Keep Ocean Life on the Move

This unit looks at aquatic habitat and focuses primarily on the challenges facing migratory species, like leatherback sea turtles, harlequin ducks, Atlantic salmon, and grey whales. To survive, marine migrants need unbroken chains of feeding and resting sites between their breeding and wintering areas. Many species, including the whooping crane, depend on both marine and inland habitats to complete their migrations. If just one habitat is destroyed by, say, construction or pollution, a link in the migratory chain is broken. That's just one reason why all Canadians — from the dampest shorelands to the driest grasslands — have a stake in conserving habitat for ocean life.

• This package constitutes a long-term lesson plan designed to inform youth from coast to coast about the ecological value of marine habitats and the issues affecting them.
• It is packed with resources for classroom activities and habitat improvement projects that promote learning through constructive action.
• It encourages students to think globally by pursuing conservation objectives through national and international partnerships between schools.

1. Lesson Planning Guide
2. Ocean Life on the Move
   Life is a highway for billions of creatures that live, breed, eat, and play in the ocean.
3. Action and Awareness Projects
4. Monitor Marine Migrants
   Students can leam a lot about marine migrants — and how they depend on healthy habitats to survive — by monitoring them both in real space and in cyberspace.
5. Biodiversity Field Study
   One way to conserve our aquatic treasures is to participate in a biodiversity field study along a migratory route.
6. Conserve a Flyway
   Countless thousands of winged wanderers need places to rest and refuel as they commute between Canadian breeding grounds and wintering habitats in the United States and Central and South America.
7. Revitalize a Wetland
   Like a jewel in a crown, each wetland is priceless in its own way.
8. Sea Duck, Tree Duck
   Plunging populations in 10 of our 15 sea duck species have raised an alarm among waterfowl biologists.
9. Great Blue Hope
   Make a nesting structure that will accommodate not only great blue herons but also black-crowned night-herons and double-crested cormorants.
10. Stand on Guard for Aquatic Habitats
    We have only just started to give the marine heritage under our care the attention and protection it deserves.
11. Turn the Tide on Pollution
    For many marine migrants, the deep blue sea is becoming a deadly obstacle course, as solid waste and land-based pollution become unwelcome travelling companions.

12. Migratory Species
13. Sea Ducks on the Move
14. Summary

• Advise students to work toward conservation goals by informing themselves about ocean habitats and by completing suitable projects.
• Before undertaking habitat projects, obtain permission from landowners or your municipality and consult with a local by-laws inspector.
• Ensure the long-term benefits of projects by getting more than one grade involved and by collaborating with community groups.
• Consult with experts, such as conservation officers and marine biologists, who can tackle duties requiring special skills.
• Post weatherproof signs at project sites to inform passers-by of your objectives.
• Maximize safety by recruiting older students, parents, or community volunteers and by working in small groups.
• Take extra precautions when working near water.
• See that students wear appropriate clothing and footwear.
• Bring along a first-aid kit, sunscreen, insect repellent, and Epipen on outings.