Showing posts with label old growth. Show all posts
Showing posts with label old growth. Show all posts
2/10/2024
Forests For Life
If we are looking for effective carbon sequestration, never mind feeble and overpriced industrial solutions. We need to look at a real leader in the sector.
I am referring to forests.
Home to about 80% of the world's biodiversity, forests are collectively the second biggest storehouse of carbon after oceans, absorbing significant amounts of greenhouse gases.
They also enhance biodiversity, while protecting waterways, enhancing soil nutrition, and providing buffers from natural disasters.
All of that, and they are beautiful places to live or visit. How dull life would be without trees and forests. And how different life would be.
Some believe that civilization would have been impossible without trees.
How sad it would be if we destroyed all the primal/old growth forests of the world, a task that is frighteningly close to completion.
Not only are such forests living history books, but they are also carbon sinks that rival any kind of expensive human solution in industrial sequestration.
Once those forests are gone, they will take centuries, eons in some cases, to replace. And for what? A few jobs and temporary profits.
How sad.
Considering their importance, we should show trees and forests respect and gratitude more often.
We should also do everything within our power to protect what little old growth that is left. It is those ancient forests that absorb and hold the most carbon, if that is to be one of our goals.
Protect forests and we retain one of our best ways of mitigating our effects on the atmosphere.
Trees are our friends. Forests for life.
6/28/2014
Trembling Aspen
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| A small grove of trembling aspen. |
Trembling aspen are the most widely distributed trees in North America. They live up to their name. Even the slightest breeze makes them do their thing. They tremble.
This aspen tree has my favourite scientific designation that reflects this behaviour - Populus tremuloides.
I think the leaves are susceptible to moving and shaking because the "petiole is distally flattened at right angle to plane of blade".
That makes sense to me.
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| Older trees sport distinctive bark patterns like hard won woody tattoos. |
Trembling aspen grow to 35 meters, but height is not their most spectacular feature. What makes these trees special is that they can form large groves through root suckers, making them clones and therefore a single, huge organism.
There is an aspen grove in Utah that has a root system estimated to be 80,000 years old, and some say that is a conservative number. While none of the trees in the grove is overly tall, the entire clone is 106 acres in size.
The Utah grove is known as Pando, or The Trembling Giant.
The grove I photographed in central British Columbia along the Crowsnest Highway is considerably smaller, but just as amazing and beautiful.
3/23/2014
Canada's 2nd Biggest Douglas-fir Tree Identified in Recent Clear Cut
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| Big Lonely Doug, the second largest known Douglas-fir tree in Canada. Photo by TJ Watt |
The second largest known Douglas-fir tree in Canada was recently discovered by big tree defenders on Vancouver Island. Named "Big Lonely Doug" by the Ancient Forest Alliance members that found it, this magnificent tree has been left stranded in the middle of a 2012 clear cut by forest liquidators Teal-Jones.
But don't be distressed by the sad scenes depicted in TJ Watt's amazing photos of this notable tree that had a close brush with death in 2012, or its surroundings. Teal-Jones, the logging company that share the responsibility for this tragic mess with negligent MLAs in the BC Liberal Party, assure us on their website that
"There is virtually no waste in manufacturing wood products".
Thank goodness people like those at Ancient Forest Alliance are out doing the work in the woods to try and stop the waste, not to mention the extinction of the primal forests that remain on Vancouver Island.
If you want to help them help us, please consider donating to this worthy organization of hard-working big tree campaigners.
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| 12 meters (39 feet) in circumference or 4 meters (13 feet) in diameter, and 69 meters(226 feet) tall. Photo by TJ Watt |
The following information is from the AFA Facebook page:
Port Renfrew - Conservationists with the Ancient Forest Alliance have found and measured what appears to be Canada’s second largest recorded Douglas-fir tree, nick-named “Big Lonely Doug”, standing by itself in an area clearcut in 2012.
Preliminary measurements of the tree taken yesterday found it to be about 12 meters (39 feet) in circumference or 4 meters (13 feet) in diameter, and 69 meters(226 feet) tall. Big Lonely Doug is estimated to be about 1000 years old, judging by nearby 8 feet wide Douglas-fir stumps in the same clearcut with growth rings of 500-600 years.
Big Lonely Doug’s total size comes in just behind the current champion Douglas-fir, the Red Creek Fir, the world’s largest, which grows just one valley over.
Big Lonely Doug grows in the Gordon River Valley near the coastal town of Port Renfrew on southern Vancouver Island, known as the “Tall Trees Capital” of Canada. It stands on Crown lands in Tree Farm Licence 46 held by the logging company Teal-Jones, in the unceded traditional territory of the Pacheedaht First Nation band.
The fact that all of the surrounding old-growth trees have been clearcut around such a globally exceptional tree, putting it at risk of being damaged or blown down by wind storms, underscores the urgency for new provincial laws to protect BC’s largest trees, monumental groves, and endangered old-growth ecosystems.
