CBC News
November 13, 2018
The struggle over what’s ancient, giant, valuable and dwindling in B.C.’s coastal forests
I.
For the past seven years, environmentalists in B.C. have been looking for trees just like it — wide, tall and centuries old — big, ancient trees that erupt out of the ground and make people standing beside them look minuscule and insignificant.
They could be red cedar, Douglas fir, hemlock or sitka spruce, at least 250 years old and dominant in the densely forested landscapes where they grow.
In May, an hour’s drive southwest from the Vancouver Island logging town of Port Alberni, a group including TJ Watt and Andrea Inness found one — a giant Douglas fir measuring 66 metres tall and three metres in diameter at chest height.
“It’s kind of like coming across a unicorn,” said Inness, 36, who grew up on a small island off Vancouver Island and talks about old-growth giants with a religious reverence.
The pair, who work for the environmental group the Ancient Forest Alliance, figured it was the ninth largest tree of its kind in Canada and around 800 years old.
“Trees of that size are so few and far between now … less than one per cent remains of the old-growth Douglas fir stands, so we were giddy with excitement,” said Inness.
But two weeks later, the giant fir was cut down by loggers who say it was rotten in its core and worth more being turned into products like wooden beams than living out its life in the forest.
“It creates a lot of revenue,” said fourth-generation logger Jeremy Matkovich about old-growth trees like the fir. “It has supported my family, my dad’s family — it’s going to be [the same for] my kids’ family, probably their kids.”
The tree is — or was — a symbol of the latest iteration of B.C’s War in the Woods where, on one side, environmentalists want all old-growth trees off limits to cutting because of the role they play in preserving biodiversity and keeping climate change from advancing.
The other side — forestry workers — wants at least some old-growth trees available to logging as the wood is valuable and important to an industry that supports more than 140 rural communities across the province.
II.
Many Canadians know Douglas firs as well-shaped and fragrant Christmas trees in their homes, but in B.C.’s temperate rainforest, they can reach staggering heights and live for up to 1,000 years.
It can rain up to 250 centimetres a year in these rainforests, which are along the coast of B.C.’s mainland, Haida Gwaii and western Vancouver Island. All that moisture feeds an ecosystem perfect for trees to grow into massive green and growing monoliths.
Stepping into a grove like the one where the giant Douglas fir was discovered is like pushing through a heavy curtain of green and entering into a dimension where the only sounds you hear are the sway of massive branches in the wind, the dripping of moisture and the soft crunch of your feet sinking into dense, soft earth of rotting wood and fern fronds.
The air is dank and dense with oxygen, the smell slightly sweet and deep.
Both loggers and environmentalists agree that there is a big wow factor when they come across a truly big old tree.
“It’s breathtaking to stand before something that’s lived for upwards of 1,000 years,” said Watt. “It’s a truly humbling experience.”
The province says there are 1.9 million hectares of forests on Crown land on Vancouver Island. About 840,000 hectares of that is considered old growth and out of that, the province says 520,000 hectares are protected from logging.
Still, the Sierra Club of B.C. estimates that around 10,000 hectares of old growth, 100 square kilometres, is being cut each year.
One of the Ancient Forest Alliance’s 10 demands for the industry is to transition to only cutting second growth trees, leaving all old growth to remain, live, die and help the groves exist and thrive. Second growth forests are made up of replanted trees that get harvested every 50 to 100 years.
Loggers say significant groves of old-growth forest are already protected and the industry is transitioning to second growth, but to stop cutting old growth immediately could put whole towns out of work.
It’s been 25 years since 800 people were arrested as they tried and succeeded in saving the ancient forests of Clayoquot Sound near the coastal towns of Tofino and Ucluelet.
Loggers themselves respect those turbulent years, saying that forest practices were modernized as a result. The rate of cutting dropped and there were also changes to better manage ecosystems.
III.
Ancient Forest Alliance campaigner Andrea Inness looked sad when asked about the big fir being cut down.
“[It’s] a little bit like coming across an elephant that’s been shot for its ivory and it’s wrong,” she said. “[It’s] a little bit hopeless that the ninth widest tree in Canada can’t be protected … what hope is there for the rest of endangered eco-forest systems?”
She stood in a special place for the Ancient Forest Alliance called Avatar Grove, which is a 20-minute drive from Port Renfrew on the southwest coast of Vancouver Island.
Inness looked up to the top of another Douglas fir, which is not as big as the one that was taken, but still impressive. Its roots have formed a sort of platform above the spongy earth where it grows. Its trunk is dense and gnarled and wide. Inness craned her neck back to try and glimpse its top.
“You know, I get a profound sense of just connection to nature, connection to the past,” she said about this area.
“This is what Vancouver Island is supposed to look like and did look like for many, many thousands of years.”
Avatar Grove, (yes, named after the movie) is the alliance’s showcase for old, ancient trees.
TJ Watt first went into the area in 2010 and took Ancient Forest Alliance founder Ken Wu to the green and lush ravine leading down to the Gordon River the following year.
At that time, there were markers hung from trees, put there by logging surveyors, but no cutting permit had been issued.
Watt and Wu knew it was a special area with several large and impressive Douglas firs, but also red cedars that were unique and old because of the giant burls on their trunks.
After photographing the trees, they set to work advocating to have the area saved from logging, built stairs and boardwalks for easier access for visitors and applied to the province to have the area designated as a recreation area.
Now thousands of people come each year to walk through and take photographs of themselves standing beside the trees.
Port Renfrew has also since rebranded itself as Canada’s tall tree capital, hopeful that tourism dollars will be its key economic driver rather than logging or fishing.
“It brings me such joy to hike here throughout the summer months. You bump into people from all around the world, many … say it’s the most beautiful place they have ever been,” said Watt, who owns a home in Port Renfrew.
“But at one point in time its future was uncertain.”
The big tree hunters hope to develop other groves like this, creating showcases for people to see and experience these ecosystems.
“Avatar Grove … has been an incredibly useful tool for advocacy and for getting people connected to these amazing forests,” said Inness.
IV.
What groups like the Ancient Forest Alliance are doing has resulted in a new version of the War in the Woods, a public relations battle over B.C.’s iconic old trees that is playing out online, in political lobbying and during hikes in the forest rather than with civil disobedience and arrests like the summer of 1993.
Inness, along with Watt, a soft-spoken 34-year-old who grew up skateboarding outside Victoria, and Wu, 44, are full-time big tree hunters looking for specimens they say are anchors of B.C.’s unique coastal rainforests.
“I feel truly lucky that we still have some of Earth’s last temperate rainforests right here on Vancouver Island,” said Watt. “[The] passion in my life is exploring and documenting these landscapes, hopefully resulting in their protection.”
