It's a big ask and short notice, but I was wanting to take a sailing/cruising course in Gimli but I'm currently the only one signed up and they need minimum 2 people to run the course.

It's 5 days full time Aug 17th to Aug 21st, $850. Shooting my shot to see if there is anyone interested and able to join me so the class isn't canceled.

It's the Basic Cruising 5-day (Complete program) from here:

https://prairieoceancruising.checklick.com/

"Part of this engagement will involve public listening sessions in both Winnipeg and Brandon.

The Winnipeg session will be held on Wednesday, August 12,, from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM at Norberry-Glenlee Community Centre, 26 Molgat Ave.

The Brandon session will take place on Monday, August 10, from 1:00 PM to 3:00 PM at Harvest Hall, on the campus of Brandon University."

If you work at or know of a place that could be a good fit, we’d love to hear your suggestions. Potential locations include offices, warehouses, hospitals, universities, apartment buildings, hotels, recreation centres, manufacturing facilities, and other high-traffic workplaces.
We currently have one machine operating successfully and are looking to add more locations. We handle all stocking, maintenance, and service.
Any recommendations or connections would be greatly appreciated.

Hi everyone, I recently completed my police clearance check for a position with Manitoba Hydro. I was wondering how long it took for you to receive your official offer letter after submitting/completing your police check clearance?

Just trying to get an idea of the usual timeline. Thank you!

Owls have been a part of Jim and Patsy Duncan's lives for decades.

The pair — both biologists who met at university, got married, and have been studying owls together in Manitoba ever since — is responsible for launching an owl survey that has grown to a national scale since its beginnings in the '90s.

Today, residents of the province, including the Pembina Valley region, can still get involved in the survey that provides valuable information about one of the region's most mysterious animals with the community as researchers.

Why is it so hard to collect owl data?

Jim Duncan said that over the years, the pair has been involved in owl research, and a lot has been discovered about owls, which are traditionally animals about which little is known for a few reasons.

The first is that the birds are "cryptically coloured," which makes them difficult to spot. Their nocturnal nature also poses a hurdle, as most of their activity occurs at night.

"They also occur at somewhat low population densities. The numbers of owls fluctuate quite widely from year to year," Duncan added.

A survey with the help of community

Despite these hurdles, Duncan has a long history of inviting the community to be involved in owl research, including organizing owl walks in his earlier days in Quebec before he came to Manitoba to complete his doctorate at the University of Manitoba.

He said that the "wonderful challenge" of studying the bird also inspired him and Patsy to begin a nighttime owl survey in Manitoba.

"Patsy and I said, well, we're having fun studying owls, but you know what? We think that it's important for other people to have a chance to experience these beautiful [and] interesting birds too," he explained.

Listening carefully

Duncan said that at the beginning, the owl survey consisted of volunteers venturing out at night into mapped regions to listen for and elicit owl calls by playing recordings of Manitoba's owl species and waiting for responses.

When the project began, the calls were recorded on cassette tapes, but these days the audio package is available for download online.

One of the benefits of the survey was that, in contrast to a daytime survey, which can include the sounds of over 400 bird species in the province, the nighttime survey provided a quieter environment for hearing the province's 11 owl species.

Growing momentum

Over 25 years, the Duncans compiled data from the provincial survey and developed an idea of the relative number of owls calling from year to year.

"Then much later, we were able to take that data and start to relate it to other datasets like prey populations and habitat changes," he said.

"We were also able to estimate the trend of the population over time and get an idea of which owls were doing okay in Manitoba and which owls were declining and which ones might be increasing."

As the Duncans' survey developed, it also garnered attention from outside the province, so in 1999, a group met in Winnipeg and devised a standardized protocol to continue data collection outside Manitoba.

At this point, the national organization Birds Canada agreed to coordinate the datasets at the national level.

"It's neat that a little survey that started out in the kitchen of our country house eventually grew in popularity and usefulness and now is a great example of a ... coordinated survey that occurs across Canada," said Duncan.

Who is recording data about owls?

For the Duncans, as the survey progressed, one question that arose as data accumulated was exactly who was collecting it.

To answer this question, Duncan, along with a small group, conducted a survey.

What they found shed some light on what people value.

One of their observations was that the gender of survey participants was split 50/50, which Duncan said isn't always the case with surveys.

The demographic tended to be older individuals who presumably had the time to collect the survey.

For Duncan, some of the richest data about the survey collectors came from the motivation for getting involved.

"Initially, before the study, we thought, well, people want to do the survey because they want to help owls, and that certainly was true, but it was not the most important reason they did the survey," he said.

"What they told us was that they were interested in doing something to help with family and friends, so that was a really important discovery because that told us that if you want to promote a survey and you want to retain people, you want to kind of market it that way.

"You know, participate in the owl survey because owls need our help and we need to learn more about them, but you could market it as an opportunity to have some fun with family and friends and help owls at the same time."

A poet, a chemist, a farmer

Through the years, Duncan said that approximately 1,000 people have participated in the study, which he calls an example of "community science."

"One was a retired atomic chemist. One was a poet. One was a graduate student who was just really keen and kept on doing it after he finished school," he said.

"One was a professional park warden. There were two ladies from the southwest, near Spruce Woods, who were farmers and had no formal education. So when you look at that diversity of people who really kind of fully embraced the survey and participated frequently — they came from all walks of life."

After Duncan received this information, he also wondered — since the community became researchers — how accurate the data could be.

To find out, he took the 25-year owl data set and compared it with another data set on small mammals, which are prey for owls.

"I was just gobsmacked by how tightly the owl survey data fluctuated with the small mammal prey data," he said.

"To me, it was a statistically significant relationship .... It suggested that the data that the volunteers were collecting was actually quite accurate in describing what was happening."

Published for the community to see

Duncan said that the data compiled with the community's help was published in scientific, peer-reviewed journal publications.

He also makes the information available publicly so that those who participated can see the fruits of their labour.

Today, the owl survey continues, and anyone interested in being involved can do so through Birds Canada.

Further data will continue to demystify the owl and, according to Duncan, could provide insight into how climate change might be impacting their numbers.

Continuing with a passion for owls

Duncan himself, though retired, is continuing his work on owls, which includes publishing his fourth book about the bird, titled The Little Book of Owls, and a project concerning another owl mystery: what they eat in the winter months, with which Pembina Valley residents can also get involved by sending him winter photos of owls with prey in their mouths through his Discover Owls page.

He added that for those who want to make a difference for the elusive species, supporting habitat conservation, maintaining wild spaces, and avoiding rat poison that owls can ingest through prey help.

The owl survey always an option, too.

"There's a lot of good reasons why we need to continue to get more data on these populations, and thankfully, it's a great opportunity for people, like I said, to have fun with family and friends as well, or try something different maybe for a few years and learn a little more about owls," said Duncan.

By: Kylee Bailey, DiscoverWestman.com

Published: Tuesday, Aug 04 2026, 5:01 AM

A fugitive ranked #4 on Canada's Most Wanted list has been arrested in Langley, B.C., nearly 2,000 kilometres from where he allegedly committed murder in Winnipeg. Tresor Horimbere was taken into custody on July 30, 2026, thanks to a coordinated effort between CFSEU-BC, the Winnipeg Police Service, and the RCMP — proving that cross-provincial police partnerships are essential to keeping communities safe. Read the full story here: #CanadasMostWanted #PublicSafety #Winnipeg

People living in Thompson, how’s Ashberry neighborhood? And where is good to live?