One Of The Last Of Its Kind

Question: Was this photo taken in 1814 or 2014?
Photo credit: TJ Watt, AFA

The following was taken from the Ancient Forest Alliance Facebook page.

Question: Was this photo taken in 1814 or 2014?

Answer: Sadly, just last week.

AFA's TJ Watt snapped this quick self portrait beside a near-record-size Douglas-fir tree that was left standing alone in an old-growth clearcut not far from Port Renfrew on southern Vancouver Island. Giant stumps litter the surrounding area.

Less than 1% of the original old-growth Douglas-fir trees remain on Vancouver Island after a century of logging and this may be one of the mightiest left of its kind - now left highly vulnerable to blow down.

What BC needs are ancient forests, not ancient policies, like those which allow for the destruction of these last endangered areas. But we'll need your help getting there.

You can start by signing and sharing our petition at www.AncientForestPetition.com or sending a letter to BC politicians here www.ancientforestalliance.org/write-letter.php and then be prepared for a very busy 2014!

Thank you!!

Front Yard Flotsam

This large cedar that washed out of the Sooke River stayed hung up on a sandbar before salvagers came,
cut off the root end, and hauled the log away.

After having one of the driest fall seasons on record on south Vancouver Island, we recently experienced a record-breaking rainfall in a 24 hour period. When winter rainfalls coincide with seasonal high tides, the flotsam factor in my front yard increases dramatically.

It is exciting to see huge logs and whole trees float by during these winter freshets. Some of the debris is dislodged from area beaches by extra high tides, but much of the tree debris is sourced up the Sooke River which enters the harbour along Billing Spit's western shore.

Most of the tree debris gets washed out to sea, or gets hung up on a new beach somewhere. Some middle sized logs get hung up on sandbars in the harbour and stay until the next high tide or heavy rainfall.

Some of the larger logs stay around for years, perhaps decades. When these get stranded on a sandbar in the harbour they are heavily used by wildlife. Eagles perch and eat their prey on the large debris. River otters also love to play on the tree debris in the harbour.

This large Douglas fir log has been on the beach for a decade or more. Only the most extreme
tides and weather will move it off the beach.

Really big logs that get hung up on the sandbars will bring out the salvagers, or beachcombers as they are also called. Using giant chain saws, they remove the root ends of large trees, and use small boats to float the lucrative wood to where they can transfer it to land for milling.

Phillips Road Big Trees, Sooke

The tiny vehicle gives scale to this tall line of trees marching down Phillips Rd in Sooke.
The column consists of older Douglas fir and Sitka spruce.

Only eight years ago when I first moved to Sooke, upper Phillips Road (which runs along the west side of the Sooke River) was still like an entrance to the old forest. Here were some of the largest trees remaining within the municipal boundary.

At that time two massive Douglas fir elders stood on either side of the road creating a narrow bottle neck that I knew would need to go some day when development came farther up the road.

The centuries old trees were so close on either side of the pavement that they had large scars on their bark from multiple contacts with vehicles trying to squeeze through.

There has been development in this area since the earliest days of European settlement, but it was mostly limited to small farms along the Sooke River.

I was happy when these trees were spared during roadway upgrading in this developing area.
The empty field in the foreground is now a thriving community garden.

Now the Sunriver neighbourhood has added hundreds of new homes and the treescape has been dramatically and permanently altered. Eventually the two large trees guarding the entrance to the old forest on upper Phillips Rd. became impediments to development, and were taken down. The stumps were pulled and an upgraded roadway was put in.

Other spectacular trees survived the on-going transformation of this part of Sooke, including the tall row of trees across Phillips Rd. from the community garden. There are others to be found here and there along the Sooke River that runs along the eastern edge of this new neighbourhood.

Happy Winter Solstice

Hemp Can Save Trees

It is unnecessary to cut ancient trees for pulp and paper when a crop of hemp
could produce four times as much fibre in a single season.

"Emily Carr: Deep Forest" At Vancouver Art Gallery

A Rushing Sea of Undergrowth, Emily Carr, 1932-35.

This weekend is a celebration of Emily Carr's 142nd birthday. The local artist was born in Victoria on December 13th, 1871.

