Region Archives: Canada West

Living with wildfire and protecting salmon habitat headline the latest The Root of It newsletter from UBC’s Faculty of Forestry & Environmental Stewardship. Wildfire researcher Dr. Kira Hoffman joins Dean Rob Kozak to explore Indigenous-led fire stewardship and lessons from B.C.’s recent wildfire seasons. New research suggests protecting 70–80% of the watersheds salmon depend on is closer to what’s needed to sustain populations than the global 30×30 conservation target. Also featured are a strengthened fisheries research partnership with the Lower Fraser Fisheries Alliance, Rob Kozak’s appointment to a second five-year term as dean, and Society of American Foresters accreditation for three undergraduate programs. Education opportunities include a November 19 online information session on mass timber micro-certificates and a dual master’s program in green business with the University of Helsinki.

In the latest edition of Woodlots Weekly, Woodlots BC outlines three priorities ahead of the October 24 provincial election: strengthening wildfire protection through locally managed forests, maintaining woodlot tenures to support rural jobs, and recognizing the benefits of community-based forest stewardship. The organization also announces its membership in Canadian Forest Owners, providing a stronger voice for B.C. woodlot licensees in national forest policy discussions. Other highlights include the availability of presentations from the recent Woodlots BC conference, new Innovation in Action grants of $25,000 to $50,000 for innovative silviculture projects, and funding opportunities through the Forest Enhancement Society of BC for wildfire risk reduction and ecosystem rehabilitation.

How can autonomous trucks be integrated in forest operations? That’s one of the questions that FPInnovations’ autonomous transportation team aimed to get clarity on during this year’s autonomous transportation pilot project. FPInnovations has facilitated collaboration between West Fraser and Kodiak AI,  a leading provider of Physical AI-powered autonomous vehicle technology, and had the opportunity to oversee a pilot which took place this summer in Hinton Alberta. The FPI-Kodiak team completed two test weeks which included crew training, validating safety procedures, collecting baseline data, and mapping key road segments to pinpoint operational constraints. With both manual and autonomous runs completed — combined with insights from logging truck drivers and site personnel — the team gained a sharper view of real‑world variables such as dust, grades, surface conditions, and mixed traffic. West Fraser, Kodiak and FPInnovations are now working together on defining the next steps from this initial validation, engaging with stakeholders and Alberta Regulators.

The Municipal District of Opportunity No. 17 is pushing the provincial government to establish a reliable funding stream for the ongoing maintenance of local fireguards, warning that rapidly overgrown vegetation is creating severe new wildfire risks for northern communities. During a regular council meeting on Sept. 28 in Red Earth Creek, Reeve Marshall D. Auger shared a detailed update on the municipality’s recent advocacy efforts. He told the council that he and Deputy Reeve Brendan Powell recently met with Alberta’s Forestry and Parks Minister, Todd Loewen, to press him directly on the issue. The impromptu meeting took place during the Alberta Forest Products Association annual general meeting and conference. The gathering gave the local leaders a brief window to speak face-to-face with the provincial minister about their escalating safety concerns.

Tolko Industries has signed a new partnership with the Westbank First Nation’s forestry company, Ntityix Resources, to manage forestry tenure in the Okanagan. The agreement sees Tolko transfer Forest Licence A98912, with an annual allowable cut of 52,100 cubic metres, to Ntityix Resources. The WFN company will then provide timber to Tolko’s mills under an automatically renewable 15-year deal. “This agreement reflects a shared commitment to reconciliation, economic development, and responsible forest stewardship,” said Mic Werstuik, CEO of Ntityix Development Corporation. “The transfer of this tenure expands Westbank First Nation’s participation in the forest economy and creates a platform for long-term Indigenous leadership in sustainable forestry management while supporting employment, capacity development, and stewardship within our traditional territory.” The deal means Ntityix will take over much of the work that goes into timber development prior to logs being sent to a mill.

