Wellesley Island nature center provides an Earth Day Experience

Gabriela Padewska, Nature Center director, said those practices are a daily occurrence on their grounds.

“We celebrate Earth Day every day, essentially,” she said.

According to Padewska, the focus of the center is “environmental education and also outdoor recreation and connecting people to the outdoors.”

Visitors can have this experience both outdoors and indoors when they visit.

“We have nine miles of trails, we have exhibits here that talk about the biodiversity and the different habitats and ecosystems that we have in our region. We feature taxidermy, which I know is very special for a lot of people to be able to actually see animals close up. So we are a great resource for people if they want to understand the environment and nature better,” she said.

In addition to the regular exhibits, on Saturday there were a number of special features.

Info stations about anti-plastics, climate literacy and the canopy project — a reforestation and rewilding effort — were set up and run by Nature Center staff and Student Conservation Association (SCA) members.

They were showing a short film called “The Story of Stuff,” which Padewska said is about the materials economy and becoming better consumers.

A shoreline cleanup was also one of the scheduled activities. Jen Cashel, Cape Vincent, drove to the Nature Center along with her two sisters, and happened upon the cleanup opportunity by chance.

“We haven’t gotten together in a while, and so we just said, ‘let’s see if the rain holds off and do something nice while we are at it.’ And we bumped into this opportunity with the cleanup,” Cashel said.

They found an old plastic glow bracelet, a rubber band and some other pieces of plastic. After taking a short break, they said they were heading back out on the River Trail for 2.8 miles, collecting any debris they found on the way.

While the three sisters were heading back out, Walt Gibson, an SCA Education Steward from Missoula, Montana, was arriving back from a cleanup at campground E in Wellesley Island State Park. Gibson had been joined by a family that had stopped in at the Nature Center. He said that it went well, and he enjoyed talking with them about the St. Lawrence River watershed as they worked.

They came back with a large garbage bag full of debris, including a tire, rusty tripod, lots of Styrofoam, tent stakes and pieces of plastic.

Next on the list of activities was a meditative hike, led by SCA member Faith Seeley. Participants quietly walked the trail observing their surroundings, taking note of a bright yellow-orange fungi called witch’s butter, and thousands of tiny gray insects bouncing around on the surface of a stagnant pool of water on the forest floor.

These participants were getting the full Earth Day experience.

“It’s just a day to help people appreciate mother earth and to understand the environment, and how we can help,” said Padewska.