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Stewardship and Invasive Species Programs
About Ivy Busters
Started in partnership with the Vancouver Park Board in 2004, our Ivy Busters program is one of the Stanley Park Ecology Society (SPES)'s key conservation and public engagement programs. The purpose of the program is to contribute to the ecological restoration of Stanley Park while providing stewardship volunteers with a fun, rewarding experience in beautiful Stanley Park.
Our activities focus primarily on removing alien invasive species from Stanley Park, but we also get involved in other restoration work such as planting native plant species, plant salvaging, clean-up efforts, mapping, and monitoring. With all of our work we focus on conservation, and strive to implement best management practices to ensure that we are properly stewarding Stanley Park for everyone to enjoy.
Replanting salmonberry on a site with removed ivy (Photo: J. Peers)
During our 2007-08 fiscal year, Ivy Busters volunteers made a greater impact than any time in the history of the program; contributing 5158 hours of volunteer work and removing 696 cubic meters of invasive plants from Stanley Park. Thanks to the hard work and dedication of these awesome Ivy Busters, 1.3 hectares of invasives were cleared last year. This means that since the program's inception in 2004, Ivy Busters volunteers have dedicated 10281 hours to stewardship in Stanley Park and removed 3.95 hectares of invasives from the Park!
In addition to invasives removals, stewardship volunteers also participated in several planting events in Stanley Park's restoration areas during the spring of 2008. Over 400 trees and 190 shrubs and herbaceous plants were planted last year. Thank you to everyone for your valuable contributions to the restoration of Stanley Park!
The restoration of Stanley Park is an on-going process, and there are plenty of opportunities to come and help out! For more information, please visit our Ivy Busters and volunteer opportunities pages.
