As the world focuses on the importance of bogs and wetlands for International Bog Day on Sunday, July 27, the Wilderness Committee is drawing attention to a wetland in Manitoba's vast system of bogs: a northern provincial park wetland that was left polluted with heavy metals from mining.
Toxicity tests conducted on water from the site of a decommissioned mine in Grass River Provincial Park have revealed serious and ongoing water quality issues, including extremely high concentrations of several toxic substances that pose a threat to aquatic life.

Water samples were collected by the Wilderness Committee from a bog at the former Spruce Point Mine site, and were assessed by an independent lab in Winnipeg. The mine, operated by HudBay Minerals until it was closed in 1993, has since been heralded by the company and by the Manitoba government as a success story when it comes to mine remediation.

After reviewing the water sample test results, MiningWatch Canada confirmed that the water was "extremely toxic and well above established guidelines for the protection of aquatic life for eleven different parameters." The copper and nickel concentrations were also found to exceed Canada's very permissive federal metal mining effluent regulations, while the concentrations of cadmium, cobalt and copper were high enough to be considered acutely lethal to fish.

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