Glen Stewart Ravine

Glen Stewart Ravine is in the Toronto Beach area, running south from Kingston Road just east of Glen Manor Drive. You go down a long flight of wooden steps and follow the trail.

Before you even get down to the woods, you have likely seen house sparrows, starlings, crows, blue jays, grackles and robins, as well as pigeons and ring-billed gulls flying overhead. At the bottom of the steps, there is a very tall tree with a hole away up high, where downy woodpeckers go in and out.

In the leaves below may be hermit thrushes, house wrens, and even a whippoorwill. Chickadees and flickers call in the background. Along the path, you may look up and see a crow's nest away up high, a nuthatch at eye level, and, in the fall, golden-crowned kinglets.

If you take the steps up to Balsam Avenue, you may see a hairy woodpecker and winter wrens. If you go straight ahead, rather than up the steps, you come to a more open area where there may be goldfinches. There are migrating warblers in spring and fall. In fact, according to a City of Toronto booklet entitled "Glen Stewart Ravine Nature Trail", up to 110 species of migrating birds may be seen in this ravine.

Foxes used to have a den in the ravine as well. One day I saw a young fox run across Southwood Drive near Glen Ames Road and go behind some houses towards the ravine.

A number of years ago, small signs on metal posts were put in front of the largest trees to number them and tell what kind of trees they were. The 12 numbered trees, starting at the southerly entrance and heading up north along the right side of the main path - the left side has a nice stream running along it - are:

Red Maple
Eastern Hemlock
Yellow Birch
Northern Red Oak
White Oak
Mountain Maple
Alternate-leaved Dogwood
Black Cherry
Witch Hazel
American Beech
Sugar Maple
White Ash

If you visit this ravine, you may wish to bring a tree book with you and see how many of these trees you can find. Stay on the main trails, because erosion of the sandy soil is a problem, and the trees need the soil preserved for their roots.