Their campaigns dispute the province’s numbers about what amount of old growth is left. Wu argues that the province includes old-growth trees that exist in hard-to-log areas or places where they actually don’t grow that big or contribute as much to ecosystems as their giant cousins in lush valley bottoms.
“It’s like adding your Monopoly money with your real money and saying you are a millionaire,” said Wu.
The B.C. government fails to mention the context of how much old growth has been previously logged, said Wu. The AFA estimates that to be 75 per cent or about 1.5 million hectares of the original two million hectares of productive old-growth forest on Vancouver Island.
Environmentalists like those with the AFA say that remaining huge and ancient trees are worth far more to the unique ecosystem of the coastal temperate rainforest than being cut down and milled.
They support diverse ecosystems and even when they hollow in the middle, die, fall over and rot, they help support the growth of new trees, plant life and animals.
Some First Nations want also old growth preserved for cultural and environmental reasons. There is also an economic model showing their value as tourist and recreation destinations.
To strengthen these messages Inness, Watt and Wu push through yet-to-be-logged wild areas on public land to find trees like the big fir. They photograph the giants to reflect their stunning size and age. The goal is to hopefully drum up support over social media from residents to call on governments to keep them from being logged.
“To fight to protect something, you need to know about it and care about it and I think photography as an art form, especially, helps bridge that gap and make people aware about these incredible old-growth forests that are home to some of the largest trees on Earth that are still actually being cut down in many cases,” said Watt.
V.
Forestry workers — loggers — have themselves been outspoken about the photos and campaigns organizations like the AFA are doing, saying they hurt their industry at a time when changes could be coming from the provincial government on how Crown land and its resources are managed.
“It puts a bad name to everyone out here trying to make a living,” said Jeremy Matkovich, 42, a third generation logger from Campbell River.
His grandfather worked in an era when horses were used to haul logs out of the forest.
His father is still logging and his two sons, 19 and 21, are also loggers.
He stood in a cut block devoid of standing trees, wore a high visibility vest and defended the industry that has supported his family and his town for a century.
“We do it in an environmentally safe way,” he said about modern day logging.
“I don’t think [people] understand how many products they actually have in their home from logging.”
With Matkovich was Zoltan Schafer, a registered professional forester who started working as a logger when he was 14 years old.
He’s known as Zolie and seems to know pretty much everything and everyone involved with logging on Vancouver Island. He turns 60 this year and says much has changed since he started in the 1970s.
“It’s been a drastic change,” he said, adding that the Clayoquot protests really paved the way for these changes.
“I think the environmental movement was probably a good thing to wake up the industry but I think the balance has to come back.
“Are we always going to have old-growth timber?” he asked. “Yes.
“Maybe not in the percentage that certain people want, but we have reserves. And it’s going to stay.”
From the air on a helicopter ride to the area around Nahmint Lake, outside Port Alberni, Schafer pointed out dense groves of old growth that he says won’t be logged. Their scraggly tops, poke out above other trees along the water’s edge.
The tour was organized by the Truck Loggers Association, which represents loggers working public lands. Up above the landscape, yes there are bare, clear-cut areas, but it’s hard not to notice the vibrant green tree tops where old growth is or the emerald carpet of second growth trees.
There are still so many trees, either there for hundreds of years or replanted in the past 50.
The area the helicopter set down in was recently cut. Hundreds of logs still littered the landscape, the smell of sawdust and earth was strong and fragrant.
Schafer showed us around, walking up and down one of the access roads built to get at the trees. He has the body of a hockey player, wore a yellow and orange high visibility vest and kept his hands tucked in his waistband.
He wore his baseball hat at an angle on his head but his boots were well-worn and when he talked about changes to the industry, he was serious.
“They don’t try and clear cut anymore. They try and leave mosaics,” he said about the area.
What he is talking about is how modern logging looks. Gone, he said, is the complete mowing down of trees off entire hillsides, leaving 100 hectares of nothing but stumps and garbled up leftover trees, rocks and mud.
Loggers now leave parcels or swaths of trees of different sizes within and around the cutting areas, what Schafer calls mosaics. This is intended to help preserve the natural diversity of the area and help it when it’s replanted.
In January, the province also published a special legacy tree policy to help loggers assess large, ancient trees that should be kept from being cut. The government is reviewing it to potentially strengthen it.
Still, old-growth trees — the giants — are prized.
Schafer walked over to one that had been cut down, chopped into chunks beside the access road we stood on. It’s a big red cedar, probably somewhere around 300 years old.
Schafer counted the rings and pointed out how blemish-free the wood is, how at a mill it can be made into high value lumber or even even high-end furniture or musical instruments.
“This is what we call a ‘money tree,’” he said.
According to the Truck Loggers Association, these types of trees are worth far more than second growth trees.
Typical coastal old-growth sites can yield as much as 1,500 to 1,800 cubic metres per hectare whereas second growth sites yield around a third of that because they are harvested at younger ages, according to the TLA.
If you picture a cubic metre as a box, it has 1,000 litres of space.
Old-growth logs fetch around $350 per cubic metre for lumber-quality logs and $700 per cubic metre for high-end grades. By comparison, second-growth logs range between $120 and $200 per cubic metre.
It’s not hard to understand how old growth has kept logging as a viable industry along B.C.’s coast. Based on the TLA’s numbers, logging one hectare, or 0.01 square kilometre of the highest quality old-growth trees, could potentially generate wood worth more than $1 million.
As Schafer walked through the area pointing out old-growth trees that are currently off limits to cutting, he explained how increased protections have come, and continue to come, but to transition immediately out of logging any old-growth trees to just cutting second growth is not doable.
“We have to have a balance,” he said.
The TLA agrees and says that the current proportion of the harvest from coastal second-growth forests has risen steadily over the last decade from about five per cent of the harvest in 2000 to about 50 per cent of the total harvest today.
Leaving every remaining old-growth tree standing on Vancouver Island would result in the closure of four saw mills, at least one pulp mill and spell the end of the cedar shake and shingles industry, according to the TLA.
Schafer said the industry is sustainable with its current practices.
“I think there is a balance and I think it’s being done and I don’t think you are going to satisfy everybody,” he said. “You never are.
“I think the loggers do care, the ones I have dealt with and work with. We all try and do the right thing … protecting the streams and wildlife, cleaning the block up, getting it replanted.”
Schafer said this right where the big fir, described as a unicorn, was logged in May, two weeks after it was recorded by environmentalists.
The province’s legacy tree policy didn’t end up protecting it because the area was auctioned off by the government before the policy took effect.
No matter, say loggers like Matkovich who argue the tree was better served coming down than left standing.
“It was completely rotten,” said Matkovich. “It only had probably 50 years left and it would have blown over anyways.”
