Spent the day last Saturday with a group of volunteers removing fence posts from land along the Crowsnest River at Burmis. The effort was part of an ongoing stewardship of 93 acres public land and two km of riverfront that needs TLC.

I’m of two minds on the idea of volunteers looking after something considered owned by the public. After all, don’t we pay taxes for someone to take care of public things? On the other hand, if someone or a group has an interest and are willing to do the work, that frees tax money to be spent elsewhere. And the work is usually a labor of love.

This particular project took root about 10 years ago, when the person who held the lease to graze cattle lost it because, word has it, he didn’t take care of it. As well, concern arose that the prime land had some appeal for private development of a fishing lodge, which would effectively remove the area from public access.

A group of fly fishers involved with Trout Unlimited decided it was worth taking on, formed a society (necessary to apply for the lease) and started cleaning up the property as soon as the lease was approved in 2002.

During several early workdays, what seemed like miles of old barbed wire, some kind of attached to old posts but most on the ground and in the river snagging anglers’ waders, were removed and taken to the dump at Cowley. Noxious blueweed, ox-eye daisy, tansy and toadflax, which had been allowed to take hold, were attacked with shovels and hoes, a start at weed control that has carried on yearly.

As part of the lease terms, a new fenced compound was erected away from the river to accommodate the occasional cattle grazing to control grass for fire prevention. Over the years, it was never used for that purpose and seemed out of place in a recovering, natural habitat. As well, when a moose ran into it last year, it was obvious wildlife didn’t have much use for it.

So, this year’s work party took it down, one crew removing the wire in off weather and the next group pulling posts on a beautiful day a week later.

Malcolm, who has been Burmis lease project chairman, manned the tractor while Gerry wrapped a chain around posts then pulled up by the tractor. I closed the holes. Clive loaded posts onto his pickup to take to a second TU lease upstream at Hillcrest, where even more work has been done over the past two years under Mike’s supervision..

When I told Malcolm and Gerry it took 45 seconds to removed a post and move to the next, they stopped to make sure they took a more appropriate time. When they resumed, the next few posts took only 30 seconds. Then the younger Blair from Lethbridge, Randy from Fort Macleod and Brent from Claresholm came along to help out and the process speeded up even more. In three hours, we removed about 160 posts.

When Gerry looked back, he said, “That looks really good,” sort of like it’s supposed to look.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we didn’t need fences in the world?