The province is offering $4 million this year and $4.5 million next year for 85 projects that help species at risk.
The application deadline is the end of this month. They can be filed at SAR.stewarship@ontario.ca .
Eligible projects include:
Habitat management/restoration
- Shoreline restoration, or wetland creation
- Controlled burns to manage tall grass prairie for SAR
- Reconnecting core Species At Risk (SAR) habitat by planting habitat corridors
- Creation/installation of SAR habitat features such as hibernacula or nesting sites
Survey, inventory or monitoring
- Conducting species and/or habitat monitoring
- Conducting species inventories (for example, presence/absence/abundance surveys) for newly listed SAR or within areas that have not been inventoried
- Assessing the effectiveness of stewardship activities through monitoring
Outreach and education
- Outreach activities that increase awareness and knowledge about SAR, and encourage stewardship actions to targeted audiences or areas
- Developing public and/or industry engagement plans that promote the best actions to benefit SAR
- Promoting best management practices that minimize impacts on SAR and their habitats during land or resource use
- Delivery of information sessions for targeted audiences (for example, landowners, farmers, industries, Indigenous communities, youth) to increase awareness and knowledge of SAR, and stewardship
- Preparation of brochures, fact sheets and publications, and other communications media
Direct threat mitigation
- Development and/or implementation of best management practices to minimize impacts on SARand their habitats during land or resource use
- Implementation of features that reduce, mitigate or eliminate threats to SAR such as exclusion fencing or eco-passages
Research
- Filling biological knowledge gaps to inform species recovery
- Assessing the effectiveness of stewardship activities using scientific rigour
Local and traditional ecological knowledge
- Gathering, sharing, or incorporating local and traditional ecological knowledge of SAR and their habitats
Other
- Development of local or regional plans to conduct stewardship actions to protect and recover SARand their habitats
- Development of site specific habitat management plans for targeted SAR.