They resent the photos the AFA took and posted online of the tree cut from its base and lying prostrate on the ground.
VI.
Many people working within B.C.’s logging industry know that times continue to change and some are already getting prepared for there being less old growth to cut and mill.
On the shores of the inlet outside Port Alberni, fourth generation logger Mike McKay showed us his sawmill, Franklin Forest Products.
It was a logging camp in the 1930s before being converted to a sawmill in the late ‘70s.
His father brought it into the modern area in the 1990s and now McKay is taking it further.
He pointed to a structure of beams, belts, ladders and steel — a processor that can mill second growth logs.
“I’m going to take one last kick at the cat,” he said about the seven-figure investment he hopes will give his mill a future.
McKay, 48, employs 35 people.
“I am proud of that,” he said out from under his hard hat, which is emblazoned with maple leaves and the words “Canada Strong.”
“Sometimes it’s a little bit of pressure to keep them all employed but we seem to be doing a good job.”
The mill once had 70 workers before downturns in the industry. It also used to only cut old-growth logs, but now, 75 per cent of what McKay turns into fence posts and lumber is from old growth, and 25 per cent is from second growth.
“I think there is a transition period that we all need,” he said, adding that if there was an immediate transition to second growth logging only, his mill would go out of business.
McKay said there has been a significant preservation of old-growth forests around Port Alberni. The rest, he said, need to function as working forests, meaning they should be cut and replanted at intervals.
While environmentalists like Watt and Wu describe these working forests — second growth groves — as “astroturf” because of how uniformly they look from the air compared to old-growth groves, they do recognize their utility.
The AFA is supportive of a second growth industry and wants the province to help people like McKay retool their mills to be able to process it. But they also say curbing the export of logs from B.C. to overseas would equally help.
The Ancient Forest Alliance is looking to the B.C. NDP to make good on its 2017 election platform, to partner with First Nations to further modernize public land use planning, which is managing land in ways that meet economic, environmental, cultural and social objectives.
That could include coming up with more huge protections like what was done in the Great Bear Rainforest on B.C.’s central coast. An area the size of Vancouver Island is now off limits to logging.
In its 2018 budget, the province committed $16 million over three years to land use planning and the forestry ministry is reviewing how it treats old growth as part of that.
Ancient Forest Alliance campaigners say they’re waiting to see what comes from the province while continuing to push their way through the dense groves on Vancouver Island to find more old-growth trees to wow the public and policymakers with, like that huge Douglas fir they found in May.
“Holy moly — that’s a hell of a cedar,” Wu said as he scrambled through the fern-covered forest floor of yet another grove already surveyed for logging.
He stood up against the trunk of the massive cedar and posed for a photo taken by Watt.
They’re hopeful impressions like this will do something to keep these old giants from being felled but realistic that loggers will most likely get here first.
See the original piece here
Conservationists call for halt on old-growth logging in Nahmint Valley near Port Alberni
/in News Coverage, VideoWatch this Global News piece about the logging of magnificent ancient forests in the Nahmint Valley near Port Alberni, featuring AFA Campaigner Andrea Inness.
The AFA is calling on the BC government to immediately place a halt on the logging of old-growth forest “hotspots” of high ecological and recreational value – like the Nahmint Valley – and to use its control of BC Timber Sales to discontinue issuance timber sales in old-growth forests. Urgent action must be taken, particularly given the Nahmint is under investigation for potentially violating BC’s existing inadequate laws, which must be strengthened to protect ancient, endangered forests across the province.
Eco-group files complaint over old-growth cuts
/in News CoveragePhoto by TJ Watt
Times Colonist: An environmental group has filed a complaint over logging in the Nahmint Valley, alleging trees were cut, including one of Canada’s biggest, without regard to values such as conservation or recreation.
The Ancient Forest Alliance, an eight-year-old conservation group founded to highlight the need to protect forests as natural habitat, objects to the B.C. government decision to auction 300 hectares in various-sized cutblocks in the Nahmint Valley, southwest of Port Alberni.
Some of the resulting cutblocks logged last spring were 30 hectares. One contained a Douglas fir whose measurements, three metres in diameter, would have placed it ninth on the B.C. Big Tree Registry, a list maintained by the forest faculty at the University of British Columbia.
“Elsewhere in the valley, we found cedar stumps over 10 feet in diameter,” said TJ Watt, Ancient Forest Alliance campaigner in an interview. “There are a fair number of trees there that we feel should still be standing.”
Watt’s group filed a complaint in June with the B.C. government, contending the logging failed to take into account aspects such as the protection of sensitive or endangered plant communities. The big Douglas fir, about 800 years old, should have been left standing because it qualified as what is known as a legacy tree. The group has not heard any response to its complaint.
The Nahmint Valley is about 194 square kilometres, about 20 km southwest of Port Alberni. The area includes the Nahmint River, which widens into the 13-kilometre-long Nahmint Lake, both known for good fishing.
As far back as 1975, when the area was the responsibility MacMillan Bloedel, a B.C. forestry corporate giant at the time, the provincial government identified the Nahmint Valley as an area whose resources include more than just timber. They also include fishing, hiking, camping and wildlife habitat.
“The Nahmint is just a spectacular valley for anyone who visits the area,” said Watt.
The B.C. Ministry of Forests said in an emailed statement it reviews the timber blocks to be auctioned in the Nahmint Valley to ensure no legacy trees are at risk.
The ministry statement said B.C. Timber Sales, an agency responsible for about 20 per cent of annual tree harvest in the province by auctioning cutblocks, has conducted an inventory of old-growth cedar trees in Nahmint. It has identified more than 200 with a diameter greater than one metre and worthy of being considered for retention.
Also, an area of about 2,700 hectares, six times the size of Stanley Park, has been protected as wildlife habitat within the Nahmint Valley or identified as winter foraging range for deer and elk.
“We recognize the value of old-growth forests for their biodiversity and are currently working on an old-growth strategy,” said the statement.
See article here: https://www.timescolonist.com/news/local/eco-group-files-complaint-over-old-growth-cuts-1.23543570
Conservationists call for halt on old-growth logging in Vancouver Island’s spectacular Nahmint Valley in light of forestry watchdog investigation
/in Media ReleaseArborist-conservationist Matthew Beatty stands atop a massive redcedar log in the Nahmint Valley
Conservationists with the Ancient Forest Alliance are concerned that old-growth logging in the Nahmint Valley is continuing and that future logging is being planned for the area by the BC government, despite the fact a Forest Practices Board investigation is underway into whether the logging by BC Timber Sales fails to comply with legal orders.
