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Jordan Harbour/Ball's Falls (Eagles & Beechey, 1985):
Jordan Harbour is located just east of Victoria Ave. on the QEW. From it extends the Twenty Mile Creek and gorge ending at Ball's Falls. The riparian vegetation of this 125 ha site provides a buffer zone between urban and agricultural land and the water bodies of Jordan, Twenty Mile Creek and its tributaries.
Vegetation
The vegetation patterns occurring in the major valley are quite well developed and are comparable to and more diverse than those of the Grimsby incised valley. There is a very well developed and mature floodplain forest in the valley mouth basin at Jordan; this is one of the best developed forests recorded for the Niagara Peninsula. The forests of the terrace valleys on either side of the major valley are intermediate to young in age but are quite representative of those similar sites elsewhere along the escarpment in the Niagara Peninsula (Eagles & Beechey, 1985).
Jordan Harbour Marsh (Eagles & Beechey, 1985):
The vegetation patterns of the marsh are quite representative of the Lake Ontario Plain. The wetland communities include open submergent and emergent patterns, Typha, Calamagrostis, Scirpus-Carex, and Salix-Cornus marshes with scattered Salix groves on the levees. The sand loam forests on the slopes around the ponds include the Quercus-Acer-Pinus complex with local uplands of a dry mesic Quercus-Carya pattern.
South Jordan Escarpment Slope (Eagles & Beechey, 1985):
The vegetation communities are quite representative for this section of the Niagara Escarpment and are of a young to intermediate age.
Jordan Harbour/Ball's Falls (Eagles & Beechey, 1985):
Along the harbour, red and white oak are dominant although willow spp. are also common. Less frequent, yet found throughout the harbour area, are trembling and largetooth aspen, eastern cottonwood, choke cherry, staghorn sumac, and shagbark hickory. White pine along with eastern red cedar are abundant on the east bank, while black locust occurs on the west bank. Where Twenty Mile Creek empties into the harbour, Manitoba maple dominates. Vegetation in the re-entrant valley is mainly healthy and mature consisting of red and white oak, white ash, hop-hornbeam, white elm, basswood, sugar, red and black maple, black cherry, sweet cherry and a few eastern hemlock and butternut walnut. South of Highway 8, the vegetation differs slightly and eastern hemlock is dominant. This section also hosts a maple/beech association, sassafras and sycamore.
Representation
This impressive natural area has features which are impressively representative of the escarpment patterns. The major valley patterns and the valley mouth basin floodplain forest are the most significant features (Eagles & Beechey, 1985). Jordan Harbour Marsh (Eagles & Beechey, 1985):
Coupled with the Jordan Escarpment Valley, this area presents a compact unit of geomorphological and vegetational patterns which are of quite a limited extent in the Great Lakes system. While many of the major river valleys in the western third of Lake Ontario do show a well-developed, formerly drowned pattern, in Ontario only those between Hamilton and St. Catherines have a presently still flooded pattern.
Landform
This area presents a landscape unit which expresses a wide variety of geomorphological features that are representative of this section of the Niagara Escarpment. The major feature is the long, well-developed, deep, incised valley of the Twenty Mile Creek which, after cutting across a portion of the Vinemount Moraine atop the escarpment plain, forms a 110 foot high water falls and lower rapids; this permanent creek has formed an indirect valley into the escarpment and into the Whirlpool Terrace. At the mouth of the valley is a broad floodplain basin with well developed annual alternate stream channelization on scree; this extends to the north towards the drowned meander valley alluvial wetlands of the Jordan Harbour area. Contiguous with the main valley to the west is a moderately well developed terrace valley and partially buried escarpment face. On its eastern side is a more complex buried escarpment terrace slope and valley terrain (Eagles & Beechey, 1985). Jordan Harbour Marsh (Eagles & Beechey, 1985):
This area is the largest single drowned misfit meander valley in the Niagara Peninsula. It presents a well-developed series of broad meander patterns formed previous to the flooding of the valley by Lake Ontario following isostatic uplift. The upper reaches of the valley have very shallow water with a large alluvial plain; there is a moderately well-developed levee pattern here as well. The mouth of the valley is very broad and has a large open pond enclosed behind a large bay mouth bar.
References
* Allen, G.M., P.F.J. Eagles and S.D. Price (eds.) 1990. Conserving Carolinian Canada: Conservation Biology in the Deciduous Forest Region. University of Waterloo Press, Waterloo. 346 pp.
* Eagles, P.F.J. and T.J. Beechey (eds.) 1985. Critical Unprotected Natural Areas in the Carolinian Life Zone of Canada. Final Report, Identification Subcommittee, Carolinian Canada. The Nature Conservancy of Canada, The Ontario Heritage Foundation and World Wildlife Fund (Canada). 400 pp.
© Natural Heritage Information Centre, 1998
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