The days of colossal trees like these are quickly coming to an end as the timber industry cherry-picks the last unprotected, valley-bottom, lower elevation ancient stands in southern BC where giants like this grow.
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| It will take a thousand years or more to replace this clear cut old growth forest. Photo by TJ Watt |
Vancouver Observer - Canada's 2nd Largest Douglas-fir Found: "The vast majority of BC's remaining old-growth forests are at higher elevations, on rocky sites, and in bogs where the trees are much smaller and in many cases have low to no commercial value.
It's the valley-bottom, low elevation stands where trees like the Big Lonely Doug grow that are incredibly scarce now. 99 per cent of the old-growth Douglas-fir trees on BC's coast have already been logged.
It's time for the BC government to stop being more enthusiastic about big stumps than big trees, and for them to enact forest policies that protect our last endangered ancient forest ecosystems."
http://www.vancouverobserver.com/news/canadas-second-largest-douglas-fir-discovered
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| While trees are a renewable resource, with current logging practices and regulations, forests older than about 80 years are not. Photo by TJ Watt |
"...while trees are harvested the effects are only short term as reforestation follows."
- from the Teal-Jones logging company website, that fails to realize that the destruction of thousand year old trees is not a "short term effect".
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| Witness to the on-going destruction of our ancient forests, with Canada's second largest known Douglas-fir in the background. What a magnificent, lonely tree… Photo by TJ Watt |
2/03/2014
Lessons In The DeMamiel Creek Forest
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| The DeMamiel Creek forest is mostly second growth with old growth trees in places. It is in the Coastal Douglas fir ecozone, and is comprised mostly of private land. |
The primal forest is the best school one is likely to find. Too bad so many people are skipping class, including those who are supposed to be responsible for protecting this precious resource.
The students that do take the time to learn the lessons of the forest discover everything they need to know about successful living on this planet. Trees provide places we can experience the richness of life. Here we can learn the lessons of gentle living and cooperation.
Notable teachers across the ages have acted as our guides, sharing with us their insights gained from developing a relationship with the trees.
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| A fungal community growing on a moss community growing in a tree community. Things proceed peacefully - there are no wars... until we show up with our scorched earth assaults and clear everything in sight. |
Pete Seeger loved being on the stage, but found respite in the forest. He said, "Every time I'm in the woods, I feel like I'm in church."
But churches pale in comparison to sunlight filtering through a grove of centuries old Western red cedar or Douglas fir on a misty day. The great cathedrals of the world were built to emulate such groves of towering trees, which are the original places of worship.
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| This is the original place of learning and worship - everyone is welcomed here. |
The forest wilderness is where John Muir went to discover the clearest way into the Universe. His prescription for all of us urban types was to occasionally spend a week in the woods to "wash the spirit clean".
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| DeMamiel Creek supports several species of salmon. The trees and fish have a mutually beneficial relationship. |
Henry David Thoreau lived in the woods to learn what they had to teach. He found the trees and the things that lived with them to be a source of beauty, harmony, and perfection in cooperation.
Thoreau learned that in the woods everything does its part with thrift and equality, and he pondered the folly of not doing the same in the human world.
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| DeMamiel forest is accessible from the adjacent Sunriver neighbourhood. |
Indian activist Vandana Shiva started her eco-education in the 1970s women-led Chipko movement. These are the original tree huggers - Chipko means "to hug or embrace". The women were so dedicated to their communities' Himalayan forests that they wrapped themselves around the trees to protect them from loggers saws.
After repeated walks among the beautiful oaks and rhododendrons, Shiva learned that "the forest teaches us enoughness: as a principle of equity, how to enjoy the gifts of nature without exploitation and accumulation."
By 1980 the Chipko movement scored a major victory for forests and the people when the Indian government imposed a 15 year ban on logging in the state of Uttar Pradesh. Similar logging bans spread to other states as communities took back forest resources for the benefit of the people living there.
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| Everything does its part, and each part is as important as any other. |
No species other than humans takes more than its fair share. In the forest there is no consumerism, no greed, and no accumulation for personal aggrandizement. There is the freedom to be and participate as a necessary and integral part of something larger to which we are all connected.
It is vital that we adopt the wisdom of the woods, and soon. Instead of clear cutting the last ancient forests to the ground, we should be studying and emulating them.
When we begin to learn their lessons we will begin to live in harmony with our environment, and with each other.
10/26/2013
Are big-five forest firms about to get a windfall?
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| Ancient Douglas fir on Juniper Ridge marked for death so Island Timberlands shareholders (including the BC government, Timberland's single largest investor), can realize more profit. Photo: TJ Watt |
Are big-five forest firms about to get a windfall?
From: The Province - Ben Parfitt, October 20, 2013
Shortly before the May election, the provincial government withdrew legislation that could have handed de facto control of publicly owned forestlands to a handful of forest companies.
