Crothers' Woods
Encyclopedia
Don River (Toronto)
The Don River is one of two rivers bounding the original settled area of Toronto, Ontario along the shore of Lake Ontario, the other being the Humber River to the west. The Don is formed from two rivers, the East and West Branches, that meet about north of Lake Ontario while flowing southward into...
valley in Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. It is approximately 25 ha in size and consists of woodland, meadows, wetlands, and an assortment of past and present municipal uses. The wooded area has been designated as an Environmentally Significant Area (ESA) by the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority
Toronto and Region Conservation Authority
Toronto and Region Conservation Authority or Office de protection de la nature de Toronto et de la région is one of 36 conservation authorities in Ontario, Canada...
. An ESA designation is useful in highlighting valuable natural areas but this does not affect planning uses. The area is currently zoned as undeveloped parkland. Crothers' Woods was named after George W. Crothers who built a manufacturing company called Crothers Caterpillar. The plant built heavy machinery for the construction and mining industries. The company stayed until 1979 when they relocated to Vaughan, Ontario
Vaughan, Ontario
Vaughan is a city in York Region north of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Vaughan is the fastest growing municipality in Canada achieving a population growth rate of 80.2% between 1996–2006, according to Statistics Canada having nearly doubled in population since 1991. Vaughan is located in Southern...
. Murhal Developments bought the property and eventually sold it to Loblaws which built the store that currently occupies the site just off Millwood Road.
While there are no clear boundaries, Crothers' Woods is generally thought to include both sides of the valley that extends from Pottery Road and the Bayview Avenue
Bayview Avenue
Bayview Avenue is a major north-south route in the Greater Toronto Area of Ontario. North of Toronto, in York Region, Bayview is also designated as York Regional Road 34.-History:...
extension in the south and west to the Millwood Road bridge in the east. Further east, good quality forest exists on the north side of the valley for another 1.2 km to the western edge of E.T. Seton Park
E.T. Seton Park
E.T. Seton Park is a public park located in the North York neighbourhood of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The park is named after renowned naturalist, artist, and writer, Ernest Thompson Seton...
.
The land in this part of the valley is owned by the TRCA and managed by the city of Toronto's Parks and Forestry Department
Toronto Parks, Forestry and Recreation Division
The City of Toronto Parks, Forestry and Recreation Division is the division of the Toronto municipal government responsible for city-owned parks, forests, and recreation centres...
.
History
Toronto Purchase
The Toronto Purchase was an agreement between the British crown and the Mississaugas of New Credit in 1787. The Mississaugas of New Credit exchanged 250,808 acres of land in what became York County The Toronto Purchase was an agreement between the British crown and the Mississaugas of New Credit...
. After the establishment of York
York, Upper Canada
York was the name of Old Toronto between 1793 and 1834. It was the second capital of Upper Canada.- History :The town was established in 1793 by Governor John Graves Simcoe, with a new 'Fort York' on the site of the last French 'Fort Toronto'...
in 1793, land grants were made for much of the land north of the city including the Don Valley. In the 1800s, the Don River was exploited for its capacity to support water driven mills. At least two mills were constructed in this part of the valley. They were eventually purchased by the Taylor family who owned the Don Valley Brick Works
Don Valley Brick Works
The Don Valley Brick Works also known as Evergreen Brickworks is a former quarry and industrial site located in the Don River valley in Toronto, Ontario. Currently the buildings sit mostly unused while the quarry has been converted into a city park which includes a series of naturalized ponds...
.
Due to urban expansion, the city constructed the North Toronto Sewage Treatment Plant in 1929. This handles effluent from local areas including Leaside
Leaside
Leaside is a neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The area takes its name from William Lea and the Lea family, who settled there in the early years of the nineteenth century. The area first developed as farmland along with Toronto through the nineteenth century. It was incorporated as a...
and North Toronto
North Toronto
North Toronto was a town located in the northern part of the Old Toronto district in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It occupies a geographically central location within the current boundaries of the city of Toronto. It is a relatively narrow strip, centred around Yonge Street; it extends from the CP...
.
