Mi’kmaw leaders and residents in southwestern Nova Scotia say the province failed to properly warn them before approving aerial glyphosate spraying that could begin as early as this week within sight of Bear River First Nation, and they argue the case exposes a deeper gap in how Nova Scotia consults Indigenous communities on pesticide use.
The province approved the spraying on Aug. 19 for a window running from Sept. 16 to 30 along Thomas, Guinea and Victory roads in Annapolis and Digby counties, land bordering the First Nation. Nova Scotia’s Pesticide Regulations require 30 days’ public notice before a spray, typically through posted signs, but residents say the warnings were easy to miss. Lenny Hornung, who lives nearby, said his household only learned of the plan after a neighbour stumbled on a sign while picking berries. Robin Sturley, another resident, said the signs themselves were placed poorly and their warning text was too small to read from the road.
Chief Carol Potter, who represents Bear River First Nation on the Assembly of Nova Scotia Mi’kmaw Chiefs, said the spraying threatens the community’s ability to safely gather traditional foods and medicines on land it has used for generations. Phyllis Harlow, a beekeeper in the First Nation, said pollinators and harvested plants cannot be fenced off from drifting herbicide.
Those concerns were formalized on Sept. 11, when the Mi’kmaw Chiefs’ rights implementation office, Kwilmu’kw Maw-klusuaqn, sent the province a statement demanding an immediate halt to the Thomas Road application and a suspension of all pesticide approvals near Bear River until what it called meaningful consultation takes place. The statement said Nova Scotia has not disclosed the specific property identifiers for the approved spray sites, which it argued leaves the community unable to assess how close the herbicide will land to sites used for harvesting. It also said the province left earlier letters on the file inadequately answered.
That transparency complaint is the detail largely missing from wire coverage of the dispute so far, and it points past the notification-sign argument to a harder legal question. Nova Scotia’s duty to consult Indigenous communities on decisions affecting their rights stems from the Supreme Court’s 2004 Haida Nation ruling, and Mi’kmaw harvesting rights in the region trace to the Peace and Friendship Treaties of 1760-61, affirmed by the Supreme Court in its 1999 Marshall decision. Neither requires the province to obtain consent before approving a spray, but both call for a process that gives an affected community enough information to weigh in before the decision is final, not after.
Environment and Climate Change Minister Timothy Halman said the province followed its own process and called Nova Scotia “a responsive regulator,” adding that the residents’ complaint is under investigation. His response did not address the Mi’kmaw Chiefs’ specific demand for the underlying property identifiers.
Glyphosate remains among the most contested herbicides in Canadian forestry. Health Canada re-approved it for use until April 2032 after a 2017 review, while the World Health Organization’s cancer research arm classified it as a probable human carcinogen in 2015, a gap regulators and critics have argued over for years. Nova Scotia has seen recurring standoffs over aerial spraying in Annapolis County for more than a decade, and this dispute follows that pattern with an added Indigenous rights dimension that has not been resolved in the province’s favour before.
With the approved spray window running through Sept. 30 and the investigation still open, the immediate question is whether Nova Scotia will pause the Thomas Road application while it reviews the complaint, or let the window close first and sort out the process questions afterward.
Via Global News, with additional reporting from a Sept. 11, 2026 statement by Kwilmu’kw Maw-klusuaqn (Mi’kmaq Rights Initiative).