The contentious sections of the bill were dropped amid a swelling chorus of questions about why such a gift would be bestowed without any debate about what it meant for our shared lands and resources.
It took little time, however, for the government to reverse direction again. During a campaign stop in Burns Lake, Premier Christy Clark said that if re-elected, her government would reintroduce the bill because that is what “the people” wanted.
Given that only weeks earlier the government had pulled the bill from the order papers in response to objections from First Nation leaders, environmental organizations, social-justice advocates and forest professionals, among others, the premier’s choice of words was, to say the least, odd.
What “people” did she refer to? Well, we may soon find out. Following her party’s re-election, the premier instructed Minister of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations Steve Thomson to make the campaign pledge a reality.
A good bet is that the answer lies in understanding who would benefit most from such a change. In that regard, the shareholders of the five largest forest companies operating in the province fit the bill nicely.
Between them, Canadian Forest Products, West Fraser Timber, International Forest Products, Tolko Industries and Western Forest Products control the bulk of what is logged each year in British Columbia. They would control even more under the proposed legislative changes.
To understand what is at stake, it helps to know that outside of parks, virtually every standing tree in B.C. is spoken for, because the province has allocated the rights to log them under numerous licences issued to forest companies, logging contractors, woodlot owners, First Nations and communities.
The most important and valuable of those licences are Tree Farm Licences. Holders of TFLs have exclusive rights to log trees over defined areas of land. Currently, TFL holders log about 11.3 million cubic metres of trees per year (a cubic metre equals one telephone pole). Of that, the top five companies control 9.1 million cubic metres or 80 per cent. TFLs are as close as one gets to private control of public forestlands in B.C.
The next most important licences are forest licences. Forest licence holders have rights to log set numbers of trees over vast landmasses known as Timber Supply Areas or TSAs. But because many different companies may hold forest licences within the same TSA, forest licences have less value than TFLs, which give one company exclusive control over a specific area.
One other essential detail: the most valuable forest licences are “replaceable” or renewable. Far less valuable are non-replaceable forest licences, which are usually issued on a one-off basis to deal with perceived crises such as mountain pine beetle attacks or forest fires. Significantly, the overwhelming number of licences held by First Nations — who are typically on the outside looking in when it comes to benefiting from natural resources in our province — are non-replaceable.
As with TFLs, the top five forest companies hold a virtual monopoly on replaceable forest licences. Two out of every three trees allocated under such licences are theirs.
What the government now proposes in the name of “the people” is to allow the holders of replaceable forest licences to roll such holdings into far more secure TFLs. This could lead to near total control of public forestlands by an exclusive five-member club.
In 2012 and in the lead-up to the 2013 provincial election, that club made $556,020 in political contributions to the Liberal Party and $115,200 to the NDP — big dollars for some, but no more than modest investments for a powerful handful of companies who have a very clear vision of what lies ahead.
Entire TSAs — where trees are in increasingly short supply and where what little timber remains is oversubscribed — are on the cusp of being rolled into TFLs. And the Gang of Five is well positioned to divvy up the spoils.
Left on the sidelines would be First Nations, rural communities, small independent and value-added mill owners — people made poorer to give “the people” what they want.
Whether the government’s second attempt at this legislation will move forward remains to be seen. It has promised a public consultation process of sorts. The voices of opposition were heard loud and clear in the lead-up to the provincial election. This time out, which people will the government listen to?
Read more here: http://blogs.theprovince.com/2013/10/20/ben-parfitt-are-big-five-forest-firms-about-to-get-a-windfall/
Read even more here: http://www.vancouverobserver.com/news/island-timberlands-log-contentious-old-growth-forests-vancouver-island
See much more on continued threats to BC's old growth forests here: http://www.ancientforestalliance.org/news-item.php?ID=705
10/08/2013
Tree Art - Mark Gauti
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| Tree/Ent by Mark Gauti |
Mark Gauti is a local artist that does beautiful Coast Salish art. I love his work and how he incorporates traditional and modern in his images. I especially love his depiction of a tree being in "Tree/Ent".
Ents are tree creatures in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. They are tall, slow, patient creatures which live in the forest of Fangorn and exist to protect the trees.
When I go out into the rainforest I see ents everywhere. They are the elders of the forest. Towering, wrinkled, and shaped by the centuries, they are as individual and distinctive as people.
But we have a problem.
In the Lord of the Rings all the ents are male. No mention is made of female ents, although surely they do exist. Luckily I have the solution.
In the coastal rainforest the straight and strong Douglas fir ancients are the male ents. In old age these tree beings take on the classic look as in the Fangorn Forest. Their ancient limbs are held at attention and are often twisted and broke by tussles with winter gales.
Dripping with old man's beard lichen they stand rigid and determined over the ages watching from their lofty heights over the forest.
