April 2017

On Monday night, Edie with canine April, Laura, Eoin and Bobtoc walked 47 minutes only.   

Tuesday April 25th:  Libby, Edie and Maureen visited the Chilliwack Tulip Festival.  Even though it was cool, the tulips were beautiful.  We had lunch and a walkabout in Yarrow – very nice little town and good cafe.  

“Christina Saremba volunteers extensively with BMN, Friends of DeBoville Slough and Colony Farm Park Association, contributing her organizational and technical expertise, passion and vision.” 

These were the words recognizing Christina at the PoCo Volunteer Awards gala at the Giggle Dam on April 26th. She was nominated by four local societies: BMN, Friends of DeBoville Slough, Colony Farm Park Association and the Maple Creek Streamkeepers for her volunteer work. Below is an extract of Christina’s nomination from BMN: 

Christina joined BMN in 2010 and quickly became a very active volunteer. One year after joining, she was elected to our Board. Most recently, she served a 2 year term as our Vice President and has now become our Volunteer Coordinator, a new position created specifically for her to take advantage of her special talents. 

One of Christina’s greatest strengths lies in organizing and working with other volunteers. Through her previous experience working with other non-profits, she brings a tremendous knowledge of how to build and strengthen volunteer-driven societies such as ours. She and her husband developed a membership survey and then led our Board through a visioning process to allow us to function more effectively and incorporate the survey’s results into our long-term planning. 

Christina has worked to make BMN a more resilient group by developing manuals for running most of our activities. Another very valuable project she has undertaken has been to gather years of expertise from some of our more senior volunteers and compile this information into useful “how-to” nature booklets. Thus, we have now produced booklets on building nest boxes for local common birds (21 pages) as well as a guide for annual nest box maintenance. She is currently working on guides for assessing and monitoring bats in the Tri-Cities and for rearing mason bees. These guidebooks are posted to our website (www.bmn.bc.ca) so that anyone has access to the information. In this manner, Christina has greatly enhanced our community outreach. 

Our monthly public meetings (which are advertised and open to the public) are one the main ways in which we engage with members of the public. Christina is a very competent and unflappable audio-visual person at these meetings – we know we can count on her to ensure our guest speakers never encounter problems with their PowerPoint presentations. She has also organized several boat trips and other nature outings for BMN, helps with cleaning our 250 nest boxes every spring, and plays a major role in running our annual Silent Auction where we raise funds for local nature-related charities. 

Christina has been the driving force behind the production of BMN’s colorful nature guidebook for children called “Discover Nature in the Tri-Cities” which was released in the spring of 2015. This 40-page guidebook (available in free printed copies and for download from our website) describes eight local parks and provides a trail map plus drawings of the plants and animals that may be encountered during visits. This guidebook is intended to be an introduction to local nature for families

 in the Tri-Cities. 

BMN received a large portion of the funding for this guidebook from the Ottawa Street branch of the TD Bank in Port Coquitlam. Christina offered to spearhead the development and publication of the guide. This was a clearly a project in which she could offer her special skills. Christina assembled a knowledgeable team of nature writers from among our membership and prepared requests for proposals which clearly outlined the requirements for a professional editor, illustrator and graphicslayout. She interviewed all the candidates and drew up their contracts. She also led the team of BMN members who served as the writers for each park area and who continued to provide feedback to Christina on a number of other related matters. This team of volunteers and contracted specialists met on a regular basis for almost two years. These meetings were chaired by Christina who provided the Minutes and diligently followed up with everyone to maintain an appropriate timeline. She also contacted local school teachers whose classes were given the opportunity to review early drafts and provide feedback. 

The total budget for this project was about $12,000 which makes it BMN’s most costly project to date. Christina kept track of the finances and reported back to the BMN Board on a regular basis. As the project reached completion, Christina spent hours to ensure any errors in the guidebook were eliminated. Members of the team who worked with her were thoroughly impressed by the professionalism that Christina brought to this project. It is quite fair to say that, without Christina’s professional guidance, BMN would have had great difficulty in bringing this project to fruition. Christina has also been involved in promoting and distributing the guidebook to local libraries and schools. She is currently tracking its use and would like to see it used more extensively by new residents to the Tri-Cities area especially those for whom English is a second language. 

Christina hopes that her award will promote awareness of the “Discover Nature” guidebook for families in Port Coquitlam (and beyond) to enjoy.

April 29th: Laura, Susan, Rod, Larry, Ivan, Alex, Flora and Bobtoc met at the Centre on dry but overcast Saturday morning.  The group walked for the most part, using the route from the Centre west on Eastlake to Underhill, Broadway, north onto Arden-Greystone, hung a right onto Shellmont, continued through to the lane, crossed Cinnamon Drive to the Primrose Hill trail down to Forest Grove Drive to the Gaglardi pedestrian overpass, past the Stoney Creek School and you know the rest of the way back to the Centre.  Distance and time, 10k and 1:54 respectively.  A good time had by all.

Coquitlam Cruisers:    From Jennel: So much for resting!  I’ve tallied up all the km for my WALKS & runs this weeks and its accumulated to 49.8km!!!  WOW!  That’s because I drove nowhere!!!  I’ve only ran a couple of times and very slowly…the rest have been walking the girls to & from school and all their track & field events!  (& Starbucks) lol This week will be the same…getting excited for the big day!!!

April 30th: Christina completed the MEC Fort Langley Half in 2:30 – This is a fantastic scenic course along the Trans Canada Trail which is a combination of trail and road. The Half Marathon starts in Pitt Meadows and goes over the Golden Ears Bridge and finishes in Fort Langley.