Tag Archive for: Walbran Valley

It was an historic moment 20 years in the making.

Today it was announced an agreement has been reached between the province, 26 First Nations, environmental groups and the forest industry to protect 85% of BC’s Great Bear Rainforest from logging.

“It preserves land with cultural, ecological and spiritual ties vitally important to the people who have lived there for millennia,” said BC Premier Christy Clark at a press conference in Vancouver.

“I stand here today proud, happy, but still a little bit upset that it’s taken this long for us to find that balance that we were looking for for the last 20 years,” said Dallas Smith, President of the Nanwakolas Tribal Council.

The Great Bear Rainforest covers 6.4 million hectares and is the largest intact temperate rainforest in the world.

The best known species to call it home is the Spirit, or Kermode, bear.

20 years ago the battle to protect it began with protests and blockades — that was followed by an international campaign against BC forest products, which cost millions of dollars in contracts.

“International pressure was definitely key to bring the parties together to collaborate,” said Richard Brooks, Greenpeace Canada’s Forest Campaign Coordinator.

There will still be logging in the remaining 15%, but the parties involved say it will be under some of the strictest regulations in North America.

Ken Wu, executive director of the Ancient Forest Alliance, says now that BC’s northern rainforest is protected, it’s time to focus on Vancouver Island.

“We actually have the most significant or grandest ancient forests remaining,” said Wu.

“These are Jurassic Park-type landscapes, primeval ancient landscapes and we only have 6% of our productive forests under protection.”

Wu says if nothing is done to protect places like the Walbran Valley from logging, old growth-dependent species here will eventually go extinct.

But he hopes with today’s unprecedented agreement, it will never come to that.

“This basically changes the political dynamic in terms of forests in this province, in fact, in this country, so it’s a huge leap forward,” Wu said.

[Chek News article no longer available.]

The Delica stops along a narrow, twisting section of the Walbran Main just a few miles from the Carmanah Walbran Provincial Park border. We scramble from the van for a view across a broad valley overlooking two strings of hills that lead into the distance. At the bottom of the valley is a confluence of rushing water, a distant waterfall visible as a thin twisting ribbon glistening white amid a landscape otherwise green.

It’s a deceiving green, as it hides the wealth within. A forest may seem just a forest, but TJ Watt, a campaigner for the Ancient Forest Alliance, points out the details.

“Second growth forest will look quite monotonous. The trees will typically be all the same height and generally the same shade of green, almost looking like a lawn, very uniform, whereas old-growth forests tend to look messy, to put it the simplest way.

“You have trees of varying heights so one will be sticking up higher than the other. Because of gaps in the canopy you’ll have these dark shadows that give the forest more of a 3D look to it. They often have more mosses or lichens so from a distance you can sometimes see those hanging off the tree branches. And also if there is a lot cedar there, then you often see the dead tops of the cedar trees sticking out; they look like white spires. That doesn’t necessarily mean the trees are dead, but sometimes the leader section of the tree has died off. Once you get used to seeing those, you can really tell the forests apart from a distance.”

What we’re looking at across this wide valley is a messy forest – the indication it is old-growth. In the valley bottom is Castle Grove, one of the finest remaining examples of ancient red cedar stands. It and the surrounding old growth on the lower slopes make up one of the largest intact chunks of endangered, unharvested forest remaining on Vancouver Island.

It’s a rare view. On Vancouver Island south of Barkley Sound, about 90 percent of the original forest has been logged, along with about 95 percent of the lowland old growth.

“What we’re really down to is the last remnants of the classic giants and it’s the best of the classic giants because it’s literally in the Carmanah-Walbran-San Juan-Gordon River, these four southern valleys where you get the very best growing conditions in the entire country. If you go north it gets colder, as you go east it gets drier,” says Ken Wu, a campaigner for the Ancient Forest Alliance.

What we’re looking at is a snapshot of what soon won’t exist. Eight cutblocks are proposed for the slopes surrounding Castle Grove, and one has been approved.

