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Today the Ancient Forest Alliance (www.AncientForestAlliance.org), the Hua Foundation (www.HuaFoundation.org) and the Stanley Park Ecology Society (www.StanleyParkEcology.ca) launched a new educational program that will eventually target the half a million Chinese-speakers in the Lower Mainland about the ecology and conservation of BC's old-growth forests.

The organizations held their first "training for educational tour guides", volunteers who are interested in potentially leading old-growth nature walks in Mandarin or Cantonese, in Stanley Park. The Ancient Forest Alliance's Ken Wu and the Hua Foundation's Kevin Huang guided the dozen volunteers along some of the most spectacular old-growth trails in the park, the Tatlow and Lovers Trails where 14 feet wide, 800 year old redcedars still stand, and explained in English about the plants, animals, ecology, and related conservation issues regarding old-growth forests in British Columbia. The specialized terminology will subsequently be translated by skilled volunteers into Chinese for the participants to study.

As there are half a million people in the Lower Mainland who identify their mother tongue as Chinese, this program aims to help raise the awareness and level of engagement of a major segment of BC's population on the ecology and conservation needs of old-growth forests.

At a future date to be announced, once there is a trained core of nature guides, there will be public tours in Mandarin and Cantonese in the old-growth forests of Stanley Park and potentially in the Walbran Valley, Avatar Grove, Eden Grove, and Echo Lake Ancient forests.

If you can speak Mandarin or Cantonese and would like to participate in this program, please contact Ken Wu at info@ancientforestalliance.org

Last weekend's hurricane-force winds in Port Renfrew resulted in at least 30 trees (luckily none of the spectacular giants) crashing down over the Avatar Grove trail in the Lower Grove, damaging sections of the boardwalk (see photos HERE). This is unfortunate, as the Ancient Forest Alliance had literally just completed the boardwalk a week before after 3 years of hard work and was about to hold a ribbon-cutting ceremony to launch its completion. We now have to clear the trail and fix the boardwalk, steps, and platforms in the Lower Grove before we re-open it, which will take several months given the wet winter weather that is descending upon us. For now the Upper Avatar Grove remains open. Thank you for your patience and your support! We look forward to launching the fixed and completed boardwalk in the spring!

Thank you to Sitka (https://sitka.ca/) for raising $4000 for the AFA to construct our Avatar Grove boardwalk. We are most grateful for their generous help in making this project a reality!

Thank you to 13-year-old Joshua Wright, one of our great young donors, who has raised $350 for the AFA through the sale of his drawings. Joshua came to support our Avatar Boardwalk construction efforts in late September. We are SO grateful for conscious young people who also take action to make the world a better place. Thank you Joshua!

See the photo gallery of the latest boardwalk construction at the Avatar Grove! We've made some major improvements thanks to the help of dedicated volunteers and all those who've donated!

Last night almost 600 people showed up for the benefit screenings in Victoria of Hadwin's Judgement, based on John Vaillant's book The Golden Spruce, for the Ancient Forest Alliance! Thanks to all of you who came out and to producer Elizabeth Yake, author John Vaillant, the Cinecenta theatre, and the volunteers who made such a successful night for our organization and cause!

Thank you to 9 year old Gavin Wright, who collected donations at his lemonaide stand for the Ancient Forest Alliance! He showed up to present his batch of donations to us after the film screening of Hadwin's Judgement. We're most grateful to Gavin for his initiative to help our organization and campaigns!

Check out the website of the Sunshine Coast (Roberts Creek area) based conservation group the Elphinstone Logging Focus who are working to achieve a 2000 hectare expansion to the protected area on Mount Elphinstone. BC Timber Sales has given the go ahead to log the 'Twist and Shout' forest within the proposal, which includes numerous veteran old-growth Douglas-firs and redcedars, and local activists have been non-violently protesting there for weeks. See a comprehensive list of updates and coverage and events and how to take action on the "Twist and Shout" section of their website at: https://www.loggingfocus.org/campaigns/protect-the-twist-and-shout-forest/

And check out some great photos of the forest there by Shel Neufeld: https://www.facebook.com/shel.n.neufeld/posts/10154336717750155?pnref=story