Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.
Caroline Blakely and 13 other volunteers found a fridge tangled about 300 metres deep in the woods, along with children's toys, fishing poles, roofs, water heaters and lumber on the west side of Grand Lake. The garbage was likely from floods in 2018 and 2019, where unprecedented water levels destroyed homes and displaced more than 1,100 residents along the St. John River and nearby lakes.