Press Release by Ntityix Resources: Westbank First Nation and Tolko Industries Ltd. Announce Landmark Forestry Partnership and Tenure Transfer Agreement

The Forest Practices Board will conduct a limited-scope compliance audit of stand-level biodiversity practices and block reserve management in the Thompson Rivers Natural Resource District, beginning Monday, Oct. 19, 2026. The audit will examine the practices of BC Timber Sales’ Kamloops Business Area, the Lower North Thompson Community Forest and Gilbert Smith Forest Products. Auditors will review harvest planning, and on-the-ground practices and reporting, including the establishment and management of wildlife tree-retention areas and block reserves, to determine compliance with legal requirements. The audit area is within the Kamloops Timber Supply Area, which covers approximately 2.77 million hectares. The audit will focus on operations within the Clearwater, Dunn, Vavenby, Adams Lake and Barrière landscape units within the Kamloops Timber Supply Area. Wildlife tree-retention areas help support biodiversity by retaining trees and other forest features in harvested landscapes. They can also help protect important forest attributes, including riparian areas, cultural heritage values and visual quality.

Ecologist Karen Price spent months as part of an advisory panel tasked with identifying the old growth forest in B.C. most at risk and in need of protection. The places her team identified, known as deferral areas, were to be temporarily protected from logging, with local governments and First Nations to decide whether those protections became permanent. Now she’s watching the province auction off some of those areas to logging companies. “The province is putting out, for bid, old growth that is identified as some of the most at-risk old growth around,” she said. “They have taken that mapped area and they are precisely asking folks to bid to log it.” The B.C. NDP committed on multiple occasions, most recently in the 2024 provincial election campaign, to implementing the 14 recommendations of the 2020 Old Growth Strategic Review. …”People immediately translate [the Old Growth Review] into losing jobs … and that’s not true,” said Garry Merkel, one of the authors.

The Forest Practices Board will conduct a full-scope compliance audit of Carrier Lumber Ltd.’s forest planning and practices near Prince George, beginning Monday, Oct. 19, 2026. The audit will cover operations under forest licence A18158 within the Prince George Natural Resource District for the period Oct. 1, 2024, until Oct 23, 2026. Auditors will review harvesting, roads and structures, silviculture activities, wildfire protection and associated planning. They will assess compliance with the Forest and Range Practices Act and the Wildfire Act. The licence operates within the Prince George Timber Supply Area, which includes the Prince George and Stuart Nechako natural resource districts. Only operations within the Prince George Natural Resource District will be audited. The operations being audited are within approximately 100 kilometres of Prince George, extending from Bear Lake in the north to Penny in the east, Hixon in the south and the Stuart River to the west. The licence has an allowable annual cut of approximately 187,000 cubic metres.

Additional coverage in My Bulkley Lakes Now, by Brendan Pawliw: Carrier Lumber under the microscope: Forest Practices Board to begin regional audit

After nearly eight years of seeking funding, the City of Kimberley has secured $400,000 to study how wildfires could affect its drinking water supply. The effort dates back to the 2018 Meachen Creek fire, which raised concerns about the vulnerability of local water sources. Mathieu Bourbonnais, an assistant professor at the University of British Columbia (UBC) Okanagan and co-director of the Centre for Wildfire Coexistence, said people often take their drinking water for granted. …Kimberley’s drinking water comes from the Mark Creek and Matthew Creek watersheds. A severe wildfire could affect both the quality and availability of Kimberley’s drinking water long after the flames are out. The project aims to identify those risks, and find ways to reduce them without creating new problems for the water supply. …Bourbonnais’s lab at UBC Okanagan is working with the city and fire ecologist Bob Gray to model how fires could behave in the Mark Creek watershed.

