Blue Weed Blitz marks eleven years of progress

Submitted

The Pincher Creek Watershed Group, whose motto is ‘Community, caring for the creek’ is busy once again setting the stage for the Annual Blue Weed Blitz. The Watershed Group is a volunteer organization that recognizes the creek as part of a highly integrated, complicated and fragile ecosystem. As a watershed group, their mission statement is “to work together, as a community to improve the health of the creek”.

 This year marks the eleventh year for the Blue Weed event which continues to draw on the dedication of dozens of area citizens and landowners who care what happens on our creek. With the event focused on the eradication and control of the infamous Blue Weed, a lovely but noxious invasive plant, the day is also yet another celebration of the strength of volunteerism in our community.

Pincher Creek runs nearly seventy kilometers before linking into the Oldman River west of the village of Brocket. The Pincher Creek Watershed drains an area of roughly 250 square kilometers, making the creek the largest tributary of any river in Southern Alberta. The creek, with its beginnings in mountainous terrain near Victoria Peak, drops nearly 1500 meters through the foothills, through our town, and out across a short stretch of prairie to the Oldman River. Rich in cultural and natural history, the creek supports a vital ecosystem of plant, animal, and aquatic life. Over thousands of years of time, the creek has changed course, almost dried up, flooded countless times, all the while remaining a critical element of the cultural and biological life of our region.

Volunteers will gather at the Mountain Meadows Ranch on the Christie Mines Road at 10:00 am on the morning of Saturday, July 13th. The Blue Weed day begins with coffee and donuts. Volunteers are divided into teams which are then transported to various “reaches” of the creek. Blue Weed is removed from the shorelines and gravel bars, bagged and later transported to a facility where it is burned. The ‘crews’ will then return to Mountain Meadows Ranch later in the day to celebrate eleven years of effort while enjoying a prime rib dinner, entertainment and an awards presentation. 

The event has attracted upwards of 100 volunteers in the past and has been known to be a lively social event. The day is one of hard work, socializing, hands-on learning, sharing, and contributing to the overall well-being of this precious resource. Everyone who participates will come away with a better sense of the notion that “what happens upstream generally happens downstream”, of the importance of stewardship on our waterways, and that it takes a community to make it all happen.

More information and directions are available by calling Sahra Hancock at 403-627-2074.