Domtar
Domtar
Domtar Corporation is the largest integrated producer of uncoated freesheet paper in North America and the second largest in the world based on production capacity, and is also a manufacturer of papergrade pulp....
operated a plant that produced and recycled paper products. Immediately to the north of it, was Bate Chemical and Polyresins Inc. Manufacturer of oil and water based paint resins and adhesives. (It was also subcontracted from Lever Bros to make Ajax Liquid cleaners.) They operated until the late 1980s when they closed. Subsequently the TRCA purchased the land and demolished all of the buildings except for Bate Chemicals research and development lab building. It was converted into the Toronto Police dog training facility. The rest of the area was cleaned up and the contaminated soil removed.
On the north side of the valley, the land where a former brick making operation called Sun Valley Ltd. was used as an industrial landfill. This was used mostly for brick and ash waste from nearby industry. It was shutdown in the 1980s. The dump was capped with clean fill and now is marked by a large meadow covered with invasive grasses and plants. It is currently undergoing natural restoration efforts. In particular it has become the Don Valley site for Trees Across Toronto, a city wide tree planting program.
Forest
Crothers' Woods is known as a beech-maple-oak climaxClimax community
In ecology, a climax community, or climatic climax community, is a biological community of plants and animals which, through the process of ecological succession — the development of vegetation in an area over time — has reached a steady state. This equilibrium occurs because the climax community...
forest. It includes such tree species as American Beech
American Beech
Fagus grandifolia, also known as American Beech or North american beech, is a species of beech native to eastern North America, from Nova Scotia west to southern Ontario in southeastern Canada, west to Wisconsin and south to eastern Texas and northern Florida in the United States. Trees in the...
, Sugar Maple
Sugar Maple
Acer saccharum is a species of maple native to the hardwood forests of northeastern North America, from Nova Scotia west to southern Ontario, and south to Georgia and Texas...
, Black Walnut
Black Walnut
Juglans nigra, the Eastern Black walnut, is a species of flowering tree in the hickory family, Juglandaceae, that is native to eastern North America. It grows mostly in riparian zones, from southern Ontario, west to southeast South Dakota, south to Georgia, northern Florida and southwest to central...
, and Red and White oak
White oak
Quercus alba, the white oak, is one of the pre-eminent hardwoods of eastern North America. It is a long-lived oak of the Fagaceae family, native to eastern North America and found from southern Quebec west to eastern Minnesota and south to northern Florida and eastern Texas. Specimens have been...
. There are also a few Butternut
Butternut (tree)
Juglans cinerea, commonly known as Butternut or White Walnut, is a species of walnut native to the eastern United States and southeast Canada. Its range extends east to New Brunswick, and from southern Quebec west to Minnesota, south to northern Alabama and southwest to northern Arkansas...
which are currently listed as an endangered species by the Species at Risk Act
Species at Risk Act
The Species at Risk Act is a piece of Canadian federal legislation which became law in Canada on December 12, 2002. It is designed to meet one of Canada's key commitments under the International Convention on Biological Diversity. The goal of the Act is to protect endangered or threatened...
. In, 1995, the forest was designated as an ESA partly due to the quality of the forest but also to the presence of rare understory plants. These include Greater Straw Sedge
Carex
Carex is a genus of plants in the family Cyperaceae, commonly known as sedges. Other members of the Cyperaceae family are also called sedges, however those of genus Carex may be called "true" sedges, and it is the most species-rich genus in the family. The study of Carex is known as...
, Thin-leaved Sunflower
Helianthus
Helianthus L. is a genus of plants comprising 52 species in the Asteraceae family, all of which are native to North America, with some species Helianthus L. is a genus of plants comprising 52 species in the Asteraceae family, all of which are native to North America, with some species Helianthus...
, and Pale-leaved Sunflower. The forest is a good place to view common spring ephemerals such as Trout Lily, Trillium
Trillium
Trillium is a genus of about 40–50 species of spring ephemeral perennials, native to temperate regions of North America and Asia....
, and Bloodroot
Bloodroot
Bloodroot is a perennial, herbaceous flowering plant native to eastern North America from Nova Scotia, Canada southward to Florida, United States...
.