In its latest Woodlots Weekly newsletter, Woodlots BC encourages licensees to engage with political candidates ahead of the provincial election, advocating for no net loss of woodlot tenures, reduced regulatory burdens, healthier and more resilient forests, and greater local decision-making. The newsletter also looks back at the 2026 Woodlots BC Conference and AGM, highlighting field tours, presentations, student participation and discussions with funding partners. Looking ahead, members are encouraged to explore two funding opportunities. The Silviculture Innovation Program’s Innovation in Action grants offer $25,000 to $50,000 for innovative silviculture projects, with applications closing November 30, 2026. Meanwhile, the Forest Enhancement Society of BC opens a new funding intake October 15, supporting wildfire risk reduction and forest ecosystem rehabilitation projects. Woodlots BC is inviting project ideas from members and plans to develop proposals for both programs, while encouraging individual licensees and associations to apply independently.

The Town of Lake Cowichan has acquired nearly 100 acres of land that will serve the community’s future needs, say officials. “What the acquisition provides is something Lake Cowichan has historically had very little of: strategically located municipal land and the flexibility to plan for the future,” said Mayor Tim McGonigle. “We’ve been working on this for over two years, and we certainly appreciate Mosaic’s help in helping us acquire these lands.” The $1.4 million transfer agreement between the town and Mosaic for two parcels of land … was signed on Sept. 17, with funds from the town’s existing municipal reserves. The properties … include approximately $400,000 in standing timber that will become a town asset, and Mosaic has the first right of refusal should the town sell the timber. …No final decisions have been made on the use of the two parcels … those decisions would be made by the new council voted in on Oct. 17.

BC Timber Sales has extended the public input process until Oct. 15 for a proposed logging operation in the Mount Rose Swanson area in Spallumcheen. …BCTS website said, “BCTS has heard the concerns expressed by the public and Township of Spallumcheen and has completed a rigorous process to refine the Results and Strategies in the 2018 Forest Stewardship Plan…to better reflect the Sensitive Area Order and make it more clear to the public how these Results and Strategies guide timber harvest. (The) new set of Results and Strategies aims to create balance between the recreation available on the mountain and timber harvesting, aiming to maintain and where possible, enhance recreation opportunities for users.” The required 120-day referral period has been extended to Oct. 15. An online petition launched by community members opposing the plan has more than 1,300 signatures.

A man responsible for setting a massive wildfire that burned through northern Saskatchewan last year has been sentenced to six years in prison. Thirty-year-old Jason Halkett, originally from Brochet, Man., was sentenced Thursday after pleading guilty to one count of arson causing damage to property for lighting the Ditch 2 wildfire. The fire burned more than 200,000 hectares of forest during Saskatchewan’s 2025 wildfire season. “This really sets a precedent for public prosecutions and that there was no prior wildfire sentencing case, per se. So it was a lot of work and detailed a lot of public prosecutions efforts to bring this to fruition,” Crown prosecutor Robyn Ermine told reporters after the sentencing. …The maximum penalty for the offence is 14 years in prison. …Taken into consideration was Halkett’s potential for rehabilitation, as he has been completing his high school education while in custody.

What if investing $1 today could save $4 in catastrophic wildfire damage tomorrow? In this episode, Jason Fisher (Executive Director of FESBC) breaks down why active forest management isn’t just logging—it’s frontline wildfire defense. Can smarter management stop megafires before they start?

Kristen Weiss

Premier David Eby wants British Columbians to build a firebreak to protect what makes B.C. special and matters most, keeping out an infection of “Trump-style politics.” …What makes B.C. special is what remains wild: ancient forests, salmon rivers, wolves, caribou, a living coast and biodiversity… British Columbians across the political spectrum consistently say they value wildlife and wild places and expect governments to protect them. Yet while the premier warns that Trump-style politics are crossing our border, his government has been fast-tracking resource projects… B.C. politicians across party lines have been doing this for years. Trump would approve. So the question this election is bigger than candidates standing up to Donald Trump. It is whether they will stand up to protect the forests, wildlife, oceans and ecosystems that make British Columbia special. And that exposes the problem with the firebreak metaphor. Because it’s already too late to build a firebreak. 

