“Thursday, May 17, 2012: FOCA has learned that Fisheries and Oceans Canada staff are today being informed of the decision of the Government of Canada to close operations at the Experimental Lakes Area in Kenora, Ontario.

This closure, if it proceeds, will mark a significant setback for scientific research and will impede the ability of scientists to be able to understand the effects of human impacts on aquatic environments, by eliminating one of the only facilities in the world where whole-ecosystem experiments can be conducted.”

Concerns about this decision should be sent directly to Fisheries Minister Keith Ashfield, keith.ashfield@parl.gc.ca.

Royal LePage released its annual Recreational Property Report this morning, along with the results of a survey it commissioned. The survey polled current cottage owners and those who intend to buy in the next five years. One of the more surprising finds is that more than four-fifths of current owners do not rent their property out to offset carrying costs. How to afford to keep the cottage has been a recurring topic for a while now, and we hear from readers all the time about the rising costs of hydro, property taxes, etc., so I’d thought there would be more cottagers renting. Among prospective owners, the survey found that about half of them intended to rent out their cottages. Other tactics people are considering to get into a cottage: reducing discretionary spending; buying a fixer-upper; buying a vacant lot and building later; and, buying with family or friends. (Many are also probably hoping to win the lottery, but may have been reluctant to admit this to a pollster.)

Anyone in the market for a bargain should head east, way east. According to the report, New Brunswick has the lowest prices for a standard waterfront, road-access, 1,000-sq.-ft. three-bedroom cottage with 100 feet of shoreline: around $110,000. Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland are also affordable, and all three of these Atlantic provinces have inland properties on the market for less than $100,000. (Curiously, the report has no information at all about Nova Scotia.)

As for Ontario, a prime location (the Meaford/Thornbury/Collingwood region) may push the cost of that standard cottage up to about a million dollars. There are still affordable properties to be found, however, especially those without waterfront, with St. Joseph Island and Lake Huron being the most accessible (about $90,000 for a standard property on a backlot).

The least surprising finding? More than half of all respondents (55 per cent) said that their number one priority was peace and quiet. That’s something we already knew.

I guess turning board games into movies is getting more popular; I’ve heard that movies based on Candy Land and Monopoly are in the works. I have no idea how true to the games these movies will be. For example, Monopoly: Is it really going to be about…buying real estate? Are the movie characters going to be the gameboard pieces—will, say, Jonah Hill play the Shoe? At any point during the film, will somebody collect $10 for winning second prize in a beauty contest?

But actually, when I think about it, there are a bunch of board games rattling around in the cottage games cupboard that, based on the titles alone, sound like obvious choices for movies. For example:

Drama: The Game of Life; Sorry!; Girl Talk

Horror: Operation; Snakes and Ladders; Don’t Wake Daddy

Action: Hungry Hungry Hippos; Kerplunk; Twister (oops…this one is already taken)

Mark my words—watch for these and other board games at a multiplex near you.

Okay, the Ontario budget may have passed (yay, no election!), but the bill to enact amendments coming out of that budget is still yet to pass; it’s Bill 55, the Strong Action for Ontario Act (Budget Measures), 2012, and it’s in its second reading debate in the legislature. As the Conservatives are doing in Ottawa with the federal budget, the Liberals have lumped all the revisions together into one omnibus bill, meaning that changes to individual acts will not get substantial debate and public consultation. There are 69 acts affected by this bill, so there are a lot of changes about to go through all at once.

Today, in an open letter to the premier, more than 50 groups, including the Federation of Ontario Cottagers’ Associations, Greenpeace, the David Suzuki Foundation, and Ontario Nature, have asked the government to separate out the acts that have to do with the environment, concerned by the weakening of the protection these acts provide. Among the acts are the Endangered Species Act, 2007, the Provincial Parks and Conservation Reserves Act, 2006, the Crown Forest Sustainability Act, 1994, the Public Lands Act and the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Act, 1997.

Here’s some of what the letter has to say: “A legal analysis conducted by Ecojustice and the Canadian Environmental Law Association reveals that Bill 55 significantly undermines the level of environmental protection and public oversight of natural resource use and conservation by: exempting industrial and development activities from legal requirements to protect wildlife and natural resources; broadening exemption powers; allowing the delegation of government authority to other unspecified bodies; and extending or eliminating deadlines for planning and reporting (e.g., species recovery strategies, park management plans, reports to the Legislature).”