And the females? Why they are the Western red cedars of course with their gracefully drooping limbs and feathery braided needle leaves. The female ents have fine stripped reddish paper dresses that peel and flutter in the wind.
When winter comes female ents don't defy the gusts and gales like the male ents. Instead of fighting they go with the flow as they dance and sway uninhibited. They smell good too.
Old Douglas firs, especially when dripping sap on a hot summer day, smell like a cross between a musky earthiness and aftershave. Ancient Western red cedar, on the other hand, smell like the most amazing perfume.
Maybe Mark Gauti will do a companion piece to the one above depicting a female ent. Either way, I love what he did with "Tree/Ent".
The following is from Mark's "Trickster Art" Facebook page:
Biography
Mark Gauti is a Coast Salish Artist from the T’Sou-ke First Nation. T’Sou-ke Nation is a Coast Salish Tribe on the border of Coast Salish territories and Nuu-chah-nulth territories. T’Sou-ke shares art and culture with the two different tribal groups. Mark uses a wide range of mediums in his art, including: paint and canvas, glass acid etching, drum making, wood carving, photography and digital art.
Mark worked as an environmental scientist for many years for his tribe T’Sou-ke where he was involved mapping of endangered species and gathering traditional ecological knowledge on traditional uses of native plants for food and medicine. For the past ten years mark has been involved in Coast Salish Culture with participating in drumming, language programs and Tribal Canoe Journeys, as well as researching traditional art and storytelling. Understanding that traditional First Nation’s art and storytelling was the original form of environmental education Mark starting mixing culture with more modern environmental programing with T’Sou-ke and now continues this work with other tribes.
In Pacific Northwest Coast stories, tricksters are the ones who take on a job that no one else will, often leading to change, and Mark considers his art to be trickster art because he is an environmentalist who sees the way we are treating the earth as wrong and uses art as a form of environmental and cultural education.
Marks' website can be found here.
8/21/2013
Rainbows and Clear Cuts
A recent open letter to the Vancouver Island community from the World Rainbow Family had something to say about the ongoing desecration and destruction of ancient forests on the north island.
In part, the letter stated:
"A main reason sounded for why we shouldn’t be able to gather on Raft Cove was the environmental impact on this place of significant natural beauty. What our family saw on our journeys around the North Island deeply shocked us, and we would like to share with the local community and the world the horrific level of deforestation of ancient and sacred trees occurring now on the North Island.
The Hopi prophecy that forms the ideology of our family is that a tribe, from all corners of the world, with multiple colours, will rise up from the midst of destruction and heal the earth. Given that we are a deeply environmentally conscious group, these environmental concerns were hard to comprehend. Historically, we have been involved in local environmental matters, such as the 1993 protection of the Clayoquot Sound forests."
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| Clear cuts are harmful to the forest, soil, water quality, and animal life, but are profitable for corporations. |
7/24/2013
Old Growth Clear Cutting Continues
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| Example of spectacular temperate rain forest on Vancouver Island contrasted with nearby logging of old-growth forest.
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BC now has a new government, same as the old government. Get ready for business as usual in the province's old growth forests, especially since environmentalists in Canada are now seen as "radicals, adversaries, job-killers, foreign funded radicals and ideological extremists".
Definitely not a good time to be a defender of the trees, although during dark days such as these it is the most important time to be a voice in the wilderness.
Instead of bringing such individuals and organizations in from the wild fringes, environmentalists are instead put on the federal government's official "enemies" list. These so-called radical groups could be audited by the CRA in order to muzzle what is seen as a threat rather than evidence of a functioning democracy.
The BC Liberals are good pals with the current pro-business as usual regime in Ottawa, and use many of the same tactics.
Expect more old growth clear cuts, fewer jobs, and more ships laden with old growth whole log shipments to China and other overseas markets.
Clear Cuts
“In clear-cutting, he said, you clear away the natural forest, or what the industrial forester calls "weed trees," and plant all one species of tree in neat straight functional rows like corn, sorghum, sugar beets or any other practical farm crop.
You then dump on chemical fertilizers to replace the washed-away humus, inject the seedlings with growth-forcing hormones, surround your plot with deer repellents and raise a uniform crop of trees, all identical.
When the trees reach a certain prespecified height (not maturity; that takes too long) you send in a fleet of tree-harvesting machines and cut the fuckers down. All of them.
Then burn the slash, and harrow, seed, fertilize all over again, round and round and round again, faster and faster, tighter and tighter until, like the fabled Malaysian Concentric Bird which flies in ever-smaller circles, you disappear up your own asshole.”
― Edward Abbey
In 2010 Hannah Carpendale wrote "Losing Legacies In The Cut Block" in the Simon Fraser University student newspaper. The article chronicles the sad state of affairs in BC's forests at the time, and things have not improved since.
She states, "Logging of our ancient forests is a luxury that can’t be sustained. Companies are not committed to sustainable jobs or habitats — what they are committed to is short-term corporate profit, and our old-growth forests are the price we are involuntarily paying for that.
