For those who live in the community of Peterborough, have.The deafening sound of the chainsaws seems to inflate from every corner.
“If you drive in the city, it’s carnage. There are debris everywhere,” said Evan Noland.
The arborist and owner of New Growth Tree Care, did not have the chance to breathe since March 28 – the day when ice storm came to crash through the province and lasted more than two days.
Little by almost 20 mm of ice accumulation, trees and power lines began to tumble at alarming rates in the northern, southern and east parts of Ontario – wreaking havoc on property and fauna, and plunging hundreds of thousands in the dark.
Since early Friday evening, nearly 121,000 Hydro One customers have always been without electricity.
“This is probably the worst (damage) that I have seen,” said Noland, who has been in the trees sector for almost a decade.
“The Derecho 2022 – It was a pretty bad storm. But honestly, it does not even compare what I see now. There are people who came as far as Timiskaming – it’s five hours away – to answer and help.”
Evan Noland and his brother Mark, say they worked more than 12 hours a day to answer the calls of the residents of Peterborough.
Noor Ra’fat / Global News Toronto
With members of trees scattered around hundreds of sidewalks of the city, the number of lost trees may seem immense.
But experts say they quantify the disaster does not present themselves as simple.
“Working with municipalities, private landowners, the provincial government to really understand the full extent – I would say that it could take a few years,” Jessica Kaknevicius, CEO of Fores Canada, told Global News.
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“I think what (the crews) are really security focused. Trees and forests that do not represent an immediate danger will probably be left until the summer for people to re -evaluate all damage. ”
However, Kaknevicius says that this ice storm is one of the most powerful she has seen in recent years – after that of 1998.
“I would say that in Southern Ontario, we really can’t afford to lose more forest coverage here. We should really look at new innovative ways to keep what we have and restore what has been lost,” she said.
Such losses could have serious consequences in urban areas, said Kaknevicius.
Tree awnings help block many precipitation to reach the ground. For communities with fewer trees, the risk of flooding increases.
With the absence of the shadow of the trees, temperatures can also increase in surrounding areas and snow can melt at higher speed, saturating the ground.
Among the thousands of people rushing to calculate their potential losses, corporate owners like Shannon Porter have raised their commercial affairs in the long term.
“It is extremely dangerous to access the woods of the woods at the moment. There are many branches and hooked members in the trees,” said Porter to Porte Lumber in Port Dover, Ontario.
Porter says that the high season for wood harvesting is in winter. But now, thousands of trees that were to be harvested at the end of this year have collapsed too early.
Worried that wood could decompose if they wait too long, suppliers can be forced to sell the brush in the coming weeks, which will considerably reduce its price.
In addition, the trees that have damaged the branches but which are still standing will now have reduced their lifespan to about a year, before the quality of the wood decreases, said wearing.
“This is probably one of the worst moments to harvest these trees,” he said.
The forestry activity of carrying serves international customers, including those of Michigan and Pennsylvania.
He said he was already concerned about the possibility that the United States imposed Canadian wood prices.
Now, this potential decrease in the value of its product adds more uncertainty to its finances.
“The way he seems right now, looking at our industry, if (the United States) were priced our business, it would close everyone,” he said.
On Friday, in a statement, Natural Resources Canada told Global News that she did not follow the national figures on forest coverage destroyed after bad weather.
“Abiotic damage, such as ice storms, is mapped by certain provinces, but not by others,” said the press release.
However, researchers have been able to estimate the damage caused by other disasters in recent years, such as forest fires in 2023 in British Columbia.
According to Canada forests, 18 million hectares of trees have been lost, which could equip more than 30 billion trees.
Although these figures may seem devastating, Kaknevicius says that the canopy of the state of Canada does not seem dark.
“The trees are really resilient and can bounce back. I don’t think the situation is disastrous, but I think we really have to be careful about what we do with our forests and landscapes, and work with Aboriginal communities to improve long-term forest health, ”she said.
Kaknevicius and Porter say that only time will say how Ontario’s green infrastructure will get out in the coming months.
But as cleaning continues in many communities and the risk of more unpublished time remains on the horizon, Noland says that the owners should not take matters into their own hands.
“Call a professional to assess the situation. It is not worth risking your life if you don’t know what you are doing,” he said.