Animals typical of an urban forest can be seen here. Black-crowned Night Heron
Black-crowned Night Heron
The Black-crowned Night Heron commonly abbreviated to just Night Heron in Eurasia, is a medium-sized heron found throughout a large part of the world, except in the coldest regions and Australasia .-Description:Adults are...
s have been spotted near the river and at ponds within Crothers' Woods. Red-tailed Hawk
Red-tailed Hawk
The Red-tailed Hawk is a bird of prey, one of three species colloquially known in the United States as the "chickenhawk," though it rarely preys on standard sized chickens. It breeds throughout most of North America, from western Alaska and northern Canada to as far south as Panama and the West...
s are also frequent visitors and can be seen hovering over the woods. Recently White-tailed Deer
White-tailed Deer
The white-tailed deer , also known as the Virginia deer or simply as the whitetail, is a medium-sized deer native to the United States , Canada, Mexico, Central America, and South America as far south as Peru...
have been spotted in the woods and it appears they are becoming permanent residents.
Mountain biking
Due to the steep walls and the extensive gullies that exist through this part of the valley, Crothers' Woods attracted the attention of many user groups over the years. A trail network which was begun by motorcyclists in the 1960s was subsequently adopted by cyclists in the 1980s with the advent of the mountain bike. Cycling usage grew steadily over the next decade, corresponding with the North American popularity of the sport, and the trails were also enjoyed by trail runners, dog-walkers, bird-watchers, and hikers. By the early 1990s, some of the trails had become degraded through overuse. At that time, initial efforts were made by the Parks Department to control the environmental damage by blocking off badly eroded trails. However, this activity was postponed after the Metro amalgamation in 1998.In 2004, the city again became involved at the behest of local groups such as the Task Force to Bring Back the Don
Task Force to Bring Back the Don
The Task Force to Bring Back the Don is a citizen advisory committee that advises Toronto city council on issues concerning the Don River and its watershed. It consists of 20 citizen members and 3 council members.-History:...
. Rather than try to limit use, the city adopted a proactive approach and decided to work with all stakeholders and user groups to repair and improve the trail system. For the short term, they brought in consultants from the International Mountain Bicycling Association
International Mountain Bicycling Association
The International Mountain Bicycling Association is a non-profit educational association whose mission is to create, enhance and preserve trail opportunities for mountain bikers worldwide....
and put on trail building workshops. These workshops have taught skills necessary to create shared sustainable trails and have resulted in a marked improvement in the quality of the trail system. While the cycling community has supported this program with volunteer labour, some environmentalists have been less than sanguine about the continued cycling activity in Crother's Woods.
For the longer term, the city commissioned a management plan in 2006 on Crothers' Woods to come up with guidelines on how to best manage the trails and alleviate the longstanding friction between the various stakeholders and user groups.
As the single largest user group of the trails in Crothers Woods, cyclists have recently organized in order to better deal with the city staff and other smaller stakeholder groups. In 2004, a group called the Don Valley Trails Users Club was formed by cyclists, and was intended to serve as an umbrella organization representing all trail users. In 2007, the DVTUC was superseded by a new organization called the Toronto Off Road Bicycling Group, with a stronger mandate to represent cyclists.
Local buildings and other infrastructure
- North Toronto Sewage Treatment Plant
- LoblawsLoblawsLoblaws is a supermarket chain with over 70 stores in Canada, headquartered in Brampton, with stores across Ontario and Quebec. Loblaws is a division of Loblaw Companies Limited, Canada's largest food distributor...
store - Toronto Police dog training facility
- Ontario HydroOntario HydroOntario Hydro was the official name from 1974 of the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario which was established in 1906 by the provincial Power Commission Act to build transmission lines to supply municipal utilities with electricity generated by private companies already operating at Niagara...
power corridor - Canadian National RailwayCanadian National RailwayThe Canadian National Railway Company is a Canadian Class I railway headquartered in Montreal, Quebec. CN's slogan is "North America's Railroad"....
corridor - Canadian Pacific RailwayCanadian Pacific RailwayThe Canadian Pacific Railway , formerly also known as CP Rail between 1968 and 1996, is a historic Canadian Class I railway founded in 1881 and now operated by Canadian Pacific Railway Limited, which began operations as legal owner in a corporate restructuring in 2001...
corridor - field currently used as a snow dump by municipal services
- Beechwood Drive