Cudmore Creek Ravine may be midtown’s forgotten ravine, but it hasn’t been completely overlooked. On June 20, the City completed the Cudmore Creek Wetland and Trailhead Project, which has transformed a section of this ravine into an oasis of biodiversity, and a destination for users of the Crother’s Woods trail network.
The site of the new wetland is just north of the intersection of Bayview Avenue and Pottery Road, close to where Cudmore Creek meets the Don River. This was previously a degraded area used for parking vehicles and equipment, and surrounded by thickets of invasive buckthorn and dog-strangling vine. The area now provides an end point for a loop trail in Crothers Woods, and a connection with the Lower Don Valley trail. The site has been converted into a wetland with two ponds surrounded by native plantings.
The wetland fringes have been planted with native seedlings and saplings such as red osier dogwood, sugar maple, staghorn sumac, sandbar willow, and black chokeberry, to name just a few. The new plantings currently have a sparse and scraggly look, but over time they will fill in, and it will likely become an even more popular haven for birds (already enjoying the area), pollinators, and amphibians as the native plantings mature.
The wetland site is right beside the traffic light at Bayview and Pottery Road, so can be easily reached on the roadside paths from Todmorden Mills or the Evergreen Brickworks. It is also at the end of a loop trail in the Crothers’ Wood network, so is another option for anyone exploring that area. From the trail access point on Bayview a little south of Nesbitt Drive it is a walk of about 1 km in fairly rough terrain. Walkers should have good walking shoes, and might want to think twice going on this steep trail when wet. The path is also used by mountain bikes, who are directed to move in a counter-clockwise direction on the loop. Walkers can avoid mountain bikes careening downhill by using the more eastern half of the loop (with bikes leaving the wetland area going up-hill).
A walk along this trail will clearly illustrate the tendency of invasive plants to take over entire areas, with the approach to the new wetland area dominated by dog-strangling vine and buckthorn. For the new wetland to thrive, it will take a sustained effort to stop invasives from moving into the area.
The Cudmore Creek wetland and trailhead is a welcome addition to the Don Valley ecological corridor and to the local trail network. Check it out some time!