Victoria, BC – The Ancient Forest Alliance is calling on the BC NDP government to halt further logging in the Nahmint Valley near Port Alberni while investigations into potential non-compliance by the BC’s government’s logging agency, BC Timber Sales (BCTS), are currently underway.
Nahmint Valley – BC’s 9th widest Douglas-fir tree – BC Timber Sales
In May 2018, the Ancient Forest Alliance exposed the logging of some of the world’s largest trees by BCTS in Hupacasath and Tseshaht First Nations territory in the Nahmint Valley. Over 300 hectares were auctioned off for logging with some cutblocks being 30 hectares – or about 30 football fields – in size. Thousands of old-growth trees have since been cut, including a Douglas-fir tree measuring 3 metres (9.9 feet) in diameter, which ranked 9th on the BC Big Tree Registry’s list of the widest Douglas-firs in the province.
“After exploring and documenting various old-growth cutblocks planned by BCTS throughout the Nahmint Valley, we submitted a natural resource violation complaint to the Ministry of Forests in June, alleging that BC Timber Sales’ Forest Stewardship Plan fails to meet the results and strategies set out in the Vancouver Island Land Use Plan Higher Level Plan Order that rare and underrepresented plant communities be represented and protected,” stated Ancient Forest Alliance Campaigner and Photographer TJ Watt.
“We also pointed out that one of the primary land use objectives for the Nahmint Valley in the Vancouver Island Summary Land Use Plan includes the retention of a ‘high proportion’ of old forest, including large, old-growth Douglas-fir trees. In addition, the three-metre-wide Douglas-fir that was felled in May, which we estimated to be at least 800 years old, was in violation of BCTS’ “Best Management Practices for Coastal Legacy Trees” policy, which states that the minimum size for retention of Douglas-firs is 2.1 meters. We believe other western redcedars and Douglas-firs in the BCTS-issued cutblocks also exceeded the minimum threshold size for protection.”
An investigation by the Ministry of Forests ensued as a result of the AFA’s complaint, but the results of that investigation have not been made public. The AFA has also yet to receive any information in response to a freedom of information (FOI) request submitted in September, seeking information on the ministry’s investigation, despite the investigation having been completed and the due date for response to the FOI having passed in late November. The Forest Practices Board also recently launched an investigation into the logging in the Nahmint Valley. Meanwhile, BC Timber Sales released its 2018 West Coast Operating Plan in October, outlining additional old-growth timber sales in the Nahmint Valley that have yet to be auctioned off.
“We are deeply concerned about the potential violation, given the abundant ecological, tourism and recreational, and cultural values of the Nahmint Valley and possible negative and long-term impacts on these values,” stated Ancient Forest Alliance Campaigner Andrea Inness. “We are also concerned that BCTS is continuing to engineer future logging cutblocks for the Nahmint Valley despite the results of the ministry’s investigation not having been released and the Forest Practices Board now conducting their own investigation. Given there’s a possibility that the BC government’s logging agency is in violation of its own land use regulations, these future logging plans should be placed on hold until it is determined the law isn’t being broken.”
“Ultimately, however, what’s needed is for the BC government to use its control over BC Timber Sales to discontinue issuance of old-growth timber sales altogether. The ongoing logging of some of Canada’s largest trees and most spectacular ancient forests in the Nahmint Valley is proof that BCTS cannot be trusted to sustainably manage BC’s endangered old-growth forests.”
Background Information:
The Nahmint Valley is considered a “hotspot” of high-conservation value old-growth forest by conservation groups and is home to Roosevelt elk, black-tailed deer, cougars, wolves, and black bears, as well as old-growth associated species like the marbled murrelet and northern goshawk. The area also supports significant salmon and steelhead spawning runs. The Nahmint is considered by many people to be one of the most scenic areas in BC, with its ancient forests, rugged peaks, gorgeous turquoise canyons and swimming holes, and large and small lakes, and is heavily used by hikers, campers, anglers, and hunters.
The Ancient Forest Alliance is calling on the BC government to implement a series of policy changes to protect endangered old-growth forests, including an interim halt to logging in old-growth “hotspots” – areas of high conservation value, such as the Nahmint Valley – to ensure the largest and best stands of remaining old-growth forests are kept intact. It also includes the implementation of the province’s long-overdue Big Tree Protection Order, meant to protect the country’s largest trees with buffer zones; a provincial land acquisition fund to purchase and protect endangered ecosystems on private lands; a comprehensive, science-based plan to protect endangered old-growth forests across the province; and conservation financing support for First Nations communities in lieu of old-growth logging.
AFA Holiday Booths – Dates & Locations
/in AnnouncementsIt’s that time of year again! Drop by an AFA booth in Victoria or Vancouver this holiday season to pick up gifts such as our 2019 calendar featuring beautiful images from AFA Photographer & Campaigner, TJ Watt, as well as our popular greeting cards, stickers, posters, buttons, and adoption certificates (adopt-a-tree or grove)!
Victoria:
Booth Location: MEC Victoria (1450 Government St, Victoria, BC V8W 1Z2)
Date & Time: Friday, Dec. 14 from 10 am to 5 pm
Booth Location: Hudson Public Market (1701 Douglas St #6, Victoria, BC V8W 0C1)
Dates & Times:
Wednesday, Dec. 12 from 11 am to 4 pm
Saturday, Dec. 15, from 10 am to 5 pm
Wednesday, Dec. 19, from 11 am to 4pm
Friday, Dec. 21, from 4pm to 8pm
Booth Location: Patagonia Victoria (616 Yates St)
Date & Time: Saturday, Dec 15, from 1 pm to 5 pm
Vancouver:
Booth Location: Patagonia Vancouver (1994 W 4th Avenue, Vancouver V6J 1M5)
Dates: Dec 7, 8 & 9 (Friday, Saturday, Sunday)
Time: 11 am to 4 pm
Please make the AFA your priority organization to support this Holiday Season! We are BC’s lead organization working to ensure comprehensive provincial legislation to protect endangered old-growth forests and to ensure the sustainable, value-added logging of second-growth forests. Your contribution truly goes far with us, and we appreciate it!
Can’t make it to one of the booths? Here are some other ways to purchase gifts or donate:
Thank you for your dedicated support!
~The AFA Team
Year-End Celebration & Fundraiser – THANK YOU!
/in Announcements, Thank YouThank you so much to everyone who came out and supported the AFA at our Year-End Celebration & Fundraiser on Nov. 29! We were delighted to welcome nearly 100 people throughout the evening, all who brought great energy, socializing, food and silent auction donations to make the night a great success! Excitingly, we raised nearly $5000!!
