By Staff
Bidding for the Haliburton Highlands Land Trust’s Rock Our World online auction remains open this month until Tuesday, Sept. 22. The auction helps fundraise for the management and conservation work the charity does in Haliburton County.

The land trust manages several properties across the county, including the Dahl Forest, which is open to the public for hiking. The Barnum Creek Nature Reserve, located near Haliburton Village, is to open soon.
The auction includes handcrafted one-of-a-kind items and gift certificates for local dining, among other things.
Bidding takes place on Haliburton Highlands Land Trust’s Facebook page.

New board chair
The land trust is welcoming new board chair Greg Wickware and thanking outgoing chair Mary-Lou Gerstl for her dedicated service.
Gerstl has been chair since 2016 and presided over several accomplishments including the acquisition of the 600-acre Barnum Creek Nature Reserve property.
“Mary-Lou has been an excellent leader. Her passion for all species and their habitats and her dedication to protecting the environment are unparalleled. Mary-Lou made it her business to know everything about the workings of the land trust, from administrative details to grant applications. She was involved in almost every HHLT project and event,” a press release from the land trust reads.

Wickware has been vice-chair of the board since 2017 and is a retired research scientist and expert in geomatics, the study of the earth’s surface.
“Greg has facilitated a number of interesting and important U-Links/Trent University student research projects over the years. He has acted as an advisor and has supervised many students in the field at land trust properties and at their computers as they write up the results of their research,” the press release says.
Wickware was also involved with the Barnum Creek acquisition with property owners Margaret and Leopoldina Dobrzensky.
Staff