Tree Planting Project, Simooaquik Bird Sanctuary, New Brunswick (2025)

Here's a post to share some info about an environmental protection project that we completed on behalf of one of our Sponsor Partners.  The tree planting work on this site (which is in southeastern New Brunswick) was done in the Fall of 2025.  The project site is very close to the main corner in Shemogue.  The planting on this site was entirely sponsored by Forests Canada.

 

This site was harvested relatively recently, by a third party, and our goal was to rebuild a new forest there, specifically so that it can be a now and future bird sanctuary.  The site is large (over fifty acres) and is located in the northern shoulder of the very environmentally sensitive Chignecto Isthmus region, which is a critical wildlife corridor.  Here's a link showing the approximate location of this project:

 

The name that we picked for this site (Simooaquik Bird Sanctuary) comes from what was allegedly the original Mi'kmaq name for the region, which may have been roughly translated into, "Good place for Geese."  The primary purpose of this project was to support biodiversity and wildlife habitat.  A secondary goal was supporting climate stability through carbon sequestration.  

In total, the planting team added 39,390 seedlings to this site.  The site also features some natural regeneration of white birch, red maple, yellow birch, balsam poplar, and other hardwoods and soft deciduous.  Diverse forests are healthy forests.

Here are a few more photos taken during the planting of this project, which took place in early October of 2025:
 

 

We look forward to studying this site in the coming years.  We will be doing periodic surveys to assess the carbon capture progress of the new forest.

Again, a huge thanks to Forests Canada, the sponsors and lead on this major project.

You can see several dozen additional photos of the work on this planting site by visiting our public planting photos folder on Dropbox.  Visit this link then go into the "2025 Planting Photos" folder, then into the "Simooaquick Bird Sanctuary" sub-folder:

    www.replant-environmental.ca/photos 

 

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest!

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.

 

 

 

 

 

Tree Planting in Herring Cove Provincial Park, New Brunswick (2025)

Our organization did some tree planting work at Herring Cove Provincial Park this past September (2025).  This work was funded entirely by the Forests Canada organization through their Forest Recovery Canada initiative as the Project Sponsor.

 

This provincial park is located in the very southwest corner of New Brunswick, on Campobello Island (which is northeast of Grand Manan Island).  From the United States, Herring Cove is only a six minute drive from the border bridge at Lubec Narrows.  From our home base in Canada, the route is slightly more complicated, involving two ferry crossings in each direction, first to Deer Island and then on to Campobello Island.  Here's an overview graphic, courtesy of Google Earth:

 

The approximate GPS coordinates at the park visitor centre are:  44.87716, -66.93423

Most of the planting for this particular project involved planting tree seedlings where the Park staff wanted to improve visual buffers between camping sites (with existing sporadic mature trees).  We also planted a few trees in some open areas that should be returned to forest land, and in parts of the understory where the canopy could use eventual thickening and diversity.  The afforestation and the underplanting with both be important for carbon sequestration and climate change mitigation, and will provide additional habitat for birds and wildlife.  Basically, several goals aligned with the work that we carried out.

We initially started this project in 2024, and were happy that the weather cooperated in the Fall of 2025 to allow us to come back and finish the final phase of the project. 

In total, our planting team added 21,995 trees to the Park this year alone!

Here are a few photos of the planting team in action:

This project went very smoothly.  We were able to complete the planned planting on all of the targeted areas within this park.  Naturally, we will also be making regular visits back to monitor the long-term growth and health of the planted trees.

We'd like to thank the staff at NB Parks in general and Herring Cove's staff and grounds crew in particular for helping with the logistical planning that ensured this project came together, and we again want to thank the Forests Canada organization for being the sponsor that made this work possible.

You can see more photos of our tree planting work at this site by visiting our Planting Photos folder on Dropbox, then going into the "2025 Planting Photos" folder, then into the "Herring Cove Provincial Park" sub-folder.  Start here:

    www.replant-environmental.ca/photos

 

If you'd like to learn more about Herring Cove Provincial Park, visit their web page:

www.parcsnbparks.info/en/parks/6/herring-cove-provincial-park

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest!

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.

