Lettre: Proteger Le lac des Étoiles sur L'ile Canard Blanc

Le lac des Étoiles

Ministre Claude Béchard
Minister of Natural Resources and Wildlife
500, boul. René-Lévesque Ouest
Bureau 9.500
Montréal, Québec
H2Y 1W7

RE: Le lac des Étoiles must be protected (lac des Étoiles sur L'ile Canard Blanc dans le Municipalité de Lac-Simon)

Ministre Claude Béchard,

As a child, I could remember the turtles crossing the road between our home and the town of Cheneville. As a child, I could remember the frogs in the water and the toads living along the beach. I no longer see frogs, toads or turtles.

In July of 2007, I visited lac des Étoiles for the first time in over 20 years. I saw these animals for the first time in years. Lac des Étoiles on L'ile Canard Blanc is a refuge for these frogs, toads and turtles. Homeowners on Ile Canard Blanc say the lac des Étoiles turtles are over a hundred years old!

Unfortunately, picnic tables have been introduced by the Municipalité of Lac-Simon. Increased traffic will only have a negative impact on the wildlife on the habitat of lac des Étoiles. Lac des Etoiles is being altered. For example:

1. the land is scared with burnt wood and makeshift fires;
2. the land is littered with beer caps and cigarette buts;
   
3. the moss on the rock outlook is being destroyed by wandering foot traffic;
   
4. the overflow stream, with its soft peat/moss characteristics, has been damaged with increased foot traffic. There is even talk of a foot path, across this sensitive stream, around the lake. What better way to finally kill off all the animals!;
5. the soft shoreline, home to toads basking in the sun, has footprints embedded in the mud.
   

Unfortunately, it now appears that the Municipalité of Lac-Simon and the MRC Papineau want to include lac des Étoiles along a Petite Nation kayaking route. With the possibility of increased activities (above and beyond the rise in population), the volume will keep increasing exponentially. Given the cumulative and often irreversible effects of those activities on wildlife habitat, it has become essential for me to write this letter asking you to act.

My understanding is that in Québec there is a law whose objective is to protect wildlife habitat. In the case of lac des Étoiles, the habitat is located on lands in the domain of the State, is it not? Together we must protect the animal and fish habitat of lac des Étoiles.

Does the Act respecting threatened or vulnerable species apply?

No person may, in the habitat of a threatened or vulnerable plant species, carry on an activity that may alter the existing ecosystem, the present biological diversity or the physical or chemical components peculiar to that habitat. (17)

Québec wildlife is indeed rich and diversified. We are all owners of that collective richness and we must take care of it.

Therefore, I call for the:

1. immediate removal of the picnic tables;
   
2. construction of a log/wooden fence to deter people from wandering to the sides of the rock outlook;
3. no trail around the Lac des Etoiles;
4. instalment of signs that forbid swimming, fires and camping;
5. Lac des Etoiles not be included in any tourism route.
   

Lac des Étoiles must be protected. The turtles of lac des Étoiles must be protected.

We have a duty to protect.

Sincerely,

Paul Malouf

CC: Ghislain Ménard, directeur général MRC Papineau
Jean Perreault, urb. Coordonnateur Service de la planification et de l'aménagement du territoire, MRC de Papineau
Serge Thivierge, Maire Municipalité de Lac-Simon
Guy Roy, Inspecteur en bâtiment et environnement
Line Beauchamp, ministre de l'Environnement, Ministère du Développement durable, de l'Environnement et des Parcs
Lyse Leduc, President, Association des Propriétaires du Lac Simon