The B.C. Liberal government is continuing to hand over logging rights to large-scale logging companies — basically, the right to convert our public land to tree farms, to devastate our ecosystems and deplete a crucial and unique resource.
We have seen this happen so many times in history . . . the collapse of the Atlantic cod stocks to name just one instance.
Will we stand around and watch it happen again?"
4/05/2013
Pre-Election Information Night and Rally For Ancient Forests in BC
A reminder to come out to the Pre-Election Info Night and Rally for Ancient Forests on Wednesday April 10th from 7:00 to 9:00 pm at Alix Goolden Hall, located 907 Pandora Ave (corner of Quadra and Pandora), Victoria BC.
Join the Ancient Forest Alliance for an info night with new maps on the status of BC's endangered old-growth forests, draft legislation on how to protect them, and a variety of speakers including:
- Robert Morales (Chief Treaty Negotiator, Hul’qumi’num Treaty Group),
- Scott Fraser (NDP MLA for Alberni-Pacific),
- Dr. Andrew Weaver (Deputy Leader, Green Party of BC, and climate scientist),
- Vicky Husband (Victoria conservationist, Order of BC and Canada recipient),
- Arnold Bercov (President, Pulp, Paper and Woodworkers of Canada – Local 8),
- TJ Watt (Campaigner and Photographer, Ancient Forest Alliance),
- Ken Wu (Executive Director, Ancient Forest Alliance) and others.
Background info:
Ancient forests are vital to sustain endangered species, tourism, the climate, clean water, wild salmon, and many First Nations cultures. See VIDEOS at: http://www.ancientforestalliance.org/videos.php and PHOTOS at: http://www.ancientforestalliance.org/galleries.php
A century of unsustainable logging has eliminated the vast majority of the biggest, best old-growth trees in the valley bottoms and lower elevations that historically built BC’s forest industry. This has resulted in diminishing returns as the trees get smaller, more expensive to reach higher up, and lower in value.
As second-growth forests mature and now dominate the forested land base, the BC government has done little to stimulate investment in second-growth sawmills and value-added facilities to process the logs. Instead, they’ve allowed vast quantities to be exported raw to foreign mills in China, the US, and elsewhere.
Much of BC’s remaining old-growth forests now consist of marginal or “low-productivity” trees growing on poor sites at high elevations, on steep, rocky mountainsides, and in bogs. The BC government’s statistics deliberately over inflate the amount of remaining old-growth forests by including these stunted “bonsai” forests – mainly uneconomic to log – in their public relations figures, as well as failing to provide context on how much old-growth forests once stood.
Our remaining “productive” old-growth forests where the large trees grow, or “ancient forests”, today consist of only a small fraction of their original extent. This is particularly true on Vancouver Island, the southern mainland coast, and in the BC interior.
On Vancouver Island, 75% of the original, productive old-growth forests have been logged, including over 90% of the valley bottoms where the largest trees grow.
The history of unsustainable resource extraction around the world is replete with examples where the biggest and best stocks have been depleted one after another, resulting in the loss of resource industry jobs along the way.
BC’s politicians must not allow this familiar pattern of high-grade resource depletion, ecosystem collapse, and the impoverishment of rural communities to continue in BC’s forests under their watch – or through their active support. A major change in the status quo of unsustainable forestry in the province is vital. Politicians who fail to understand this fundamental concept must not have power.
From: Ancient Forest Alliance
3/05/2013
Rolling Over Crown Forests
BY BRIONY PENN, MARCH 2013 Focus on Line http://www.focusonline.ca/?q=node/513BC
Liberals go ahead with another giveaway of publicly-owned land to corporations.
Three years ago, in a feature report entitled “The Big Burn,” Focus revealed the findings of a dozen retired forest service professionals about BC Liberal plans to privatize BC’s forests under pressure from what are called “distressed asset managers.” These are the mega-corporations like BAM (Brookfield Asset Management; now the top performing company in Canada) and TAM (Third Avenue Management) that buy up majority interests in distressed logging companies (including Canfor, Weyerhauser, Catalyst, Western Forest Products, TimberWest, Island Timberlands etc).
Through political pressure for deregulation (eg lobbying to get rid of riparian zone and watershed regulations), they manage to enhance their lands’ value. Then they strip off the timber and rationalize the lands into categories of real estate, bioenergy plantations, etc. Then they flip them. They’ve been incredibly successful in liquidating hundreds of thousands of hectares of heavily-subsidized private forests on Vancouver Island.
Now the BC Liberal government is amending the Forest Act in ways that will help such companies gain more control over public forestlands.
Distressed asset companies have been lobbying behind the scenes for a decade for their ideal tenure reform: changing volume licences—where they just get the trees, to the more lucrative area licences—where they get everything, including the underlying land.
