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Environmental group hopes new tech will help halt old-growth logging

Oct 2 2015/in News Coverage

A remotely piloted aircraft has shone new light on an old-growth forest near Port Renfrew that has been approved for logging by the B.C. government.

The advent of technology has given photographer TJ Watt of the Ancient Forest Alliance, a grassroots environmental organization headquartered in Victoria, a wealth of insight into the scope of the Central Walbran ancient forest.

“It allows us to explore and document areas that were essentially impossible to reach before,” Watt said.

“There is a whole other world within the forest that, when you’re stuck on the ground, you don’t get a chance to view. But using the drone to fly upward in the canopy, we’re able to provide a new perspective on the scale of these massive trees.”

Watt released a video on YouTube this week to protest a recent decision by the provincial government that gives Teal-Jones Group, a Surrey-based logging company, permission to log a 32-hectare area for pulp, paper and solid wood products.

Rick Jeffery, president and CEO of Coast Forest Products, an industry association and advocate for the coastal forest industry, said there is no reason for the public to think the area captured on video will disappear entirely.

“[The Ancient Forest Alliance] is in there flying a drone around, and that’s lovely,” Jeffrey said.

“We’re in there with boots on the ground for hours and hours and days and days, spending the time to make sure that the development is consistent with the land-use plan and isn’t risking or threatening the values that our friends in the Forest Alliance are saying they are trying to protect.”

In fact, the Walbran “really isn’t at risk,” Jeffery said. “The development there will be small clearcuts that mimic the range of natural variation that you would find in an old-growth forest. Areas get blown over, slides happen and the new forest grows up in that small patch. That’s essentially what [Teal-Jones] is doing.”

Watt captured the video on a GoPro Hero 4 camera affixed to a drone aircraft flown remotely. He was able to capture in a few hours footage that would have taken him days to acquire had he hiked around on foot. That “new tool in the toolbox” will be an important asset of environmental organizations hoping to stop further logging the area, Watt said.

“Any footage of the canopy within the forest before would have had to be done with tree climbers and pulleys. It would be a really complicated process. Outside of the forest, when you’re separated from a hillside at risk of logging by a 500-foot ravine, you’re now able fly to the other side no problem and be back and packed in our vehicle in under 30 minutes.”

His video shows an impressive western red cedar that has been named Leaning Tower Cedar, for its similarity to Italy’s Leaning Tower of Pisa. The tree is located in the Black Diamond Grove area of the valley near Port Renfrew, a contested parcel of land that was approved for logging by the B.C. government. It is the first of eight proposed cutblocks.

Teal-Jones is legally required to manage at-risk species in wildlife habitat areas that crews come across, Jeffery said, so the plan doesn’t pose a risk to the ecosystems in the Upper Walbran or the Walbran Valley itself.

“There is absolutely nothing aggressive about these plans. We don’t just willy-nilly draw lines on a map and say we are going to go harvesting there.”

Watt is aware that video images may not change provincial government policy. However, he remains hopeful they can sway the public.

“The greatest use is to get thousands of people interested in the cause. But social media and whatnot could pressure the government, who makes the ultimate decision of whether the forest and the Walbran stand or fall.”

Thank You to Patagonia & Patagonia Vancouver!

Oct 1 2015/in Announcements, Thank You

The Ancient Forest Alliance would like to thank Patagonia and Patagonia Vancouver for their significant support through their grassroots environmental grant program, helping us to build an ancient forest movement across BC’s Lower Mainland! See Patagonia’s website at: https://www.patagonia.com/ca and visit the Patagonia Vancouver store online.

B.C. suspends sale of ancient forest on Sunshine Coast identified as hot spot for bear dens

Sep 24 2015/in News Coverage

Environmentalists who blocked construction of a forestry road on the Sunshine Coast for more than five weeks have won a temporary victory in their bid to stop logging of an old-growth forest identified as a prime spot for black bear dens.

B.C. Timber Sales won’t put the forest up for sale as planned on Oct. 1 and instead is “going to consider its options over the winter,” said Vivian Thomas, spokeswoman for the Ministry of Forests, Lands, and Natural Resource Operations. The road builder, K & D Contracting, “had other jobs, so moved (their) equipment out,” she added. RCMP attended the logging site but no one obtained a court injunction to end the blockade.

“When there’s a blockade and you can’t get past it and you’re sitting there, you have to move,” said Doug Grant, a manager with K & D in Campbell River. “It cost about six weeks of productivity.” The company had barged in its heavy equipment.

A July 2014 report by consulting biologist Wayne McCrory found “very high-quality old-growth den habitat” in the Dakota Valley near Sechelt. Based on field work within two of four cutblocks proposed for sale, he extrapolated that logging of the overall 64 hectares would impact about 32 active bear dens.

The dens he investigated were within the trunk or cavity of cedar trees at elevations of 700 to 920 metres. Three-quarters of the best old-growth den habitat has already been logged in the area, McCrory observed, adding it is important to protect what little remains.

Ross Muirhead and Hans Penner, environmental campaigners with Elphinstone Logging Focus, said in an interview that they hope suspension of the sale will give the province time to consider the ecological and cultural values of the Dakota Valley — and not just timber values.

“Any delay in issuing the cutblock is good news,” Muirhead said. “It gives both sides more time to study the other features.”

Research commissioned by the province showed one old-growth yellow cedar to be 1,100 years old — a date calculated only after cutting the tree and others down rather than using less-invasive core samples, Penner said. “We find that appalling, an outrage. They killed the trees to count their age.”

Thomas said a few trees were cut to better determine if they were culturally modified, suggesting the “decay and healing” were more likely the result of “biogeoclimatic conditions.”

Thomas said BCTS discovered two cedar trees that appeared to have been recently used by bears as dens just outside the boundary of a cutblock and excluded them from the planned harvest area. She noted that black bear populations in B.C. are healthy and not a conservation concern and that nearby Tetrahedron Provincial Park provides an abundance of bear habitat.

Penner noted that a study of the logging site by consulting archeologist Jim Stafford found 33 trees thought to be culturally modified, suggesting long-term aboriginal use such as stripping off cedar bark. The province disputes the claim. Cultural modified trees that pre-date 1846 are protected under the Heritage Conservation Act.