Thank you to Joe Martin for presenting on the knowledge and teachings of the Tla-o-qui-aht people and culture, to Rachel Ablack for sharing her beautiful voice with us all, to the Victoria Event Centre staff, and to our amazing volunteers, supporters, and AFA staff whom without, we could not have pulled off such an enjoyable and successful evening. We’re also sending a special thank you to the many wonderful businesses, artists, and individuals who generously donated over $3,500 in items toward our silent auction as well as delicious food toward the event:
Patagonia Victoria, Robinson’s Outdoor Store, Mountain Equipment Co-op, Sitka, i.O.N Clothing Featuring Hemp & Company, Pelican Products, Zero Waste Emporium, Inspire Hair Salon, Butchart Gardens, Deadbeetz Food Truck, Il Terrazzo Ristorante, Bon Macaron, Garden Works Oak Bay, Harmony Belly Dance Co., Esquimalt Farmer’s Market, Windblossom Massage, Hummingbird Crafts, TJ Watt Photography, HoopSpin Lab, Market on Yates, Country Grocer, and Thrifty’s Food James Bay, artists Logan Ford and Kleque Method, and AFA supporters Lyn James, Nitya & Scott Harris, Kristin Grant, and Amanda Evans.
We are so grateful for your dedicated support. Thank you again!
The AFA Team
TJ Watt, Andrea Inness, Joan Varley, Tiara Dhenin, Amanda Evans, Morgan Wheeler, Rachel Ablack, and Jenny Tan
Conservationists applaud old-growth protection resolution signed by Wilderness Tourism Association of BC
/in Media ReleaseA grizzly bear walks a shoreline in BC’s iconic Great Bear Rainforest. A sailboat operated by wilderness tourism company Maple Leaf Adventures is anchored in the distance.
Conservationists with the Ancient Forest Alliance are celebrating a recent resolution by the Wilderness Tourism Association of BC (WTABC), representing 2,500 businesses across BC, calling on the BC NDP government to protect the province’s endangered old-growth forests, support First Nations sustainable economic development, and ensure a sustainable, value-added, second-growth forest industry.
Click here to read the resolution.
“Many of BC’s wilderness tourism businesses, including my own, rely on healthy, functioning old-growth forests to provide the extraordinary wilderness experiences that people are looking for when they visit BC,” stated Kevin Smith, President of WTABC’s Board of Directors and President of Maple Leaf Adventures, a Victoria-based eco-tourism company that runs expedition cruises along British Columbia’s coast. “The WTABC strongly supports provincial policies that ensure BC’s remaining endangered ancient forests stay intact.”
Ancient Forest Alliance Campaigner Andrea Inness welcomed the position taken by the WTABC. “BC’s appeal as an outdoor tourism destination is largely due to the many recreational activities that old-growth forests support like wildlife viewing and recreational fishing. Increasing numbers of people are also visiting BC specifically to see our old-growth forests, home to some of the biggest and oldest trees on Earth,” stated Inness. “We applaud the WTABC’s decision to stand up for old-growth forest protection for the sake of BC’s eco-tourism operators and the broader economy.”
The Wilderness Tourism Association joins thousands of businesses (BC Chamber of Commerce), mayors and city councils (Union of BC Municipalities), First Nations, unions (the Public and Private Workers of Canada forestry union) and conservation groups across BC in calling on the provincial government to increase protection for BC’s endangered old-growth forests.
“BC’s business community is starting to realize that, far from hampering development in rural economies, many of which are suffering from decades of decline in forestry jobs and revenues, protecting old-growth forests can be a boon for business,” stated AFA Campaigner and Photographer TJ Watt.
Port Renfrew on western Vancouver Island is a textbook example of the benefits of big trees to small businesses. Since Avatar Grove, an exceptional grove of ancient forest, was protected in 2012, the town has seen a major increase in revenue in rental accommodations, restaurants, grocery, stores, and other businesses, as visitors come from around the world to experience the grove and nearby record-sized trees.
Communities across the province stand to benefit from protecting nearby ancient forests. In fact, studies have shown that keeping old-growth forests standing can provide a greater overall economic benefit than cutting them down when factoring in their value in supporting tourism, recreation, carbon offsets, water conservation and filtration, recreational and commercial fisheries, and non-timber forest products (e.g. wild mushrooms and medicinal herbs).
“Nature-based tourism is one of the top three drivers of BC’s tourism and rural economy, supporting 26,000 direct full-time jobs and some 40,000 jobs in total,” stated Scott Benton, Executive Director of the WTABC. “Demand for wilderness tourism is increasing in the province, creating opportunities for new business ventures, so the provincial government needs to take swift action to protect the intact natural landscapes, such as old-growth forests, on which these businesses depend.”
Background Information:
Old growth forests are integral to British Columbia for ensuring the protection of endangered species, climate stability, tourism, clean water, wild salmon, and the cultures of many First Nations. At present, over 79% of the original productive old-growth forests on BC’s southern coast have been logged, including well over 90% of the valley bottoms where the largest trees grow. Only about 8% of Vancouver Island’s original old growth forests are protected in parks and Old Growth Management Areas.
The Ancient Forest Alliance is calling on the NDP provincial government to implement a science-based strategy to protect BC’s endangered old-growth forests; support First Nations land-use planning and sustainable economic development and diversification in lieu of old growth logging; ensure the sustainable logging of second growth forests (which now constitute the majority of forest lands in southern BC); and implement regulations and incentives for the retooling and development of BC mills and value-added facilities to handle second-growth logs.
See maps and stats on the remaining old-growth forests on BC’s southern coast at: www.ancientforestalliance.org/old-growth-maps.php
The BC Chamber of Commerce, BC’s premier business lobby, representing 36,000 businesses passed a resolution in 2016 calling on the BC government to increase protection for BC’s old-growth forests to benefit the economy after a series of similar resolutions passed by the Port Renfrew Chamber of Commerce, the Sooke Chamber of Commerce, and the WestShore Chamber of Commerce.
See: www.ancientforestalliance.org/news-item.php?ID=1010
The Public and Private Workers of Canada (PPWC), representing thousands of forestry workers across BC, passed a resolution in 2017 calling for an end to old-growth logging on Vancouver Island and an accelerated transition to a sustainable, value-added second-growth forest industry.
See: https://ancientforestalliance.org/conservationists-applaud-old-growth-protection-resolution-by-major-bc-forestry-union/
Both the Union of BC Municipalities (UBCM), representing the mayors, city and town councils, and regional district councils across BC and the Association of Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities (AVICC), representing Vancouver Island local governments, passed a resolution in 2016 calling on the province to protect Vancouver Island’s remaining old-growth forests by amending the 1994 land-use plan.