The aftermath of a tragic fire at a Burns Lake sawmill and the perceived need to leverage money for a new sawmill to restore jobs in a distressed community—with an election looming—was just the prompt the Liberals needed to introduce “area-based tree farm licences at the minister’s invitation.”
Of course this legislative change may also open up a Pandora’s box for the Liberals just before an election. In 1988, the Socreds tried sneaking in this form of privatization—which is called “rollover”—and failed.
Forest licences were originally set up with checks and balances to limit companies from creating excessive “shareholder value” and to ensure some benefits came back to the public—either in the form of royalties or leaving the forest standing to provide all the ecosystem services that we enjoy. In the last 10 years, however, regulations governing licence holders have been eroded to such an extent that those checks and balances just aren’t there anymore.
With forest legislation and regulations gutted, licence holders don’t even have to provide management plans anymore. The natural next step for an aggressive, corporate-friendly government has now been taken: allowing companies to roll over their volume-based licences into area-based Tree Farm Licences. Many see this process as de facto privatization of public forests. Anthony Britneff, a retired government forester, says, “These tenures are like the granting of fiefdoms in which the company can strip and sell whatever they want without any requirement to invest in local infrastructure and to manufacture timber locally as a condition of holding tenure. There is no social contract in the public interest.”
A leaked Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations document dated April 7, 2012 revealed the Liberals were considering tenure reform back then to address an apparent request from Hampton Affiliates, the American company that owns 89 percent of Babine Forest Products, for government assurance of an adequate, secure timber supply before it would rebuild the mill at Burns Lake.
The memo suggests the annual allowable cut to feed the mill could be expanded far beyond what the region can sustain, leaving it decimated even by Ministry of Forests’ own internal accounts. The document also posits reducing the rules around old-growth timber, wildlife management and viewscapes. It notes that it may be necessary to suspend the chief forester’s authority to set the annual allowable cut and have those decisions made by the cabinet instead, without any public consultation. And it warns that such a dramatic policy change could trigger legal challenges.
Bob Simpson, independent MLA for Cariboo, first drew attention to the leaked document and correctly predicted new legislation would consist of “a few short paragraphs that will enable a designated politician to set the rules by which a private corporation can be given exclusive rights over areas of our public forests.”
Hampton Affiliates has a history of acquiring distressed forestry assets, stripping the timber and later selling the sawmills and underlying land. Their website currently features three sawmill sites in Washington and Oregon, levelled and ready for sale. One wonders how many jobs disappeared with closure of the sawmills in Leavenworth, Fort Hill and Packwood. Hampton also has a relationship with Brookfield Asset Management, having sold 67,700 acres of North Cascade Tree Farm to them in 2008 after it was stripped.
The details of Minister Thomson’s capitulation to Hampton’s demands are confusing. In a September 2012 letter to Hampton Affiliates, Thomson stated: “Based on the recommendations of the Timber Supply Committee regarding conversion of volume-based licenses to area-based licenses, we will bring legislation to the House at the next session.” And the Timber Supply Committee’s “approval” was front and centre again at the February 20 press release announcing the Forest Act amendments.
But the report of the bipartisan Timber Supply Committee, which is made up of sitting MLAs, didn’t make any such recommendations. Instead, it called for maintaining the past, cautious approach under the Forest Act, and if any conversions of tenure are to be made, the Committee suggested they should be towards more community-based tenures with public consultation. There’s also a discrepancy in timing. Thomson claims in the September letter to be listening to the Timber Supply Committee, but the leaked document from April suggests his mind was already made up a month before that committee was even struck.
But problems with the Liberals’ plan go deeper than the bad optics of misrepresenting the facts. No proper inventory of forest resources has been done in the last ten years in BC, so the Liberal government has no idea of the value of the forest being traded. As well, Thomson seems to be guaranteeing Hampton Affiliates—in addition to an increased annual allowable cut of saw logs—virtually every standing stick or shrub for their bioenergy plant. That kind of scorch-and-burn policy doesn’t leave any room for climate and biodiversity protection. And Thomson is offering this to a company that has a record of consolidating assets, dismantling sawmills and flogging the underlying land for higher earning ventures. Hampton will also be eligible for what such companies refer to as “entitlements in progress,” including potential compensation from First Nations’ claims, having say over other resource uses, and, of course, selling their TFL to whomever they want.
The worst-case scenario sees Hampton getting its TFL, decimating the region in search of fibre, not finding enough, coming up against legal challenges from everyone, launching a few of its own by claiming the fibre supply was misrepresented to get them to invest in the mill, and then walking away with compensation from taxpayers. The public would be left with devastated lands and “For Sale” signs for the abandoned sawmill.
There is also this precedent-setting issue: If one corporation gets a more secure forest tenure then what about all the others? And what expensive legal challenges will result if British Columbians vote for a new government in May, one that wants to change course?
