Inducted: November 19, 2024
Keith McLean was an active learner of sustainable farming techniques. He stressed the importance of balancing agricultural land and natural cover. He emphasized the use of windbreaks and cover crops to reduce wind erosion.
Keith was born in Morpeth, Ontario in 1922 to Leo McLean and Hazel Toll and he died on November 20th, 2012. He had one brother, Lloyd and he never married.
Although Keith had no formal education, he was educated in agriculture and agricultural practices on the family farm. He raised corn, soybeans and wheat.
Since his farm was close to Rondeau Provincial Park and the Lake Erie shoreline, Keith experienced the crop yield implications associated with high and low water levels. He successfully adjusted his management of the land to accommodate these conditions.
Keith was an active learner in sustainable farming techniques that reduced soil erosion and limited habitat fragmentation. Jim Brown said, "Winter also showed how some farming practices were causing harm in that vast amounts of topsoil could often blow away as more and more trees which formed windbreaks were removed for a few more acres of tilled soil". Keith re-established windbreaks and buffer strips to improve the environmental sustainability of his land. This also helped with the problem Keith realized that local wildlife was being squeezed into Rondeau Park as there were fewer and fewer safe ways for them to roam.
Keith's farm was 130 hectares of which 80 hectares were actively farmed. The remainder were preserved as wetlands and natural habitats including 2.5 hectares of tall prairie grass.
To combat wet spots on the farm, Keith created ponds and replanted areas with cover species he had not seen in years.
Keith had a love for gardening and through his efforts was successful in re-establishing many native species on his property including the American Lotus which had been displaced in Rondeau Bay by invasive plants. Of his expansive gardens, including swaths of daffodils and hundreds of chrysanthemums, he was quoted to say, "I grow things for my own pleasure and that of everyone who walks, drives or rides by". He also had a sanctuary pond for wild birds where they were protected from hunters.
Through relationships with his First Nation neighbours, Keith began implementing a holistic approach to managing his land as emphasized in Indigenous Culture. Over the years, his discoveries of artifacts of Native people who had once inhabited the area led experts to realize that humans well travelled the area for 6-7000 years. He left artifacts that are now housed in a building open to the public.
Keith was considered an expert in lotus ponds and was contacted by people all over the world to visit and learn from his expertise. He said, "Lotus used to be in Rondeau Bay. They disappeared in the 1940s". They were listed as 'imperilled' in the province by the Ministry of Natural Resources.
He stressed the importance of maintaining a balance between agriculture and natural cover. As a result, he converted marginal farmland into a wetland habitat to attract wildlife.
He also had over 8 hectares of land converted to forest cover consisting of 4,000 young trees of native Carolinian hardwood species chosen and planted with the assistance of a forestry expert to ensure natural placements. In 2000, with the help of neighbours and representatives from Stewardship Kent and the Rural Lambton Stewardship, Keith planted 90,000 tallgrass plugs on his property. This was the largest tallgrass prairie restoration in Chatham-Kent. His property was always open to the public to visit and be educated on his agricultural activities.
In 2009, Keith received the St. Clair Region Conservation Award and the Ridgetown District High School Hall of Excellent recognition. In co-operation with the Ministry of Natural Resources and the RCMP, he volunteered his services and he received a rare operating permit from the Canadian Wildlife Service so that he could nurse injured wildlife and birds back to health, including 15 whistling swans that were found frozen to a sewage lagoon in Ridgetown and 18 mallards that had been clipped probably for illegal sale.
At his death, Keith bequeathed his land to the St. Clair Region Conservation Foundation to maintain and protect. He challenged the Foundation to accept and enhance the beauty of the site, and to continue his conservation efforts for the benefit of wildlife and to keep the area free to the general public to visit and enjoy.
Ken Thompson said of Keith, "One could always count on a warm welcome when you visited Keith and his flowers…He was very outspoken...especially when it came to water levels. In his spare time, Keith could be found in the barn repairing the wings of damaged birds and helping others do the same in the Park". Ken also mentioned the huge boulders Keith had hauled in for display.
Although Keith lost his right arm in a farming accident in 1978, he continued developing his farm as well as visiting and encouraging those he heard of who had suffered a similar fate. He said, "I'll just try to help any amputee who's going through a rough time and hopefully, they can see it's not the end of the world, and that life goes on."
Keith assured the public that there was never an admission price to visit the farm. There were no donations or sales allowed except for goodwill. Busloads and carloads of people have visited Keith's paradise over the years.