Emily Carr was a friend of Vancouver Island's forests. Throughout her life she sought to plumb their mossy green depths to hopefully some day say she really knew this magnificent ecosystem.

Her paintings document her quest to learn as much from the Victoria area's big trees as she could, then depict that in her images.

“This perhaps is the way to find that thing I long for: go into the woods alone and look at the earth crowded in growth, new and old bursting from their strong roots hidden in the silent, live ground, each seed according to its own kind expanding, bursting, pushing its way upward towards the light and air, each one knowing what to do, each one demanding its own rights on the earth. Feel this growth, the surging upwards, this expansion, the pulsing life, all working with the same idea…life, life, life…”

From "Hundreds and Thousands: The Journals of Emily Carr." 

Soon you will be able to experience Carr's vision in a new exhibit of her work. "Emily Carr: Deep Forest" at the Vancouver Art Gallery will exhibit over 40 paintings starting December 21, 2013.

Most of the paintings are scenes within 25 km of Carr's home near Victoria, and were completed in the 1930s.

Scorned as Timber Beloved of the Sky, Emily Carr, 1935.

After a trip to view the exhibit, one can get first hand exposure to some of the same forests that the artist enjoyed on the south island. While vastly altered, the green fuse still drives growth and the trees still pulse with life.

"I glory in our wonderful west and I hope to leave behind me some of the relics of its first primitive greatness. These things should be to us Canadians what the ancient Briton's relics are to the English. 

Only a few more years and they will be gone forever into silent nothingness and I would gather my collection together before they are forever past."

One can visit the forest here and be surrounded by the power of nature that so gripped Emily Carr. The natural power of trees that kept her mesmerized is still to be found.

But how long before a trip to the trees yields a vast "silent nothingness"?

Magical Mossy Maples

It's the season of the Moss in the Pacific rain forest

Rolling stones gather no moss, but trees sure do. Now is the best time to see the display of aerial gardens in the Pacific rain forest. These epiphytic plants  hang from the trunks and branches of trees in a display that may only be rivalled by the Fangorn Forest itself.

Especially cloaked in the temperate rain forest are the Big leaf maples.

The climate is mild enough that there are plants growing year round here. Some species thrive in the mild winter temperatures. Included in this category would be a wide variety of mosses and some ferns.

Moss-dripped trees are reminiscent of Tolkien's Fangorn Forest.

During summer droughts moss goes into stasis until relieved by fall rains. Then through the slide
toward the shortest day of the year the moss gains a robust, puffy green that is best enjoyed this time of year.

Big leaf maple also has an association with the epiphytic licorice fern.

The association between moss and the maple trees is mutually beneficial for both. Nature is expert at ensuring such win-win interactions between species.

The moss gets a scaffolding on which to grow and thrive. These "air plants" are able to absorb water and nutrients from the atmosphere, rain, and bits of forest debris. What does the tree derive from this symbiotic relationship?

The Big leaf maple has the ability to grow "canopy roots" from the tops of their branches up into the rafts of moss, thus gaining water and nutrients from them.

Just like in Tolkien's Middle Earth forest, there is magic at work in this world's Pacific rain forest.

And The Wind Said

"And the wind said,

May you be as strong as the Douglas fir,

yet as flexible as the cedar.

May you stand as tall as the Redwood,

live gracefully as the willow,

and may you always bear fruit

all your days on this Earth."

Big Fish, Big Trees: Sooke's Ayum Creek

Big fish in Ayum Creek.

Ayum Creek in Sooke is a good place to witness how salmon and the forest interact. Although one is a water creature that cruises the ocean's depths, and another a fixed feature of the land, these diverse species need each other.

This fern-covered Bigleaf maple greets visitors to Ayum Creek Regional Park Reserve

Most people know that salmon need both fresh and salt water during their life cycle. Less well known is that large, old trees are just as important to all seven species of salmon that have lived and died in Vancouver Island waters for 10 - 12,000 years.

Ayum creek is a small spawning stream that contains coho and chum salmon, as well as steelhead and cutthroat trout. These species are dependent on large trees in the riparian habitat along the banks, as well as large woody debris in the water to provide more structure and an improved habitat.