The community of Smithers has been relatively untouched by wildfires… However, drought has significantly impacted the area and the threat of wildfire has become ever present… Our local community wildfire suppression group, the Woodmere Emergency Services Society … visited a recent BC Timber Sales block that was harvested and sold to Hampton Lumber in Burns Lake. …In the spring of 2026 we had a field visit with Hampton to look at the slash/fuel left behind on this block. While Hampton had no legal obligation to do any further clean up, we were impressed that the company recognized the issue and agreed to clean up the block. …at the end of September 2026, we saw that Hampton has gone above and beyond our expectations and has done an exceptional job at their own expense. …Companies like Hampton are what give forestry a good name in British Columbia.

©Mosaic Forest Management

By late summer, the Koksilah is running low again. The watershed sits in the Cowichan Valley on southern Vancouver Island where farms, rural homes, fish habitat, aquifers, and managed forest all depend on the same water. In three of the past seven years, agricultural water licences have been curtailed; in August 2023, an order restricted about 108 licence holders from irrigating. …Above the farms stand second- and third-rotation Douglas-fir forests… In our view, the water moving through that ground — or failing to — now belongs to the same conversation as the timber growing on it. Today, in a world of climate change, that means managing timber and water as one connected challenge. …Koksilah watershed is one place where that work is being tested on the ground. In a survey commissioned by Mosaic Forest Management …69 per cent of respondents said they want forests managed for multiple environmental benefits, while 79 per cent want them maintained as working timber land.

One of the territory’s largest tree planting projects on public lands is now finished, restoring wildfire-affected forests near Sambaa Deh Falls. This work was completed under the 2 Billion Trees Program, which is part of a six-year, $36 million funding agreement with Natural Resources Canada. In July 2026, crews working with Jean Marie River First Nation and Windfirm Resources Inc. planted 1,504,030 plugs, leading to a total yield of 3,365,613 native trees and shrubs across 403 hectares. Combined with the 2025 Kakisa project, 3.77 million trees have been planted, reaching about 47 per cent of the Government of the Northwest Territories’ commitment to plant 8 million trees by 2031. Valued at about $3.9 million, the project supported local employment, with Jean Marie River First Nation providing project management, equipment and camp support services, creating 18 direct jobs for its members, while nearly 100 tree planters were employed overall. 

Elijah Washington pushes through branches left by logging, crossing the mossy forest floor on Haida Gwaii. He kneels beside a massive western red cedar stump. …The retrofitted stump is one of seven the Council of the Haida Nation had modified this summer to provide winter shelter for the coastal black bear, known in the Haida language as taan. Found nowhere else in the world, this subspecies of black bear is among the largest in North America. Coastal black bears in BC rely heavily on large old-growth trees and the hollow logs and stumps they leave behind. Decades of logging have removed many of those shelters, however — and the younger trees growing in their place have yet to develop hollows large enough for bears, said Helen Davis, a wildlife biologist working with the Haida Nation to identify and restore bear dens. …Now, the first-of-its kind program could set a model for bear conservation worldwide. [A subscription to the National Observer is required for full story access]

A new approach to how forest lands are accessed on Vancouver Island is being piloted starting Oct 2, 2026. Following pushback from the public Mosaic Forestry will open three gates on a weekend basis, giving the public access to nearly two-thousand kilometers of logging roads near Sooke, B.C.

Hundreds gathered on the steps of the B.C. Legislature in Victoria on Sunday, calling for a “paradigm shift” in how the province approaches forestry and old-growth logging. The event, organized by Elders for Ancient Trees, was the flagship event in a series of rallies planned to take place over the weekend and coming weeks. …organizers say approximately 400 people attended the rally. According to Jackie Larkin, one of the event organizers, the date was selected to coincide with the return of MLAs to the legislature — but says with an election now imminent, the timing couldn’t have been better. “We’re extremely distressed about the state of old-growth in this province and the fact that it keeps getting logged, despite the promises from the government to stop logging and to defer and to protect the ancient trees,” said Larkin. Elders for Ancient Trees … advocates to defer old-growth logging, stop clear-cutting, and stop exporting raw logs.