See: https://ancientforestalliance.org/media-release-ubcm-passes-old-growth-protection-resolution/
AFA Year-End Celebration & Fundraiser, Thurs Nov. 29
/in AnnouncementsJoin the Ancient Forest Alliance on Thursday, November 29, at the Victoria Event Centre (1415 Broad St, near Pandora Ave) from 6pm-9pm to honour our 9th year of operation and the amazing community that has helped us grow to where we are today!
The evening will feature a fun and informative presentation from AFA Campaigners Andrea Inness and TJ Watt, free finger food and refreshments, a silent auction featuring over $1500 in great items generously donated by local businesses and artists, as well as a chance to mingle with our campaign team and fellow AFA supporters. It’s also a great opportunity to pick up some AFA merchandise such as our greeting cards featuring photography by TJ Watt, our 2019 calendars, AFA t-shirts, stickers, and more!
Event Schedule:
Tickets will be available at the door on a sliding scale between $10 and $20. All ages are welcome!
We would appreciate if you could RSVP your attendance by emailing info@ancientforestalliance.org or by calling 250 896 4007. For more information, please email us at info@ancientforestalliance.org.
Please visit our Facebook event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/1920660948000145/ to share the event widely!
*Please note, The Victoria Event Centre currently does not have an operational elevator, and there is one long flight of stairs at the venue entrance. If you would like to attend the event but require assistance with accessing the space, please contact us at and we will do our best to accommodate.
We look forward to seeing you at the event on Nov. 29th!
Thank You to Patagonia Victoria!
/in Announcements, Thank YouThank you most graciously to Patagonia Victoria for generously donating $500 to the Ancient Forest Alliance! The donation comes from a recent symposium and sale at the University of Victoria which raised awareness about environmental activism, responsible consumerism, and outdoor adventures, and goes above and beyond the Patagonia Victoria/Banff /Calgary of Elements Inc. annual commitment to the 1% For the Planet program! Patagonia Victoria has also supported the movement to protect old-growth forests in BC by hosting numerous events in their store and helping to mobilize community members. We are enormously grateful for their continuous and outstanding support!
Money trees
/in News CoverageCBC News
November 13, 2018
The struggle over what’s ancient, giant, valuable and dwindling in B.C.’s coastal forests
I.
For the past seven years, environmentalists in B.C. have been looking for trees just like it — wide, tall and centuries old — big, ancient trees that erupt out of the ground and make people standing beside them look minuscule and insignificant.
They could be red cedar, Douglas fir, hemlock or sitka spruce, at least 250 years old and dominant in the densely forested landscapes where they grow.
In May, an hour’s drive southwest from the Vancouver Island logging town of Port Alberni, a group including TJ Watt and Andrea Inness found one — a giant Douglas fir measuring 66 metres tall and three metres in diameter at chest height.
“It’s kind of like coming across a unicorn,” said Inness, 36, who grew up on a small island off Vancouver Island and talks about old-growth giants with a religious reverence.
The pair, who work for the environmental group the Ancient Forest Alliance, figured it was the ninth largest tree of its kind in Canada and around 800 years old.
“Trees of that size are so few and far between now … less than one per cent remains of the old-growth Douglas fir stands, so we were giddy with excitement,” said Inness.
But two weeks later, the giant fir was cut down by loggers who say it was rotten in its core and worth more being turned into products like wooden beams than living out its life in the forest.
“It creates a lot of revenue,” said fourth-generation logger Jeremy Matkovich about old-growth trees like the fir. “It has supported my family, my dad’s family — it’s going to be [the same for] my kids’ family, probably their kids.”
The tree is — or was — a symbol of the latest iteration of B.C’s War in the Woods where, on one side, environmentalists want all old-growth trees off limits to cutting because of the role they play in preserving biodiversity and keeping climate change from advancing.
The other side — forestry workers — wants at least some old-growth trees available to logging as the wood is valuable and important to an industry that supports more than 140 rural communities across the province.
II.
Many Canadians know Douglas firs as well-shaped and fragrant Christmas trees in their homes, but in B.C.’s temperate rainforest, they can reach staggering heights and live for up to 1,000 years.
It can rain up to 250 centimetres a year in these rainforests, which are along the coast of B.C.’s mainland, Haida Gwaii and western Vancouver Island. All that moisture feeds an ecosystem perfect for trees to grow into massive green and growing monoliths.
Stepping into a grove like the one where the giant Douglas fir was discovered is like pushing through a heavy curtain of green and entering into a dimension where the only sounds you hear are the sway of massive branches in the wind, the dripping of moisture and the soft crunch of your feet sinking into dense, soft earth of rotting wood and fern fronds.
The air is dank and dense with oxygen, the smell slightly sweet and deep.
Both loggers and environmentalists agree that there is a big wow factor when they come across a truly big old tree.
“It’s breathtaking to stand before something that’s lived for upwards of 1,000 years,” said Watt. “It’s a truly humbling experience.”
The province says there are 1.9 million hectares of forests on Crown land on Vancouver Island. About 840,000 hectares of that is considered old growth and out of that, the province says 520,000 hectares are protected from logging.
Still, the Sierra Club of B.C. estimates that around 10,000 hectares of old growth, 100 square kilometres, is being cut each year.
One of the Ancient Forest Alliance’s 10 demands for the industry is to transition to only cutting second growth trees, leaving all old growth to remain, live, die and help the groves exist and thrive. Second growth forests are made up of replanted trees that get harvested every 50 to 100 years.
Loggers say significant groves of old-growth forest are already protected and the industry is transitioning to second growth, but to stop cutting old growth immediately could put whole towns out of work.
It’s been 25 years since 800 people were arrested as they tried and succeeded in saving the ancient forests of Clayoquot Sound near the coastal towns of Tofino and Ucluelet.
Loggers themselves respect those turbulent years, saying that forest practices were modernized as a result. The rate of cutting dropped and there were also changes to better manage ecosystems.
III.
Ancient Forest Alliance campaigner Andrea Inness looked sad when asked about the big fir being cut down.
“[It’s] a little bit like coming across an elephant that’s been shot for its ivory and it’s wrong,” she said. “[It’s] a little bit hopeless that the ninth widest tree in Canada can’t be protected … what hope is there for the rest of endangered eco-forest systems?”
She stood in a special place for the Ancient Forest Alliance called Avatar Grove, which is a 20-minute drive from Port Renfrew on the southwest coast of Vancouver Island.
Inness looked up to the top of another Douglas fir, which is not as big as the one that was taken, but still impressive. Its roots have formed a sort of platform above the spongy earth where it grows. Its trunk is dense and gnarled and wide. Inness craned her neck back to try and glimpse its top.
“You know, I get a profound sense of just connection to nature, connection to the past,” she said about this area.
“This is what Vancouver Island is supposed to look like and did look like for many, many thousands of years.”