Evidence of this land's industrial past. There used to be an early saw mill
and log sort on the 6.4 hectare site where the park now sits.

"The abundance of coho can be limited by the number of suitable territories available (Larkin 1977). Pool habitat is important not only for returning adults, but for all stages of juvenile development. Preferred pool habitat includes deep pools with riparian cover and woody debris."

"Streams with more structure (logs, undercut banks, etc.) support more coho (Scrivener and Andersen 1982), not only because they provide more territories (usable habitat), but they also provide more food and cover. "

"There is a positive correlation between the amount of insect material in the stomachs of salmon and the extent the stream was overgrown with vegetation (Chapman 1965). In addition, the leaf litter in the fall contributes to aquatic insect production (Meehan et al. 1977)."                              

          - source

But the fish aren't the only winners. The trees and riparian habitat benefit from the nutrients found in the dead salmon. Often bears, gulls, and other creatures pull dead salmon into the forest to dine on. Uneaten portions are left in the woods.

Once there, the nitrogen in the decaying fish fertilizes the surrounding plants, including the trees, helping them reach their impressive proportions.

Researchers have reported up to 70 percent of the nitrogen found in riparian zone foliage comes from salmon. One study concluded that "trees on the banks of salmon-stocked rivers grow more than three times faster than their counterparts along salmon-free rivers and, growing side by side with salmon, Sitka spruce take 86 years, rather the usual 300 years, to reach 50 cm thick."

While there are not any giant ancient trees in Ayum Park, there are a nice selection of medium sized trees that are growing larger with the benefit of the park's protection, and the salmon's nitrogen.

Logging Vancouver Island's Last Stands

Below is Cathedral Grove and its huge ancient trees - up above trees just like them are being cut down
 by logging giant Island Timberlands. But don't worry - it's all legal. Photo: TJ Watt

How much of Vancouver Island's dwindling patches of old growth forest do logging companies wish to cut down? All of them. 100% And if not that, then as much as they can get away with.

“On October 19, MLA Scott Fraser and myself met with Island Timberlands’ CEO Darshan Sihota, and asked him if he was intending to save any old-growth Douglas-fir forests – his reply was that it was his legal right to log it ALL. 

So despite the BC government’s scientists formerly designating these vital wildlife habitats for protection when they were still within the Tree Farm Licence, Island Timberlands sees nothing wrong with harvesting the old growth forests across all their lands. 

This even includes the mountainside above Cathedral Grove, Canada’s most famous old-growth forest.”

- Jane Morden, coordinator Port Alberni Watershed-Forest Alliance 

It is evident that there is no one in industry or government with enough gumption to do the right thing. That is why you will hear them talking a lot about rights and laws, jobs and the economy, but not so much about responsibilities, natural law and morality, or sustainability.

Timberlands bigwig Sihota thinks that all the ancient Douglas fir on "his" lands belong to him and he can do as he wishes with them. It says so in the law. But laws that allow this travesty to continue to the point of the extinction of an entire ecosystem is what Thomas Aquinas called a "perversion of law".


Natural law holds that law and morality are connected. How inconvenient this must be for corporations and their shareholders.

Law is not simply what is enacted in statutes. If legislation is not moral, then it is not law and has no authority. This view is frequently summarized by the maxim: “an unjust law is not a true law”.


In order for man-made law to be valid it must accord with higher law. The highest laws are the laws of nature. If we break those we are setting ourselves up for some severe punishment down the road regardless of what human courts say.

Logging the last wild ancient trees knowing that we will never see the likes of them again on these lands is surely breaking all the laws of nature.

Bad things happen when good people act as passive participants in the destruction. Only we can save the last big trees.


A visit to the Ancient Forest Alliance FB page right now is a crash course in the liquidation of our remaining primal forests. I highly recommend a visit to see TJ Watt's aerial shots of Vancouver Island's last stands of undisturbed old growth.

The last big tree and land grab is on its way in BC. This time they are desperate and have full governmental support, both provincially and federally. They are coming for our trees. And how much do they want?

All of it. 100%