With friends like the MNR, the Black Rat snake might not need enemies

Jeff Green | Feb 09, 2012

Efforts have been underway for several years by the Lanark and Leeds Grenville Stewardship Councils, and have been taken up by the Frontenac Council as well, to promote public awareness of the unique value and characteristics of the Black Rat Snake, which is one of the species that make the Frontenac Axis of the Canadian Shield a unique biosphere.

Mature Black Rat snakes, which are harmless to humans, can reach the length of 1.85 metres. They are the longest snakes found in Canada, and while they are common throughout the north-eastern United States, they are only found in two locations in Canada.

In one of those locations, near Lake Erie in south-western Ontario, they are an endangered species.

The Frontenac Axis population, which is a genetically unique population, is in a much better position. The snakes continue to be plentiful, and from anecdotal accounts by people living near Otty Lake near Perth, 14 Island Lake near Verona, and other locations as well, they are a very common sight in the spring and summer time. Then can be found in sheds, climbing trees, splayed out on gravel roads on hot days, and occasionally even slithering across dining room floors during dinner parties.

While snakes, particularly large snakes, are not always popular with humans, the Black Rat Snake has a lot of friends in the Frontenac Axis, and ongoing education campaigns pointing out their attributes and the role they have played in the local ecosystem for millennia have led to a more or less peaceful co-existence with the human population.

Habitat loss has also not been a real concern, as pointed out in a recent MNR document. “The availability of suitable habitat in the Frontenac Axis [for the snakes] is thought to have increased over the past 100 years; much previously worked farmland is now fallow. However, any gains in this respect may have been counteracted by negative trends in other factors.”

The negative trends referred to above relate to long-term studies at Murphy’s Point Provincial Park (near Perth), the Queen’s University Biological Station (near Elgin) and in St. Lawrence Islands Natural Park. These studies have shown a declining population.

Under the Ontario Species at Risk Act, regulations are being proposed that are aimed at protecting the Frontenac Axis Black Rat Snake population.

Under the proposed regulations, Black Rat Snakes (which are called Grey Rat Snakes under the regulations) will become a protected species in a wide swath of Eastern Ontario to the south of Highway 7. Areas covered in the regulations cover the parts of Frontenac, Lanark and Leeds and Grenville Counties that are located south of Highway 7, as well as the City of Kingston and the Town of Perth.

The proposed regulations would restrict, though not necessarily halt, development under three circumstances. In the rare locations where the snakes are known to hibernate, (the regulations call these hibernacula) a 150-meter buffer may be imposed. In “natural or non-natural egg laying sites, communal shedding sites and communal basking sites” a 30-meter buffer may be imposed. The most surprising of the measures, however, is the final one.

“Areas suitable for foraging, thermoregulation, hibernation, reproduction, dispersal, or migration within 1000 meters of any area that has been used by a Grey Rat Snake (Frontenac Axis population) would also be protected.”

While that last provision is not altogether clear, it could be seen to imply that within a 1 kilometre radius of any sighting of a rat snake there would be restrictions on development, or at the very least, costly studies would be necessary before any building, clearing of brush, or road construction could take place.

The News called the ministry for clarification about this 1000 meter area but did not receive a response.

Official responses to these proposed regulations were due on Monday of this week, and while a limited number of people received notification about the regulations in December, it seems that none of the residents in Frontenac County received notification from the ministry. (Again, we asked the ministry for information about what logic they used in deciding who to notify, but did not receive a response).

Susan Freeman, the Deputy Reeve of Tay Valley Township, who lives on Otty Lake, did not receive a letter from the ministry either, but one of her constituents did and sent it to her. She brought the issue up at Tay Valley Township and the Board of the Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO).

Last Tuesday, Tay Valley Township passed a motion that outlined some of the impacts of the proposed regulations on Tay Valley. The motion reads, in part: “The proposed regulations would have a dire and drastic impact on the future of the municipality, for instance: it poses a real threat to development; private landowners will no longer be able to carry out even the simplest task on their property such as cutting dead or dangerous trees that threaten buildings or human safety; provincial park personnel and conservation authorities will no longer be able to put in new camp sites, clear areas, erect or tear down buildings, remove trees or branches, build or grade roads, or anything that would violate the rules of the regulation; Hydro One and Bell will not be able to add or remove poles, brush trees or clear remove vegetation for new lines; County and Township municipalities will no longer be able to grade roads, control noxious weeds along roadways, repair or build fences, issue building or demolition permits without extreme red tape.”

The motion then asks the province to consider stewardship and education in favour of “burdensome restrictions that could result in property owner actions that run counter to protecting Species at Risk.”

Freeman said that the Tay Valley motion is being circulated to other affected municipalities for support, and that AMO, of which she is a board member, will be seeking a meeting with the Minister of Natural Resources, Michael Gravelle, later this month to discuss the regulations.

“We need to make the provincial government understand that rural people have a deep appreciation of the place they live in and making rules like this, with no consultation, won’t do any good at all, particularly for the species they are trying to protect,” Freeman said.

The theme of the new regulations being a detriment to conservation efforts for the rat snakes was central to a submission that Gord Rodgers, the president of both the Frontenac Stewardship Council and the 14 Island Lake Property Owners Association, sent to the ministry recently. Rogers’ submission included the following: “When we live in an area where the habitat of this species is everywhere around us, habitat regulation will not work. Education and awareness programs will protect the population of the Grey Rat Snake, not habitat regulation. The proposed regulation will alienate the majority of landowners who might be quite happy to protect their rat snakes, but now will be afraid to admit that they have these threatened creatures on their land, for fear of being prosecuted under the Endangered Species Act.”

Lanark Frontenac Lennox and Addington MPP Randy Hillier, a long time critic of the Species at Risk Act, has also weighed in on the proposed regulations. In a media release that came out on Monday, February 6, Hillier said, “This is just another example of Toronto environmental bureaucrats imposing burdensome and costly regulations on the residents of Rural Ontario. These biologists and scientists from the MNR can’t even provide basic evidence and analysis to demonstrate a need for these new regulations, yet alone grasp the impact their proposals have on property value and future land development.”

MPP Steve Clark, from Leeds-Grenville, said, “This dictatorial approach to species protection is like using a sledgehammer to kill a housefly and actually undermines conservation efforts by creating justifiable resentment and mistrust among property owners.”

As for the Black Rat Snakes themselves? They could not be reached for comment, being, as it seems officials from the Ministry of Natural Resources are saying, hidden away in hibernacula.