Buttertubs Marsh Bird Sanctuary
Buttertubs Marsh is an oasis of stillness just minutes from downtown, lined with English oaks and Lombardy poplars from the 1920's. The marsh is a man-made success, offering shelter to great blue herons, mallards, Canada geese, Ring-neck ducks, hooded Mergansers, and the American Widgeon. Violet-green swallows and red-winged blackbirds are not uncommon in the spring. Virginia Rails and American Bitterns are vocal denizens of Buttertubs Marsh Bird Sanctuary, which is also Vancouver Island's only documented breeding site of American Bitterns.
- A thread on our Nanaimo forum: Buttertubs Marsh
Buttertubs Marsh Nanaimo BC
Even for those who couldn't care less about birds, Buttertubs Marsh offers a beautiful loop of wide trail (with narrow gates to prevent motorized vehicles) around a body of water buzzing with activity. Some ruins in the area, as well as the giant, bleached husks of long-dead half-drowned deciduons, give the marsh a wonderful ambience, especially in the autumn, winter, and by moonlight. Spring and summer in Buttertubs Marsh are wonderful too, of course, but then the place has a fecund rather than a Gothic feel.
Buttertubs Marsh Conservation Area Management Plan - an informative .pdf hosted on the City of Nanaimo Site.