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view . spring 2008
Researchers working at Canada’s only centre
devoted to studying the Great Lakes and
Carolinian forest eco-system will have a critical
role in monitoring and measuring biodiversity
and climate change and in helping produce
environmental and economic solutions in the
essential fisheries, shipping and agriculture
industries.
Though it has neither walls nor a name yet,
Dean of Science Richard Caron predicts it will
become a world-class facility that will give our
young faculty the resources to allow them to
accelerate and enhance their scientific research
programs so that they realize their ambitions
to become “international research stars”.
“This is a huge catalyst for research,
teaching, and community outreach,” Caron
says. “This is a really big opportunity for the
University.”
UWindsor biology professor Dr. Dan
Mennill, who co-chairs the planning committee
for the new centre with Dr. Daniel Heath of
the Great Lakes Institute for Environmental
Research (GLIER), says the University has
some of the country’s most outstanding
environmental researchers. The centre will
help establish their reputations on a national
and international scale.
“The project grew out of the realization
that Windsor’s researchers were all conducting
their world-class research programs in
far-flung places,” says Mennill. The centre
will consolidate the work of researchers at
GLIER, the departments of Biological and
Earth and Environmental Sciences and from
other departments across campus to “build
excellence.”
Caron, Mennill and others say the centre
will follow the example of GLIER, where
pioneering work on the zebra mussel in 1986
led to studies into other invasive species, raised
millions in research funding, and led to the
establishment of the Canadian Aquatic Invasive
Species Network. The network brings together
researchers from 15 universities across Canada.
“There’s so much potential down there
in that whole area and there’s so much
interest that I think a field research station
is a brilliant idea,” says Dr. Judit Smits, a
veterinary pathologist from the University of
Saskatchewan. Smits has already visited the
area to study the effects of contaminants on
the immune function in wild birds.
Caron says that scientists from around
the world will come to work at the centre,
bringing in more opportunities for international
collaborative research “and that again will
bring more funding opportunities, more
excitement, and more students.”
It has already attracted attention from such
groups and individuals as the Essex Region
Conservation Authority and Phil Roberts
of Holiday Beach Conservation Migration
Observatory, and Point Pelee National Park.
The building momentum will feed itself,
bringing exponential growth to our knowledge
of, for example, the impact of climate change
on the ecology of our region, adds Caron.
“The excitement around this new
opportunity will bring the very best people,
the very best resources and the very best
equipment. This is good for the University,
the community, and for the country.”
Mennill says the new centre will be multi-
tiered, offering research, teaching, training
and outreach opportunities to the community,
generating interest in scientific research at
area schools and among the general public.
The Town of Leamington donated the
approximately 22-acre site in September 2007,
and Caron says that private landowners in the
area have already offered the University use
of their property for research.
Under the Leamington agreement, the
town will keep its oil and gas rights on the land
and the University will be responsible for all
costs associated with the ownership transfer.
The planning committee intends to
develop a satellite model for the research
station, where the Leamington site will
provide a base station from which to explore
the biology of other aquatic and terrestrial
ecosystems in southwestern Ontario.
The centre will develop in three stages.
The first phase, already completed, involved
finding the land, situated between Point
Pelee National Park and Hillman Marsh
Conservation Area. It includes plenty of
space, overgrown fields and forest. There is
also a former clay pit that’s now a lake, which
Heath says will enable him to put in net pens
and study fish under semi-natural conditions;
doing that in Lake Erie would have presented
logistical challenges.
The second phase will involve raising up to
$2 million for a research and meeting centre on
the property. The University is considering a
number of funding sources, including private
donors.
A dormitory will house researchers while
they are doing detailed field studies. The
centre will also include a teaching facility.
UWindsor will approach governments for
funding to build a technical facility to assess
how natural systems respond to environmental
change, says Mennill.
Stage three will involve “doing some of the
most outstanding research and teaching in
Canada in terms of understanding the Great
Lakes ecosystem and the Carolinian forest
ecosystem,” he says.
That work does not depend on having
the physical structures and money in place.
Mennill, an ornithologist and expert in
bioacoustic research, says it can involve
something as simple as setting up nest boxes
and monitoring birds.
For Mennill the centre will enable him and
wife Dr. Stephanie Doucet, also a professor
and ornithologist at UWindsor, to continue
researching the behaviour of birds in what is a
major flyway.
Heath says the centre will be a self-enclosed
facility where researchers can work and teach
graduate and undergraduate students. Doing
