Then and Now, What a Change

Once upon a time, it was all forest around here. There were no fields to speak of.

The loggers moved in, taking out the big white pines to send to England for the navy, taking out the hemlock to send the bark to the Tannery in Huntsville. Then the settlers arrived, and found you just couldn't plow around trees for a crop.

Now we replant the open spaces. We are more sensitive to the delicate line where water meets land.

With 600 acres of land, at Bondi we are very aware of our duty of stewardship to the land, and very proud of the diverse ecology sharing that land. Most of our forest is in managed forest agreements. And some of the land is in managed wildlife agreements -- those require that we maintain open fields, because those open fields are themselves an endangered species sometimes. There are plenty of birds and animals that really need that difference of habitat. Our bluebirds, for one, like to nest overlooking big open fields, but close to forests.And we've won stewardship awards over the years for our land management -- not to mention getting a big thumbs up from our neighbouring wildlife!

Recently one of our guests, Gord, dropped by to visit us again after being gone some 30 years. Returning home, he dug out some of his old photos, and sent us this one. It's taken from the Bondi Lookout, back in the mid-1950's. And the one thing that really stands out -- the fields! There are no trees planted yet on the hilltop, or along the road. Very few of our cottages were built (notably Red Pine, Tamarack and Longside!) except for those right along the shoreline. The gravel pit across the road -- from where the gravel came to build Bigwin Inn -- is very obvious.

About the same time, some of our guests here hiked up to the Lookout in that last week of summer before school pulled the kids away. Boris and Sunny sent us this picture -- taken from the same spot, and at almost the same angle as Gord's.

We still have the trees along the shoreline, but over the years with careful plantings, the trees around the cottages have grown, providing shade and privacy, while still keeping our sweeping open lawns. In fact, it's astonishing how few of the cottages you can see, now!

The road is hidden behind the trees, and the back fields -- especially the neighbours! is far less of a 'field'

And we've added the detail, bottom left corner, of Brian and David returning with the Piper Cub from a flight. We think that's a nice touch.