Avatar Grove, (yes, named after the movie) is the alliance’s showcase for old, ancient trees.
TJ Watt first went into the area in 2010 and took Ancient Forest Alliance founder Ken Wu to the green and lush ravine leading down to the Gordon River the following year.
At that time, there were markers hung from trees, put there by logging surveyors, but no cutting permit had been issued.
Watt and Wu knew it was a special area with several large and impressive Douglas firs, but also red cedars that were unique and old because of the giant burls on their trunks.
After photographing the trees, they set to work advocating to have the area saved from logging, built stairs and boardwalks for easier access for visitors and applied to the province to have the area designated as a recreation area.
Now thousands of people come each year to walk through and take photographs of themselves standing beside the trees.
Port Renfrew has also since rebranded itself as Canada’s tall tree capital, hopeful that tourism dollars will be its key economic driver rather than logging or fishing.
“It brings me such joy to hike here throughout the summer months. You bump into people from all around the world, many … say it’s the most beautiful place they have ever been,” said Watt, who owns a home in Port Renfrew.
“But at one point in time its future was uncertain.”
The big tree hunters hope to develop other groves like this, creating showcases for people to see and experience these ecosystems.
“Avatar Grove … has been an incredibly useful tool for advocacy and for getting people connected to these amazing forests,” said Inness.
IV.
What groups like the Ancient Forest Alliance are doing has resulted in a new version of the War in the Woods, a public relations battle over B.C.’s iconic old trees that is playing out online, in political lobbying and during hikes in the forest rather than with civil disobedience and arrests like the summer of 1993.
Inness, along with Watt, a soft-spoken 34-year-old who grew up skateboarding outside Victoria, and Wu, 44, are full-time big tree hunters looking for specimens they say are anchors of B.C.’s unique coastal rainforests.
“I feel truly lucky that we still have some of Earth’s last temperate rainforests right here on Vancouver Island,” said Watt. “[The] passion in my life is exploring and documenting these landscapes, hopefully resulting in their protection.”
Their campaigns dispute the province’s numbers about what amount of old growth is left. Wu argues that the province includes old-growth trees that exist in hard-to-log areas or places where they actually don’t grow that big or contribute as much to ecosystems as their giant cousins in lush valley bottoms.
“It’s like adding your Monopoly money with your real money and saying you are a millionaire,” said Wu.
The B.C. government fails to mention the context of how much old growth has been previously logged, said Wu. The AFA estimates that to be 75 per cent or about 1.5 million hectares of the original two million hectares of productive old-growth forest on Vancouver Island.
Environmentalists like those with the AFA say that remaining huge and ancient trees are worth far more to the unique ecosystem of the coastal temperate rainforest than being cut down and milled.
They support diverse ecosystems and even when they hollow in the middle, die, fall over and rot, they help support the growth of new trees, plant life and animals.
Some First Nations want also old growth preserved for cultural and environmental reasons. There is also an economic model showing their value as tourist and recreation destinations.
To strengthen these messages Inness, Watt and Wu push through yet-to-be-logged wild areas on public land to find trees like the big fir. They photograph the giants to reflect their stunning size and age. The goal is to hopefully drum up support over social media from residents to call on governments to keep them from being logged.
“To fight to protect something, you need to know about it and care about it and I think photography as an art form, especially, helps bridge that gap and make people aware about these incredible old-growth forests that are home to some of the largest trees on Earth that are still actually being cut down in many cases,” said Watt.
V.
Forestry workers — loggers — have themselves been outspoken about the photos and campaigns organizations like the AFA are doing, saying they hurt their industry at a time when changes could be coming from the provincial government on how Crown land and its resources are managed.
“It puts a bad name to everyone out here trying to make a living,” said Jeremy Matkovich, 42, a third generation logger from Campbell River.
His grandfather worked in an era when horses were used to haul logs out of the forest.
His father is still logging and his two sons, 19 and 21, are also loggers.
He stood in a cut block devoid of standing trees, wore a high visibility vest and defended the industry that has supported his family and his town for a century.
“We do it in an environmentally safe way,” he said about modern day logging.
“I don’t think [people] understand how many products they actually have in their home from logging.”
With Matkovich was Zoltan Schafer, a registered professional forester who started working as a logger when he was 14 years old.
He’s known as Zolie and seems to know pretty much everything and everyone involved with logging on Vancouver Island. He turns 60 this year and says much has changed since he started in the 1970s.
“It’s been a drastic change,” he said, adding that the Clayoquot protests really paved the way for these changes.
“I think the environmental movement was probably a good thing to wake up the industry but I think the balance has to come back.
“Are we always going to have old-growth timber?” he asked. “Yes.
“Maybe not in the percentage that certain people want, but we have reserves. And it’s going to stay.”
From the air on a helicopter ride to the area around Nahmint Lake, outside Port Alberni, Schafer pointed out dense groves of old growth that he says won’t be logged. Their scraggly tops, poke out above other trees along the water’s edge.
The tour was organized by the Truck Loggers Association, which represents loggers working public lands. Up above the landscape, yes there are bare, clear-cut areas, but it’s hard not to notice the vibrant green tree tops where old growth is or the emerald carpet of second growth trees.
There are still so many trees, either there for hundreds of years or replanted in the past 50.
The area the helicopter set down in was recently cut. Hundreds of logs still littered the landscape, the smell of sawdust and earth was strong and fragrant.
Schafer showed us around, walking up and down one of the access roads built to get at the trees. He has the body of a hockey player, wore a yellow and orange high visibility vest and kept his hands tucked in his waistband.
He wore his baseball hat at an angle on his head but his boots were well-worn and when he talked about changes to the industry, he was serious.
“They don’t try and clear cut anymore. They try and leave mosaics,” he said about the area.
What he is talking about is how modern logging looks. Gone, he said, is the complete mowing down of trees off entire hillsides, leaving 100 hectares of nothing but stumps and garbled up leftover trees, rocks and mud.
Loggers now leave parcels or swaths of trees of different sizes within and around the cutting areas, what Schafer calls mosaics. This is intended to help preserve the natural diversity of the area and help it when it’s replanted.
In January, the province also published a special legacy tree policy to help loggers assess large, ancient trees that should be kept from being cut. The government is reviewing it to potentially strengthen it.
Still, old-growth trees — the giants — are prized.
Schafer walked over to one that had been cut down, chopped into chunks beside the access road we stood on. It’s a big red cedar, probably somewhere around 300 years old.
Schafer counted the rings and pointed out how blemish-free the wood is, how at a mill it can be made into high value lumber or even even high-end furniture or musical instruments.
“This is what we call a ‘money tree,’” he said.
According to the Truck Loggers Association, these types of trees are worth far more than second growth trees.