 

 

 

Tree Planting in Mactaquac Provincial Park, New Brunswick (2025)

This past Fall (2025), Replant.ca Environmental finished the fourth phase of our long-term tree planting project at Mactaquac Provincial Park.  The work that we did in 2025 was made possible by support from Forests Canada (formerly known as Forests Ontario), and their ongoing Forest Recovery Canada program.

Mactaquac Provincial Park is only a 30 minute drive from Fredericton, over to the west through either Keswick or French Village.  The park is situated on the St. John River, across from the Mactaquac Dam and power generating station.  This station generates one eighth of the electricity for the entire province of New Brunswick.

Here's a graphic (courtesy of Google Earth) showing the location of the park:

Mactaquac has a golf course, campground, two beaches, hiking trails, and [in the winter] it also has cross-country skiing trails.  The camping options are excellent, with around four hundred camping sites and several rustic cabins.  The washrooms and showers were extremely clean, and the entire project was a wonderful experience.  Here's a link for anyone who wants to make reservations:

www.parcsnbparks.info/en/parks/10/mactaquac-provincial-park

In 2014, the first named hurricane of the season was Hurricane Arthur.  It was a very early hurricane, hitting North America in early July.  It swept up the east coast and over the Maritime provinces.  The winds did a tremendous amount of damage to trees and infrastructure, especially in the Fredericton area.  Mactaquac was hit quite hard, and lost a lot of trees.  Our goal was to start the slow process of replanting some of the areas that had blown down during that storm several years earlier, and also to begin creating new wooded areas in other sections of the park.

We had already done work in this park in 2021, 2022, and 2024. This year, we were able to complete several more sections that we had not worked in previously, including doing some reclamation on the north and east sides of the major new lagoon treatment development area.

Some of the planting for this site involves planting tree seedlings in fairly open areas, where the Parks team is turning some of the under-utilized fields and openings into future mature stands of trees.  This latter goal is important for carbon sequestration and climate change mitigation, and provides additional habitat for birds and wildlife.  It also allows the Park to better manage their budget for grounds maintenance (controlling the costs related to mowing the grass). There is also some underplanting at lower densities in some of the thinner sections of woods that are still recovering from the damage created by Hurricane Arthur.

Here are a few photos of the team in action at Mactaquac:

 

In total, our team added 29,435 more trees to this provincial park in 2025!

You can see more photos of our tree planting work at this site by visiting our Planting Photos folder on Dropbox, then going into the "2025 Planting Photos" folder, then into the "Mactaquac Provincial Park" sub-folder.  Start here:

    www.replant-environmental.ca/photos

 

We'd like to thank Kevin (the Park Manager) and Rob and their staff for their hospitality and support while we were on site.  We definitely look forward to returning in 2026 to continue the work that Forests Canada is making possible.

Jonathan "Scooter" Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest! 

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest. 

 

 

The Douglas Fir tree (Pseudotsuga menziesii)

Today's post will be about the Douglas Fir tree.  The Latin name for this species is Pseudotsuga menziesii.  What a mouthful.  Thankfully, everyone [in Canada] seems to agree on just one name, Douglas fir, even though this tree is a pretender.  But we'll get into that below.  First, a photo of a Douglas fir.  

 

This particular tree is called Big Lonely Doug.  It was featured in a book called Big Lonely Doug by Harley Rustad.  It's a good read, should you choose to pick up a copy.

Here's a range map, courtesy of Wikipedia:

 

The interesting thing is that this map suggests that Douglas fir only grows naturally within BC and southwestern Alberta (within Canada).  However, although Douglas fir is planted very commonly in BC, we've also planted small amounts of this species on select projects in the Maritimes!  Of course, it's not suitable for all projects on the east coast, since it's not a naturalized tree.  But some of the east coast nurseries grow it.  While I was digging around to find any history of Douglas fir in the Maritimes, I discovered that there was a plantation made near Stanhope (PEI) that was still healthy in the 1960's, and even today there may be other stands on PEI in Melville and Brookdale.

Douglas fir has a rich history in western Canada, and has been a critical part of the forest industry due to its value as lumber.  While the tree was essentially unknown throughout most of North America in the 1800's, by the mid-20th century it had become known as "the world's premier industrial tree," taking the place of Eastern White Pine after all the old growth pine on the east coast had been decimated.

