Monthly Archives: November 2018

One of the areas hit hardest by this year’s wildfires has reached a milestone in its recovery as a result of close collaboration between the B.C. government and the Gitxsan First Nation. After the lightning-caused Pope Forest Service Road wildfire was discovered on Aug. 1, 2018, BC Wildfire Service crews and contractors worked hard to get it under control. By the time it was fully contained in early September, the wildfire (located 37 kilometres northwest of Hazelton) had burned over 560 hectares. All of the land affected by fire suppression activities on the Pope Forest Service Road wildfire has now been fully rehabilitated — the first of the 2018 wildfires in the Northwest Fire Centre to achieve that goal. The work was completed in collaboration with the Gitxsan First Nation, whose traditional territory was directly affected by the fire.

Six months after flood waters swept through this small B.C. city, at least 28 downtown businesses are still closed. Many locals and forestry experts are blaming rampant clearcutting for reducing nature’s ability to protect residents from the hell of high waters, but the province insists all is well in the forests of southern British Columbia. …In 2017 there was localized flooding in Grand Forks, but nothing prepared the 4,200 residents for this spring’s water levels, which rose more than half a metre higher than previously recorded. As residents look for answers, there are increasingly pointed questions about the role of forestry and over-harvesting in the watershed. …Courtnay and Jesse Redding, who both grew up in Grand Forks and moved back two years ago, draw on decades of local knowledge to come to the conclusion that clearcuts worsened the spring floods.

Bob Brett

The Whistler Naturalists offered the community its first glimpse of a forthcoming mapping project that has recorded old and ancient trees around the resort. Spearheaded by Naturalists founder and ecologist Bob Brett, the initiative is one of the most in-depth efforts to record and date Whistler’s trees. The Naturalists have photographed and cored hundreds of trees around the community, which will be displayed in a slick-looking map that is due for publication next year. At the non-profit’s annual general meeting on Monday, Nov. 19, Brett explained the project’s goal. “The reason for all of this and all the coring I’ve ever done is related to trying to conserve old-growth forest,” he said. 

With one year remaining for British Columbia’s controversial wolf cull, some caribou herds appear to be stabilizing in the province’s northeast. Wolves are being killed near four caribou herds in the Peace region. Three of those areas have had active wolf management since 2015. Since then, 480 wolves have been shot by contractors hired by the province, according to the B.C.’s Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resources. The province initiated a five-year plan to cull wolves in 2015. It’s aimed at saving the province’s endangered herds of mountain caribou by reducing the number of predators that feed off them. But the cull was controversial from the outset, even drawing the ire of pop star Miley Cyrus. Critics have argued that habitat loss and human encroachment are to blame for the decline of the caribou, and say there is little evidence to back up the theory that wolves are the problem.

In 2001 the Liberal government introduced Professional Reliance to reduce red tape along with the civil service. For 15 years it was embraced by the forest industry but drew increasing criticism from competing forest resource users. As expected with a change in government in 2017 there would be a change of some programs introduced by the previous government. …The last professional reliance report that came out in the summer of 2018… and was requested because of concerns raised by a number of independent agencies. My impression from the reports is that while recommendations are around some of the problems pointed out by Ombudsperson, Forest Practices Board and Auditor General and others there does not appear to be a push for a return to the old level of government control.

For 15 years plant ecologist Randy Moody has been working on the promotion and conservation of the whitebark pine. Every year Moody, and a small team across B.C., gather a crop of whitebark pinecone seeds for recovery and conservation efforts. Moody says that this year’s crop was the largest he has seen in his career. …This bodes well for tree conservation efforts, allowing the Whitebark Pine Ecosystem Foundation of Canada to not only gather data on the tree species but also continue conservation through planting more of the endangered species’ seeds. The whitebark pine faces several challenges, including the mountain pine beetle, forest fires, climate change, and the biggest culprit; pine blister rust. Since the trees only grow in high alpine forests, says Moody, they have no where to go.