Nature Manitoba is pleased to welcome Bee City Brandon to Nature Manitoba! Bee City Brandon has joined NM as a sub-committee and will become one of our Partner Programs. We look forward to working with Bee City Brandon to work toward supporting pollinators in Manitoba! Please see more about Bee City Brandon below. 

Bee City Brandon is a member of Bee City Canada, and is a committee of volunteers dedicated to preserving, protecting, and promoting pollinators.

By Nate Entz - 2020 Grassland Bird Survey Technician with the IBA program

Above: Nate Entz worked with the IBA program in 2020 (Photo courtesy of Nate Entz)

by Chris Friesen

It will likely come as no surprise to you that naturalists like to keep track of what they see in their wanderings. Many birders keep a ‘life list’ - a list of all the bird species they’ve ever seen, and there’s often friendly competition among birders to see who has the longer list. In fact, I’m guessing that many birders also keep lists of the birds they observe each year, or in Manitoba, or perhaps even in their yard.

By Dr. Diana Bizecki Robson

Scientists have spent many decades arguing with each other about lichens.  It’s a plant! No, it’s a fungus! No, it’s a fungus parasitizing an alga. No, it’s an alga parasitizing a fungus! Nobody’s parasitizing anybody; they’re living in harmony like a bunch of hippies in a commune! For a long time, no one understood what lichens truly were, and honestly I’m still not sure we do. 

On January 16th of 2021, former Nature Manitoba President, Harvey Williams passed away. Harvey was very active in Nature Manitoba for 25 years until he left the province in 1997. He made an immense contribution to conservation efforts in Manitoba. Nature Manitoba would like to offer our sympathies to his friends and family. You can read more about Harvey’s work here.

By: Karen Vanderwolf, PhD student at Trent University