The Friends of Petrie Island volunteers operate the interpretive centre and programs, special events tent and maintain the trail system in the Grandmaitre Ecological Reserve so that all who visit can enjoy this unique natural gem in the City of Ottawa. There are a number of ways you can get involved.
Buy a Membership in Friends of Petrie Island
Membership funding supports the work of the Friends of Petrie Island such as the nature trails and our nature displays and programs.
Annual membership is $10 for an individual and $25 for a family.
Members Receive:
- Discounts on picnic table reservations
- discounts on tent rentals
- special members-only events
- monthly emailed dispatches from the island
- occasional bulletins about conditions/happenings on the island
See below to become a member of the Friends of Petrie Island.
Volunteer
We can use more hands to get the labor-intensive maintenance and improvement work done. Trail maintenance, general carpentry of benches and picnic tables, helping with the wildflower garden need volunteers. Each spring there are weekend clean-ups after the floods.
Many visitors help out by picking up garbage on the trails as they walk and dropping it in the trash bins at every trailhead. Make it a family project! Garbage bags are available at the interpretive centre. Our volunteers check the trails regularly, but if you see any dangerous trees or excessive garbage, please report those to the interpretive center.
Help out with environmental stewardship projects such as removal of invasive species, wire wrapping trees to protect them against beaver damage, and locating nesting turtles.
Share your special expertise. Do you have a special skill such as painting, teaching, botany, amateur astronomy, storytelling or are you a keen naturalist? Let’s talk about how this skill can help with FOPI’s goals! We can also use any relevant information you might have about the islands, their history, geology, plants and animals, and photographs.
Of course, there is lots of behind the scenes work that volunteers do. Become a part of the executive, help with social media, attend one of the regular monthly meetings to share your ideas and support.
Donate
- Donations are accepted. You can choose to target them to our Adopt a Baby Turtle program which gets priority for Turtle Hatchling Release Days (Donate)