Additional coverage in the Castanet by Sarah Crookall: Penticton protesters rally for protection of B.C. old-growth forests

Neal McLoughlin

Neal McLoughlin, superintendent of predictive services with the B.C. Wildfire Service (BCWS), is trying to get one of B.C.’s most challenging fires, the Bald Range wildfire, to behave in his modelling software the way it did on the ground in the Okanagan Valley on Aug. 7. On his computer, he’s turning up the dials for extreme fire behaviour, replacing the forest fuels with more flammable types, programming a stronger wind from the west and swapping local topography of a downward sloping hill with a flat landscape. Only with those interventions do his simulations get close to what actually happened on the ground that night in Summerland, when more than 12,000 people were forced to flee as flames rushed toward the town in mere hours. It’s partly because the data that informs these models was collected at least 30 years ago, when extreme fire behaviour, driven by events like prolonged drought — a feature of climate change — was less common.

Icel Dobell suffered serious injuries in an altercation with a black bear in North Cowichan in August says she is undeterred in her quest to protect the animals and the wild spaces where they live. The attack occurred at Stoney Hill Regional Park, in a region she has pushed to protect ever since … 2018. …Somehow, Dobell was able to walk away, despite multiple injuries. …Stoney Hill, along with Mount Prevost, Mount Tzouhalem, Mount Richards, Maple Mountain and Mount Sicker, is part of a 5,400-hectare reserve of municipally owned forest lands that encompass what are known as the “six mountains.” …Dobell was one of the founders of a local forest conservation group called Where Do We Stand, which hosted an event in March of 2019 to discuss the future of the municipal forests, which they wanted to protect. …Given the stakes, Dobell said her interaction with the bear has only galvanized her resolve to protect the forest.

Mosaic Forest Management will open three previously closed gates in the Sooke area to weekend public recreation beginning October 3, a pilot the company will run through the end of December. The gates will be open 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday, Sunday and holiday Mondays, allowing cycling, walk-in and licensed highway vehicle access to roughly 42,000 hectares of Mosaic land and 2,000 kilometres of roads north of Sooke. Off-road vehicles, including ATVs and dirt bikes, are permitted only through Sooke and Cowichan Valley ATV clubs, which manage access for their members. Gates may close on short notice for wildfire risk, operations, or other safety or environmental reasons. These are working forests, and the closures keep the public clear of hazards. The pilot follows a 2025 public survey on recreation and access that drew more than 7,600 responses, in which gates and access ranked as the top concern. 

David Gonella

The City of Salmon Arm is planning to partner with Indigenous nations on the creation of a new community forest tenure in order to manage local forests and help protect the city from future wildfires. At the Sept. 28 council meeting, Coun. David Gonella introduced a motion to have staff begin the work necessary for the development of a community forest tenure under the province’s Community Forest Agreement Act. Under the act, communities are given the rights to harvest timber and manage a fixed section of forest for a period of time between 25 and 99 years. Gonella suggested that staff reach out to the Neskonlith Indian Band, Adams Lake Indian Band and other local First Nations to explore partnership opportunities. He also suggested gathering input from local forestry professionals to support a future tenure application. …He said he had already been considering the idea but became even more inspired after visiting the community forest in Revelstoke.

“As we mark National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, I have been reflecting on what truth and reconciliation mean to me, to our communities, and to the work we do in forestry. I am grateful for my parents and my community for the support and guidance that allowed me to gain the education and experience to become the forester I am today. I also carry memories that remind me why this journey matters. I remember standing with my cousins as they waited for the bus to take them to residential school for the year. Each had one small bag or suitcase with their belongings. I remember wanting to go with them. My older cousin looked at me and said, “You don’t want to go where we are going.” I still remember his words. … Our people are still on a healing journey… The land has provided much of what we need along that journey. …In this issue, the Forestry Council is sharing stories from First Nations across BC about what reconciliation means to them,” writes Lennard Joe, introducing the September newsletter.