Just as the feds are making environmental assessments less arduous, particularly for resource industries such as mining and pipelines, it appears that the Ontario government thinks that the difficult economic times call for less diligence and oversight. If so many groups find the weakening of environmental laws “deeply disturbing,” then we should all be as disturbed.

Barlow, an international force in the protection of the human right to water, has been a great friend to cottage associations advocating for water protection.

The tour, Great Lakes Need Great Friends: Protecting The Great Lakes Forever, will visit Toronto (May 15), Hamilton (May 16), Thunder Bay (May 17), Kingston (May 22), Sarnia (May 24), Township of Tiny (May 28), Owen Sound (May 29), and London (May 30), and with allied groups, several U.S. cities.

“On this tour to Great Lakes Basin communities, we’ll be discussing an exciting new proposal to designate the lakes and their tributary waters as a lived Commons, to be shared, protected, carefully managed and enjoyed by all who live around them,” says Barlow. “Defending our water from exploitation is not just an environmental issue. It is also a question of human rights and social justice.”

Whomp!

That’s the sound of the mini-explosion caused by the ignition spark. Smoke billowed out from under the cover. When we opened the compartment, we saw the fire.

One of the most amazing parts of the story is that when DH grabbed the fire extinguisher from under the bow, it actually worked. It was probably the same vintage as the old fibreglass boat, circa 1962 or so. He bought a new fire extinguisher the next day.

We all know we’re supposed to have working fire extinguishers in our boats. But not everyone takes the law seriously. The same goes for smoke alarms in our cottages—they‘re mandatory—and many parts of cottage country now have bylaws requiring carbon monoxide detectors as well. You may never need them…until you do.

Fire is one of the biggest fears of cottagers I’ve talked to. Did you know that in 2011 more area burned in forest fires in Ontario than in the previous 50 years? Yet, there is little chance of saving a wooden cottage at the end of a twisting cottage road, or on an island, once the fire has started. Two years ago, I visited a magnificent, historic cottage on an island in Lake Muskoka. Having bought it from their parents, the couple who owned it were in the middle of a loving restoration. Two weeks after my visit, it burned to the ground. She was there alone at the time. The sound of crackling flames woke her up, and she got out in time.

And that is why you have smoke alarms in the cottage. Not so you can save the cottage, but so you are alerted in time to save yourself and your family. You should have one on every level of your home and cottage and outside any sleeping areas. Smoke detectors range from $20 to $40; a CO alarm will set you back under $50.

The problem with carbon monoxide, which is known as the silent killer, is that you can’t see, smell, or taste it. You may be overcome by the fumes and unable to seek help. Symptoms include shortness of breath, nausea, headaches, dizziness, and light-headedness. Cottages are particularly vulnerable to high levels of carbon monoxide because of the presence of fuel-fired devices such as gas, propane or wood-heating systems and appliances. You are also at greater risk if you have an attached carport or garage, or a boathouse with living quarters above because of the emissions from car and boat engines.

The good news is that there are steps you can take to prevent cottage fires, to protect your cottage from bush fires, to improve your chances of surviving a fire, and to avoid carbon monoxide tragedies. Information specifically for cottage owners is available through the Peace of Mind for Your Piece of Heaven Campaign, presented by Kidde Smoke & Carbon Monoxide Alarms, Cottage Life, the Federation of Ontario Cottagers’ Associations, the Ministry of Natural Resources, the Fire Marshall’s Public Fire Safety Council, the Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs, and Moose FM, plus a long list of cottage lake associations and partners.

Finally, enter the Safe at the Cottage Contest and share photos and stories about how you made your cottage property more CO Safe and FireSmart. There are lots of prizes, including subscriptions to Cottage Life magazine and Kidde smoke detectors and CO alarms.

Please, be safe this summer.

What else can you turn into an outhouse?

1. Car

Pro: Easy to move

Con: Easy to steal

2. Chest freezer

Pro: Ability to keep Popsicles close at hand

Con: Frostbite

3. Bus shelter

Pro: Already smells gross anyway

Con: See-through

4. Chicken coop

Pro: Farm-fresh eggs!

Con: Constant danger of fox attack

5. Antique wardrobe

Pro: Access to the land of Narnia, hello

Con: Frequently cluttered

6. Phone booth

Pro: Rarely busy: These days, everyone has a cell phone

Con: That jerk Superman. Like, buddy, do you really need to change in here now?

