[Sust-mar] Harrison Lewis Centre News

[Harrison Lewis Centre]

*News, views, and plans for 2016*

*The Harrison Lewis Coastal Discovery Centre*

While much of the Maritimes is getting hammered by snow it is a dark and 
dismal day on the Harrison Lewis hill. Such is frequently the case on 
this western end of the South Shore. Cold, wind, and rain. But we are 
dry, and warm by a fire in the kitchen range, and it is a perfect 
afternoon to at last put digits to keyboard in an effort to bring 
everyone up to date on what has been happening and what the Harrison 
Lewis Coastal Discovery Centre Society has planned for the coming season 
that gets underway in May.

First of all, a long overdue message of thanks to long-standing members 
of the board who stepped aside as of our annual meeting in August. Jane 
Cook, whose summer home is across the bay in Port Joli, has been with us 
from the beginning, providing support and encouragement, as was the case 
with Peter Carver, past chair and as well, a summer resident with a home 
three doors over from the Centre. Ian Dingwall, great grandson of 
Harrison Lewis, stepped up filling the seat prematurely left vacant when 
his father, founding director and chair Lewis (Lew) Dingwall suffered a 
fatal heart attack.

New additions to the board are Doug van Hemessen, Atlantic stewardship 
coordinator with the Nature Conservancy of Canada; Sarah Gutowsky, a PhD 
candidate at Dalhousie University; and Michael Greenlaw, summer 
neighbour and student at Kings. Sarah, a biologist, has participated as 
student, teaching assistant, and lead instructor with the University’s 
Seaside Summer program bringing ornithology students to the Harrison 
Lewis Centre.

As far as activities this past year, in addition to four Seaside Summer 
programs, Anne Gray serving as manager brought together weekend 
workshops. There was Roger Savage (plein air painting); mushroom culture 
with David Boyle assisted by John Crabtree; scything with instructor 
Peter Redden; chainsaw workshops with Patrick Allan; and nature writing 
with Soren Bondrup Nielsen.

Plein air students and instructor alike made the most of views from the 
back deck of the main building. An example is Roger’s painting 
reproduced here that the artist has generously donated to the Society. 
As soon as we’ve permission in place we will be offering chances on the 
painting for a draw sometime this summer. Board member Susan Hoover has 
fond memories of Soren’s nature writing workshop in which she took part. 
"There were four of us, all with different interests and levels of 
skill. Soren was a good facilitator. We spent a great deal of time 
looking at moss and other tiny plants. A real eye opener. I really 
enjoyed this workshop."

What now? Plans for the coming year. Dalhousie Seaside has booked four 
programs, we expect the Biology Grad students to return for a social 
weekend in September, and a committee headed by Doug van Hemessen is 
charged with scheduling a variety of workshops and programs, including 
new to us bird-by-ear courses. We welcome suggestions for ways to put 
this Centre to work with workshops, retreats, or events of various sorts 
with the desired focus being natural history and skills relating to home 
and farmstead life.

We look forward to hearing from anyone and everyone with a history with 
or interest in the future of the Harrison Lewis Coastal Discovery Centre.

Best regards, Dirk van Loon

On behalf of the HLC Society Board of Directors

Peter Rogers, chair

Stephanie Carver, secretary

Susan Hoover, treasurer

Willem van Loon

Michael Greenlaw

Richard McBride

Sarah Gutowsky

Doug van Hemessen

Christine Curry

The Harrison Lewis Coastal Discovery Centre

is a registered charity (#859077810)

and can issue tax receipts for donations.

Harrison Lewis Coastal Discovery Centre

339 Sandy Bay Road

RR 1 Port Joli NS B0T 1S0

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://list.web.net/pipermail/sust-mar/attachments/20160113/a0de2a90/attachment-0001.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: DSC_0209.JPG
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 575876 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://list.web.net/pipermail/sust-mar/attachments/20160113/a0de2a90/attachment-0001.jpe>