Land donated by 'restorer not destroyer' residents opens as new nature park near St. Thomas

Two Talbotville-area residents with a passion for the natural world will see their generous donation of land open this week as southwestern Ontario's newest conservation area, and the first in Southwold Township.

The Deer Ridge Conservation Area will officially open Thursday, two years after the 46-acre forested property, located southwest of Talbot Line and Sunset Road, was donated in perpetuity to Kettle Creek Conservation Authority (KCCA) by Ted and Duggie Gill.

Named after the Gill's nearby horse farm, the couple expressly requested that KCCA share the donated land with the community, and turn it into a conservation area. 

"They've been conservationists the entire time they've owned the property. Very close to nature, well-respected in the community," said Grant Jones, the mayor of Southwold and chair of the conservation authority.

"When they decided they needed to downsize, they thought the proper thing would be to give it to the conservation authority for proper care over the next millennia."

Located at 147 Glengariff Dr., the new conservation area features a 1.7 kilometre natural walking trail, wooden bridges, and a lookout over Dodd Creek which flows through the property.

The southernmost end of the conservation area will be closed to the public as per the Gill's wishes, KCCA says. The property's southernmost border abuts the couple's home and farm, which they purchased in the early 1980s, along with the donated land.

"We bought this junkyard place. Nobody wanted it. End of a one-mile-long lane way. But it was my own rural development project," Ted told CBC News.

The Gills cleared away thorn trees, wild apple trees, and hawthorns, and added ponds, a cattail swamp, and a saw grass marsh, among others, he said. 

The property has "one of the largest tracts of interior forest" in the watershed, and is home to at least 324 species of plants and animals, including 56 birds, 36 insects, 10 fish, seven amphibians, and nine species designated as at-risk, KCCA officials said.

"I spent 30 years redeveloping a scrapyard farm into a jewel. And then I thought, I want to keep this as a place of refuge for animals and species of all manner, instead of being paved by a goddamned suburb," Ted said.

It's the various subdivisions sprouting up near the couple's home that led to a search for a long-term steward of the land, and ultimately, the donation to KCCA.

The Gills donated the property through the federal Ecological Gifts Program, KCCA said. The program provides tax benefits to landowners donating land to a qualified recipient who will ensure "biodiversity and environmental heritage are conserved in perpetuity."

"As long as I'm alive, I can protect it, because I'm a mean old bastard… but it's really hard to protect something after you have become somewhat decrepit," Ted said.

"I lived all over the world, and I became more of a believer in (that) we humans are a cancer on the Earth, and we have to protect the Earth from the greedy aspects of humanity."

Provincial property records show the KCCA took ownership of the property in March 2022. It's the first land it's acquired since 1975, when it obtained what's now Dalewood Conservation Authority. 

It's no easy feat transferring land and turning it into a conservation area, Jones said. A challenge was ensuring easy public access despite a new subdivision in an adjoining lot. 

"We're looking at improving what's down there and restricting access to four-wheelers, which was a problem in the past for Mr. Gill," Jones said, adding the property is "all woodlot and gully," and isn't developable for residential or industrial use.

KCCA says related capital and operating costs have been funded via the federal Canada Nature Fund and the Green Lane Community Trust, a fund into which the City of Toronto pays a portion of gross revenues from the nearby landfill it operates.

Annual operating costs will be paid for by the conservation authority.

Gill said he was pleased to see what has been done to his old property, and says he'll work with the conservation authority to improve it further.

"We as humanity, we can do nasty things to the Earth, and it is up to certain people, part of humanity, to try to restore instead of just destroying," he said.

"I see myself as a restorer, not a destroyer."