Any others?

Would you agree? Considering how my dogs have behaved around the full moon—not to mention some of my favourite people—I’d say there’s more to folklore than meets the moonstruck eye!

It was two storeys, white with green trim, same as the rented cottage up the hill. The two of us slept alone in the single room over the boat slip. She was nine; I was 10.

Though we fell asleep every night listening to the lake’s lullaby, I cannot tell you what the space below us looked like, or even if there was a boat in the slip. It was only later that I learned the wet bottoms of these buildings were as much fun as the bunkie above. Step inside a boathouse’s weather-beaten walls and find the paradox of a lovely vessel under scarred timbers, or a hodgepodge of treasures—old outboards, lifejackets, waterskis, fishing lures, tools—that make boathouses part garage, part workshop, part museum.

Since those early years with my sister, I’ve had the chance to peek inside lots of boathouses, from magnificent new structures with multiple slips and summer homes on top to simple sheds plunked down on a dock. I figured that the price tags matched the buildings, but even I was surprised to discover, in David Zimmer’s story on the subject in our June issue (“Three Walls, Hold the Floor,” p. 68), the high cost of building a simple, single-storey, single-slip boathouse. A revision of John Prine’s famous song floated into my head: “There’s a hole in the dock where all the money goes.”

That’s why cottagers who have boathouses need to take care of them. Like the old barns of rural Ontario, they are a dying breed. And as David reminds us, once they fall down, it can be difficult to rebuild them.

If it fell down, DH and I would miss the old boathouse at our cottage. So we keep shoring up the crooked rock cribs that teeter above Georgian Bay’s low water. During the winter, we store five boats in there (a Boston Whaler, a canoe, a Laser, and two Windsurfers), plus oil and gas, a grease gun, propellers, gear oil, hanks of rope, two anchors, a bag of blocks and lines, paddles (broken and otherwise), folding chairs, chainfall hoists, and a cash register (long story).

When he was a teenager, DH scrawled some oil–gas ratios on one wall which still come in handy. Nearby in black marker is his late father’s procla-mation: Mary is great. Where better to leave a tribute to his wife?

Which reminds me of another story from our childhood sleeping cabin. A big picture window filled the wall at the lake end of our bedroom. Underneath was an upholstered bench. One night, my sister and I knelt there beside my dad. He had given us a flashlight. Dit-dit-dit-dit dit dit-dah-dit-dit dit-dah-dit-dit dah-dah-dah. Our flashing beam sent the message out into the blackness. “Hello.”

Suddenly, from a stranger somewhere on the far shore, came a tiny answering light: Dit-dit-dit-dit dit dit-dah-dit-dit dit-dah-dit-dit dah-dah-dah. “Hello!”

Over the years, I forgot most of the Morse code our dad taught us that summer, but I have never forgotten the charms of the boathouse.

This spring, DH made his first trip to the cottage earlier than ever before. The morning after a fierce windstorm, he e-mailed me the photo above with the subject line: Look what happened last night…

If you make money from using a boat, as of July 1, you may have to register your boat as a commercial vessel with Transport Canada. This applies to most commercial vessels and not just those greater than 15 gross tonnage, as previously. The change has been in the works for a while, since the Canada Shipping Act, 2001 came into effect on July 1, 2007, but with a five-year grace period. It applies to any vessel that is used in a commercial operation, even if you’re not explicitly charging passengers a fare (heads up, cottage-country real estate agents ferrying prospective buyers to look at properties).

There has been some confusion, however, about which boats this law applies to: Recently, tour and summer camp operators and Scouts and Girl Guides groups were concerned that they would have to register every single canoe, kayak, and sailboat in their fleets. The government responded by tweaking the rules so that “human-powered vessels, small sailing vessels, and small vessels fitted with propulsion motors less than 10 horse power (7.5 kW)” will not have to be registered. (Sigh of relief for anyone who uses a tinny to deliver products to the docks on your lake.) Transport Canada also provided a chart that outlines which vessels have to be registered (in either the Canadian Registery of Vessels or the Small Vessel Register) or licensed, and in which cases licensing or vessel registration is voluntary. Small commercial vessels are also required to have lifejackets for everyone on board. They must be lifejackets, not PFDs, and the label must identify them as such and say that they are approved by Transport Canada.