THE CHANGING LANDSCAPE When pioneers in this area first set up their farms in the 1830’s, they had a lot of work ahead of them. First they had to build a shanty home, and then a log home as they cleared the land. Pioneers in the Sydenham river area changed the face of the land. They built dams to power mills, causing large ponds to form. They cleared the dense forest that once covered the entire area. This old picture shows how the landscape looked after massive clearing. Where the city of London is now, there were plum, cherry and crabapple groves. Parts of Caradoc and Ekfrid Townships were covered with maple, beech, ash or elm on dry lands and black ash or elm in small swamps. Tamarack swamps were common in Ekfrid Township. Tamarack and white pine were the only coniferous tree species in the watershed, except for some small cedar patches in the north-east headwaters region.

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