Douglas fir likes direct sunlight, but it is also shade-tolerant.  Because of this, it can be found in pure even-aged stands (usually after a wildfire or a commercial harvest), in uneven-age stands, and also in mixwood forests.  It is happy to co-exist among other species, especially hemlock, cedar, pine, larch, and even aspen.  It doesn't like to grow up with spruce trees though.  Maybe they get jealous of each other because of how straight and clean the trunks grow.

Douglas fir is considered to be a false fir.  The real firs are species in BC such as Amabilis, Subalpine, and Grand Fir (or Balsam fir in Alberta and central/eastern Canada).  Douglas fir is not a type of pine, spruce or hemlock either.  Douglas fir is its own thing.  The Latin family name (Pseudotsuga) means "false hemlock."

Being a conifer, the Douglas fir has needles instead of leaves.  Here's a photo of the needles on a bundle of seedlings:

Some people have problems differentiating between Douglas fir, true firs, and spruce trees.  That's not surprising.  At a quick glance, anyone who hasn't studied trees could easily be fooled.  But luckily, Nature has given Douglas fir a unique identifying feature for inexperienced silviculturalists:  Pointy buds!  The buds of the Douglas fir have a very distinct sharp point at the tip.  Here's a close-up photo, from Step By Step:

 

Here are a few Fun Facts about the Douglas fir:

1.  The Latin name for this tree (Pseudotsuga menziesii) is a nod to its "discoverer," Alexander Menzies (although of course the indigenous peoples lived with it for millennia before that).  And Douglas refers to David Douglas, a Scottish botanist who introduced the tree to Europe.

2.  Douglas fir is a deep-rooted species.  However, the taproot usually achieves more than 50% of its final depth within just the first five years of growth!

3.  The US Navy still has eight wooden ships in the active fleet (Avenger-class minesweepers) made out of ... you guessed it!  Douglas fir.

4.  An enormous Douglas fir was cut in Washington State in 1897 which measured 465 feet.  After it was cut, the New York Times called its destruction a "truly pitiable tale."  Indeed.  This tree was called the Nooksack Giant, if you'd like to dig into that bit of history.

The Douglas fir is a very noble tree.  The world needs more of them.

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan "Scooter" Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

Teachers are welcome to use content from this post for their classes.  If you know a teacher who might like to use this information, please share it with them!  The more that people learn about trees, the better our world will be.

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest!

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.

 

Tree Planting Project at New River Beach Provincial Park, New Brunswick (2022)

Our organization did some tree planting work at New River Beach Provincial Park this past September.  This work was funded entirely by the Trees For Life organization as the Project Sponsor.

 

This provincial park is located in southwest New Brunswick, only about a thirty minute drive from the US border.  Here's an overview graphic, courtesy of Google Earth:

 

The approximate GPS coordinates at the park entrance are:  45.136406, -66.529329

 

New River Beach Provincial Park is a very scenic park, overlooking a beautiful beach.  When we were working in the park, there was a film crew on the beach below us, shooting an episode of Race Against The Tide, hosted by none other than Maestro Fresh Wes.

Most of the planned planting for this particular project involved planting tree seedlings where the Park staff wanted to improve visual buffers between camping sites (with existing sporadic mature trees).  We also planted a few trees between the cliff edge and the fence over looking the beach.  There was also a large empty field which the Park staff wants to turn into a mature stand of trees.  This latter goal was important for carbon sequestration and climate change mitigation, and will provide additional habitat for birds and wildlife.  Basically, several goals aligned with the work that we carried out.  The following graphic shows the approximate locations for the new seedlings:

 

Altogether, our planting team added 16,105 trees to the Park this year!

Here are a few photos of the planting team in action:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This project went very smoothly.  We were able to complete the planned planting on all of the targeted areas within this park.  We expect to return at some point in the near future to add some additional hardwood seedlings to the same areas.  Naturally, we will also be making regular visits back to monitor the long-term growth and health of the planted trees.

We'd like to thank the staff at NB Parks (especially Josh & Ryan) for helping make this project work, and again want to thank the Trees For Life organization for being the sponsor that made this work possible.

You can see more photos of our 2022 tree planting work on this site by going to our public 2022 Planting Photos folder on Dropbox, then going into the "New River Beach Provincial Park" sub-folder.

If you'd like to learn more about New River Beach Provincial Park, visit their web page:

parcsnbparks.info/en/parks/13/new-river-beach-provincial-park

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest!

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.