These striking images are from the headwaters of Fairy Creek, the last intact old-growth valley outside of a park on southern Vancouver Island. The valley is located 20 minutes northeast of Port Renfrew in Pacheedaht territory.
In 2020, Ancient Forest Alliance identified and documented record-sized old-growth yellow cedar trees within a proposed cutblock from logging company Teal Jones. One of them measured 9.5 ft (2.8 m) in diameter, making it wider than the ninth-widest yellow cedar in Canada, according to the BC Big Tree Registry.
The threat to Fairy Creek would end up sparking the largest act of civil disobedience in Canadian history, with nearly 1200 people arrested for blockading logging activities. These blockades were independently organized and not affiliated with or participated in by the Ancient Forest Alliance.
In June of 2021, the entire Fairy Creek watershed was temporarily deferred from logging at the request of the Pacheedaht, Ditidaht, and Huu-ay-aht First Nations as they complete their long-term land use planning process. As of 2024, this work remains ongoing.
In BC, it’s important to note that the province cannot unilaterally establish protected areas and “just save the old-growth” on Crown lands — the support of local First Nations governments is a legal necessity in their unceded territories. Protected areas establishment and logging deferrals move at the speed of the local First Nations whose territories it is. The BC government’s policies and funding can facilitate or hinder, help speed up or slow down, the abilities of First Nations to protect ecosystems. Conservation financing is a vital enabling condition that can speed up the protection of old-growth forests.
We hope to one day see Fairy Creek and the surrounding old-growth forests protected within a new Indigenous Protected Area, ideally in the form of a Provincial Conservancy.
Take action by sending an instant message to protect old-growth forests.