Perhaps the most predictable aspect of the Hampton tenure question is that a debate over how Crown land is used was hijacked by the separate issue of how to get Burns Lake millworkers and others in the pine-beetle-impacted areas back to work. It’s a typical “shock doctrine” maneuver in which an important debate gets suppressed because of the urgent necessity of dealing with an emergency. Who wants to get between a man and the prospect of a return to his job?
But if we continue to carve up and lose our forests to short-term, private interests, our ability to fight climate change and keep functioning ecosystems that sustain life will be gone forever.
Briony Penn has been reporting on Crown land issues for many years; she believes a public forum on how we value our Crown lands is long overdue.See “The Big Burn” (August 2010) at http://www.focusonline.ca/?q=node/71.
12/14/2012
The End Of Old Growth Logging
The photo above is the trunk of Te Matua Ngahere, the 'Father of the Forest'.
It is New Zealand's oldest living Kauri tree, and is estimated to be over 2000 yrs old with a girth of 16.41m.
Logging of old growth, or native forest, on public lands has been illegal in New Zealand since 2004.
When people say ending old growth logging "can't be done" in British Columbia, they fail to realize that exactly that has been done in many areas around the world.
[In 2004] New Zealand’s Labor government introduced hard-won legislation that ended logging of publicly owned temperate rainforests. In words unfamiliar to US politicians, Pete Hodgson, the minister responsible for timberlands, told parliament that, “These lowland forests are considered by many New Zealanders to be a unique and significant part of our natural heritage, too valuable for logging of any sort to continue.”
Read more about New Zealand's forward thinking forest policy here.
10/31/2012
East Sooke Park: Aylard Farm
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| Old growth Douglas-fir at Aylard Farm, East Sooke Park |
At one time a mysterious consortium of European investors owned much of the land in East Sooke. They had big visions of a private luxury resort and hunting preserve that would cater to the international jet set. Fortunately for nature lovers everywhere, the exclusive domain of the rich fell into a financial and legal morass, and the landowners were forced to sell some of their extensive East Sooke land holdings.
In 1970 the Victoria Capital Regional District purchased a significant piece from the stressed landowners. The purchase price was $520,000, and East Sooke Park was born. Now everyone is welcome to enjoy this rugged 3417 acre park and its native petroglyphs, rugged coastline, sandy beaches and magnificent forest.
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| Aylard Farm's meadows of clover, wild rose, and blue-eyed grass |
East Sooke Park can be enjoyed via 50 km of trails, including the knee-punishing 10 km Coast Trail. The park's semi-wilderness has several entrances, including the Aylard Farm access point off of East Sooke Road via Becher Bay Road.
East Sooke lies in the Western Very Dry Maritime Coastal Western Hemlock Zone. Although the forests were selectively logged decades ago, and the sea harvested for its bounty, this remains a wild land. The park visitor is advised to watch small dogs and children as cougars and black bears still populate these coastal lands.
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| Ocean glimpses through the trees invite the hiker to the sandy beach below |
Much of Aylard Farm and the rest of East Sooke Park is covered in second growth trees 60 - 100 years old. Because it was selectively logged, rather than clear cut, old growth trees of +250 years can still be seen.
Old growth forest near the Alyard park access can primarily be found at Creyke Point. The main forest consists of large Douglas-fir, Western hemlock, and closer to the ocean, Sitka spruce.
The coastal bluffs support upland ecosystems of Garry oak, Arbutus, and the twisted, tortured Shore pine. These trees are often small as they inhabit thin-soiled areas over bedrock and are exposed to harsh winter winds and storms.
Getting There
East Sooke Park is 35 km west of Victoria. Allow about an hour to drive and be able to enjoy the ample scenery. A couple of different routes are possible.
Old Island Highway From Victoria
Take the Old Island Highway (#1A) to Sooke Road. Follow Sooke Road (#14) to Happy Valley Road, turn left and continue down Happy Valley. Turn right on Rocky Point Road, which veers right to become East Sooke Road, and leads to the park. The entrance at Aylard Farm is at the end of Becher Bay Road, and left hand turn off East Sooke Road.
Trans-Canada/Highway 1 From Victoria
Follow the Trans-Canada Highway (#1) from Victoria, and take the Colwood exit. Follow the Old Island Highway (#1A), which turns into Sooke Road (#14). From Sooke Road, turn left on Gillespie Road. Turn left on East Sooke Road, then right on Becher Bay Road to reach the park entrance.
10/07/2012
Refugee Tree: Largest Red Cedar In The CRD
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| The multi-topped Refugee Tree, Strait of Juan de Fuca, and Washington's Olympic Range can be seen from the gravel pullout along Highway 14 |
A recent big tree quest saw us cruising West Coast Road/Highway 14 west of Sooke on a stunning fall day. Our mission? To seek out the largest red cedar in Victoria's Capital Region District.
For enthusiasts, a journey like this is a pilgrimage, but instead of searching out a temple, the goal is a living shrine.
