes.

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