Stories In Her Sediment

Crawford Lakes Special Sediment and the Story Missing from the Anthropocene

Back in 2023, I was working at Conservation Halton and specifically Crawford Lake Conservation Area in Milton, Ontario, as the Indigenous Education Coordinator. I had many roles in this job, but for the story being told today, I’ll talk about just one of them. I was fortunate enough to be a part of the ongoing Anthropocene research at Crawford Lake. What is the Anthropocene you may ask? This is a proposed addition to the Geologic Time Scale, which is the official timeline of the history of planet Earth. This addition would scientifically mark the start of when human beings started to significantly alter the Earth system, so much so that we can measure it in sediment. Out of the whole world, 13 places were chosen by scientists to research and find a place to mark the start of the Anthropocene. Following research in the spring of 2023 to extract a sediment core deep within the lake, which I was lucky enough to witness and be a part of, Crawford Lake was chosen as the most scientifically accurate place on planet Earth to mark the start of the proposed Anthropocene. From my end, I worked with our Indigenous partners at Crawford Lake and other people at Conservation Halton to help coordinate the process of extracting the sediment in a good, respectful, and reciprocal way. To say the least, the whole process was a surreal experience for me.

Why was Crawford Lake chosen as the spot to mark the proposed Anthropocene? Well, that’s because ‘it’ contains very special sediment, which is a key to understanding the past. Each year, during the summer, a light band of sediment forms, and in the winter, it is capped with a dark band. Normally, layers in a lake like this would mix with each other, losing their chronological information, but the layers in Crawford Lakes’ special sediment remain undisturbed indefinitely, providing an unbroken record of the past. This sediment can tell us about both local and global climate by capturing a snapshot of the atmospheric chemistry on a yearly basis. That’s why Crawford Lake and, more specifically ‘its’ sediment can be used as a scientific marker to the official start of when humans began to significantly alter the Earth system.

When the news broke that Crawford Lake would potentially become the area scientists chose to represent the start of the Anthropocene, many articles were released in the media. Not just Canadian or North American media but media sources from all over the world. However, these articles were like parts churned out from a factory, all pretty much the same and with little nuance. For the most part, they focused solely on the science, and many of the articles failed to mention the Indigenous involvement in the project, as well as the steep Indigenous history of Crawford Lake. But this isn’t even the biggest part of the story that is missing in my opinion.

So, what’s the story that is missing from the media? When it comes to Crawford Lake, I like to say that there are stories in her sediment that are still waiting to be told. From an Anishinaabe perspective and from the perspective of the Indigenous people we consulted and worked with during the planning and sediment extraction at Crawford Lake, we see the lake quite differently from the Western perspective. We do not view Crawford Lake as an ‘it’ or simply as an ecosystem. Instead, we see the lake as a mother. As a mother, the lake embodies female energy with a kind, gentle, and nurturing nature. One that is focused on taking care of all the beings, whether biotic or abiotic. I think the most amazing story that we can draw from the sediment is one of how humans interact and use the resources (or gifts) of the land. While Crawford Lake cannot speak English, but she does communicate. Not with words from a mouth or text on a page. Crawford Lake speaks not through sound but through sediment, layer by layer; all we have to do is just listen and learn. If we listen, the lake teaches us how humans have utilized the land around the lake, for good or bad. That special sediment found in one very specific spot of the lake is the perfect storyteller.

The sediment not only captures what was happening in the atmosphere during the time it was deposited, but it also captures the human interaction and land use directly surrounding the lake. It’s a well-known fact that Indigenous people lived at Crawford Lake pre-contact. However, instead of painting a broad brush stroke of ‘Indigenous,’ let’s get more specific. Undoubtedly, many First Nations people called Crawford Lake home for thousands of years. However, archeological studies show that people lived by the lake throughout the 1300s-1400s. No one knows for sure what First Nation groups were living here at this time, but they were most likely the ancestors of the Wendat or Attawandaron people, and they were farmers. Hundreds and hundreds of acres of corn, beans, squash, and other crops would have covered the land surrounding Crawford Lake and the historical village. Much like the land surrounding the lake today is farmed, so too was it in the past.

An amazing thing about the sediment is that it changes visibly when humans farm or disturb the land near Crawford Lake. Instead of delicate dim bands forming, stark contrasting layers of light and dark are created. When the Wendat or Attawandaron people farmed close to the lake, you can see the clear contrast in the sediment. Then, it suddenly disappears, signalling that these people moved on long before Europeans stepped on this land.

For the next 500 years or so, the sediment returns to very thin, almost imperceivable light and dark bands. Then the year that the Crawford family (of who the conservation area is named) bought the property, BANG! Once again, very noticeable light and dark bands appear. And they’ve remained ever since, as the land transitioned from private ownership from the Crawfords to becoming part of Conservation Halton.

What do we learn if we listen to the stories being told in the sediment? We learn that as human beings, we will always affect the land on which we live. But how we take gifts (natural resources) from the land and utilize the land makes all the difference. What was not a part of the First Nations culture was exploiting the land and using the gifts of the land without caring for the land herself or all the beings of the land. We never took without giving back, and the biggest difference was the respect and the reciprocity that went into the process of utilizing gifts from the land.  First Nation people have understood balance and proper environmental ethics since time immemorial.

And so that's the story that should be told more when it comes to the sediment. The story is that humans will always have an effect on the Earth, but the way we do this makes all the difference to current and future generations of all beings.