Some of these shrines are older than those of the more visited religious variety. Several are older than the establishment of the religions themselves.
Call me a druid, but I think that these old growth shrines, like the CRD's Refugee Tree, have as much or more moral and spiritual significance than a lock of hair or scrap of hem from someones garment.
You can't live for an eon or more and not exude a certain aura of experience, wisdom, and patience.
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| The Refugee Tree is 13.72 meters in circumference (45 ft) |
Comparing these places to shrines is only one spiritual similarity. When surrounded by the giant column-like boles in an old growth forest, many people feel like they are in a cathedral. Indeed, that is exactly how Port Alberni's Cathedral Grove got its name.
The lofty heights take ones eye upwards to the canopy high overhead. Light filters through like beams through stained glass. The magnificence of the trees, plus the stillness and quiet, elicit a sense of humility in all gentle supplicants that enter here.
What we should be asking for is forgiveness, for the bulk of this cathedral has been desecrated and razed to the ground.
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| The Refugee Tree is surrounded by other older cedars and younger forest of Western Hemlock |
The hike to the Refugee Tree is a short, but occasionally steep fifteen minutes from the Highway 14 pullout. The trail is marked with some flagging on some bush. Once you have found the trail, just follow the flagging right to the tree. The trail is overgrown in spots, and the trail is easy to miss if you are not paying attention. Always keep the next flag in sight before proceeding.
Away from the road the highway noise begins to fade and you can hear the distant roar of waves below. There are a few big hemlocks along the trail, but these are small compared to the Refugee and several other smaller, yet still impressive, red cedars in the area.
With the sound of the ocean below, and the fresh air surrounding you, it is soon apparent that a visit to the Refugee Tree is a worthwhile quest. Big trees and ancient forests have an amazing capacity to instill a sense of awe, as well as calm.
This is a special place, and if you are still and quiet, all questions are answered.
The adventurer returns, like after all successful pilgrimages, a renewed person with more respect and appreciation for the larger world.
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| There are other nice old growth trees around the Refugee Tree |
Getting There
Directions from Victoria, BC – approx. 1 hour
- Take West Coast Road/Hwy #14 through Sooke towards Port Renfrew.
- Set your tripometer at Jordan River; you will drive approximately 17 km more before hitting the roadside turn out
- The turn out is at a corner which you can recognize by its cement barrier that runs along the left hand side of the road and the steep cliff face that runs along the right. Loss Creek is about 2 km past the turn out, so if you make it to the creek you can turn around and go back.
- Stop at the corner pull out on the ocean side, and park. From here you should be able to see out over the Juan de Fuca, and you can see the many spires on the top of the Refugee Tree.
- Walk along the road barrier toward Victoria while keeping an eye out for a bit of flagging in the bush to your right.
- Enter the forest by the flagging, and follow the faint trail. Before long you will come to a short steep section that requires caution.
- After descending the small shelf you can follow the flagging and the trail to the tree.
- At the beginning of the trail notice the huge cedar stump on the left hand side. Many areas along this stretch of coast were clear cut logged 30 or 40 years ago. For reasons unknown, the odd huge cedar, including the CRD's largest, were left standing.
- Loss Creek, two km past the Refugee Tree, has areas of protected old growth Sitka Spruce forest. There are no services or established trails, just a nice creek and some great trees.
Status
The Refugee Tree is currently unprotected as it grows on forestry land. The Juan de Fuca Trail, which passes by below, could be extended to include the tree and other bits of remnant old growth that are close by in the steep ravines.
8/20/2012
John Dean Park: Saanich's Largest Old Growth Forest
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| The parking lot is in the heart of John Dean Park, and trees hundreds of years old tower overhead |
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| Big trees everywhere! |
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| A Western hemlock growing on a previously logged Western red-cedar stump is a common association - downed logs and stumps provide nutrients for the forest's next generation of trees |
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| Culturally modified trees remind visitors that 1st Nations continue to use the forest as they have for thousands of years |
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| Some of the big trees are very accessible, others have restricted access to protect them and their fragile surroundings |
There are a variety of trails throughout the park's 400 plus acres. The largest trees can be found via the Valley Mist Trail, or Illahie Loop. A steeper trail descends to the right of the park map sign leading to a T-junction. Turn left for the Illahie Loop, and right to hike to a beautiful lily pond and beyond. Some of the park's biggest trees are scattered about the forest in this area.
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| This lily pond, a short hike from the parking lot, is a great place to sit and contemplate the dragonflies hunting over the water |
Directions To John Dean Park
John Dean Provincial Park is located near Sidney on southern Vancouver Island. The park can be accessed off Hwy #17. Turn west onto McTavish Road, south onto East Saanich Road, then west onto Dean Park Road. Follow Dean Park Road until you reach the park.
Note: The access road into the park is closed between November and March.
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| A park Western red-cedar - tree of life |
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