Typical coastal old-growth sites can yield as much as 1,500 to 1,800 cubic metres per hectare whereas second growth sites yield around a third of that because they are harvested at younger ages, according to the TLA.
If you picture a cubic metre as a box, it has 1,000 litres of space.
Old-growth logs fetch around $350 per cubic metre for lumber-quality logs and $700 per cubic metre for high-end grades. By comparison, second-growth logs range between $120 and $200 per cubic metre.
It’s not hard to understand how old growth has kept logging as a viable industry along B.C.’s coast. Based on the TLA’s numbers, logging one hectare, or 0.01 square kilometre of the highest quality old-growth trees, could potentially generate wood worth more than $1 million.
As Schafer walked through the area pointing out old-growth trees that are currently off limits to cutting, he explained how increased protections have come, and continue to come, but to transition immediately out of logging any old-growth trees to just cutting second growth is not doable.
“We have to have a balance,” he said.
The TLA agrees and says that the current proportion of the harvest from coastal second-growth forests has risen steadily over the last decade from about five per cent of the harvest in 2000 to about 50 per cent of the total harvest today.
Leaving every remaining old-growth tree standing on Vancouver Island would result in the closure of four saw mills, at least one pulp mill and spell the end of the cedar shake and shingles industry, according to the TLA.
Schafer said the industry is sustainable with its current practices.
“I think there is a balance and I think it’s being done and I don’t think you are going to satisfy everybody,” he said. “You never are.
“I think the loggers do care, the ones I have dealt with and work with. We all try and do the right thing … protecting the streams and wildlife, cleaning the block up, getting it replanted.”
Schafer said this right where the big fir, described as a unicorn, was logged in May, two weeks after it was recorded by environmentalists.
The province’s legacy tree policy didn’t end up protecting it because the area was auctioned off by the government before the policy took effect.
No matter, say loggers like Matkovich who argue the tree was better served coming down than left standing.
“It was completely rotten,” said Matkovich. “It only had probably 50 years left and it would have blown over anyways.”
They resent the photos the AFA took and posted online of the tree cut from its base and lying prostrate on the ground.
VI.
Many people working within B.C.’s logging industry know that times continue to change and some are already getting prepared for there being less old growth to cut and mill.
On the shores of the inlet outside Port Alberni, fourth generation logger Mike McKay showed us his sawmill, Franklin Forest Products.
It was a logging camp in the 1930s before being converted to a sawmill in the late ‘70s.
His father brought it into the modern area in the 1990s and now McKay is taking it further.
He pointed to a structure of beams, belts, ladders and steel — a processor that can mill second growth logs.
“I’m going to take one last kick at the cat,” he said about the seven-figure investment he hopes will give his mill a future.
McKay, 48, employs 35 people.
“I am proud of that,” he said out from under his hard hat, which is emblazoned with maple leaves and the words “Canada Strong.”
“Sometimes it’s a little bit of pressure to keep them all employed but we seem to be doing a good job.”
The mill once had 70 workers before downturns in the industry. It also used to only cut old-growth logs, but now, 75 per cent of what McKay turns into fence posts and lumber is from old growth, and 25 per cent is from second growth.
“I think there is a transition period that we all need,” he said, adding that if there was an immediate transition to second growth logging only, his mill would go out of business.
McKay said there has been a significant preservation of old-growth forests around Port Alberni. The rest, he said, need to function as working forests, meaning they should be cut and replanted at intervals.
While environmentalists like Watt and Wu describe these working forests — second growth groves — as “astroturf” because of how uniformly they look from the air compared to old-growth groves, they do recognize their utility.
The AFA is supportive of a second growth industry and wants the province to help people like McKay retool their mills to be able to process it. But they also say curbing the export of logs from B.C. to overseas would equally help.
The Ancient Forest Alliance is looking to the B.C. NDP to make good on its 2017 election platform, to partner with First Nations to further modernize public land use planning, which is managing land in ways that meet economic, environmental, cultural and social objectives.
That could include coming up with more huge protections like what was done in the Great Bear Rainforest on B.C.’s central coast. An area the size of Vancouver Island is now off limits to logging.
In its 2018 budget, the province committed $16 million over three years to land use planning and the forestry ministry is reviewing how it treats old growth as part of that.
Ancient Forest Alliance campaigners say they’re waiting to see what comes from the province while continuing to push their way through the dense groves on Vancouver Island to find more old-growth trees to wow the public and policymakers with, like that huge Douglas fir they found in May.
“Holy moly — that’s a hell of a cedar,” Wu said as he scrambled through the fern-covered forest floor of yet another grove already surveyed for logging.
He stood up against the trunk of the massive cedar and posed for a photo taken by Watt.
They’re hopeful impressions like this will do something to keep these old giants from being felled but realistic that loggers will most likely get here first.
See the original piece here
Old-growth logging threatens culture, says Nuu-chah-nulth tribal council
/in News CoverageThe Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council says the provincial government needs to do more to protect B.C.’s remaining ancient forests for both cultural and environmental reasons.
Nuu-chah-nulth territory on the west coast of Vancouver Island is home to some of the province’s largest remaining old-growth trees.
But tribal council president Judith Sayers says the province needs to stop — or at least slow down — the rate at which they are disappearing.
“Our whole lives really, and a lot of our spirituality, is wrapped up in the forests,” she said.
Nuu-chah-nulth Nations use old-growth yellow and red cedar for traditional purposes, such as canoes, totem poles and long houses.
Other nations often come to Nuu-chah-nulth territory for access to ancient cedar because it is no longer available in their own regions, Sayers said.
Current logging practices also have a negative impact on salmon-bearing streams in the territory, she added.
There are protections in place, through parks and wilderness areas, for about 55 per cent of the 3.2 million hectares of old-growth forests. On Vancouver Island that translates into roughly 520,000 hectares where logging is off limits.
Environmental groups have been pressuring the government to expand restrictions on old-growth logging and shift the industry entirely to second-growth trees. But old-growth trees are more valuable.
Rights and title
A number of Nuu-Chah-Nulth Nations do have timber harvesting businesses, and some are involved in land-use planning as signatories to the Maa-Nulth Treaty signed between five First Nations and the federal and provincial governments.
But they work to preserve old-growth, Sayers said, while calling on the province to ensure other forestry companies do the same, especially in light of outstanding issues around Indigenous rights and title.
“These are our territories. We have title to these lands. We still haven’t resolved that title,” she said.
The province is in the process of modernizing its land use planning policies.
In a statement, the Ministry of Forest, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development said it recognizes the close connection Indigenous communities have to old-growth forests.
It said it is committed to working with First Nations to sustainably manage ecosystems.
Read the original story here.