It’s what Ken and TJ are here to fight.

“It would turn that whole region into a Swiss cheese if they were approved and cut,” TJ says.

It’s a region already well sliced. Right behind us is a cleared slope of stumps, debris and encroaching scrub. That cutblock was logged in 1992, when Ken walked through the wreckage to come upon a 16-foot-wide stump.

“It was as wide as the Castle Giant, the biggest known tree in the Walbran. That area was really a gargantuan Jurassic Park kind of stand – it was really one of the most significant, grandest old-growth forests in the world, and now they’ve logged it.”

For TJ, as a new activist at the time, seeing that stump had a profound impact.

“It was one of the first moments I realized old-growth logging was not a thing of the past and these giant trees were still being cut down each and every day. To think this is still happening another 10 years later is disheartening, but makes me resolve to fight harder to keep it from happening any more.”

The fight in the Walbran is escalating and while Ken believes the first cutblock is almost certain to be logged, – unlike the others, it has received approval – he believes mounting public pressure could turn the tide in favour of preserving the remainder.

And the pressure is building.

The Ancient Forest Alliance spearheaded the drive to save nearby Avatar GroveÜ, an old-growth forest outside Port Renfrew. Ken credits the support of the Port Renfrew chamber in helping win that battle.

The support to save the Walbran is already much stronger – particularly as a host of conservation groups are now involved in the Walbran. But Ken believes it is the business support, not the environmental support, that will be tip the balance.

“The reason Avatar was protected was support from the Chamber of Commerce and the business community. That’s one of the key things we’ll be working on – the outreach to all the restaurants and B&Bs and lodges.”

If there’s a lesson learned from Avatar Grove, it is that conservation has a payback. The grove is widely accredited to a growth in tourism to the Port Renfrew region and is a key item of the region’s tourism menuÜ. Clearcuts, on the other hand, never make the must-see list.

A variety of petitions, protests and initiatives are planned by the various groups battling the logging, but another emerging element is a protest camp – at the Walbran Witness Camp, the same location for the camp in the early 1990s. That served as the base for the blockades that led in part to the inclusion of the Lower Walbran Valley into Carmanah Walbran Provincial Park. A spray-painted slogan, painted by a protestor while dangling over the river on a log, still clearly proclaims “Wilderness forever” on the bridge.

The park is populated full-time by only a small band of diehards, though the weekend population tends to swell. At the moment (November, 2015) no blockades are planned; the camp residents are only keeping an eye on the progress of the logging with one brief clash between protesters and policeÜ.

Trails criss-cross the area around the Witness Camp, many leading to the monster trees that can be found nearby. One is the Emerald Giant, and Ken offers a laugh as he sees the sign, proclaiming it “aka Mordor Tree.”

“I named it that back when Lord of the Rings was popular,” Wu says. “It seemed fitting because it looked like Mordor with the turrets for branches.”

He concedes the new name sounds nicer and is more applicable as the Giant is adjacent to the Emerald Pool, a stretch of river that almost glows its namesake colour (the pool is pictured on page 17). We stop to admire a thick patch of tiny mushrooms growing from an adjacent tree. It’s an area that possesses an unspeakable beauty, from the smallest detail to the largest giant spruce.

Previous ‘wars in the woods’ have garnered international attention, and many Canadians must wonder at the fuss. Yet’s it’s hard to believe those who would let the Walbran be logged would fail to be emotional at the bulldozing of the Serengeti or strip mining in the Grand Canyon. Wu sees no difference.

“If you think about where the natural wonders of the earth are, say the Grand Canyon in the U.S. or the Serengeti Plains of Tanzania, I’d argue that the coastal rainforests of Vancouver Island rank up among them. And the Carmanah Walbran is just too beautiful; I just can’t describe it in words.”

To help the war in the woods to save the Walbran, help with any of the initiatives by the supporting conservation groups: the Sierra Club of British Columbia, the Wilderness Committee, the Ancient Forest Alliance or the Friends of Carmanah/Walbran. For driving instructions, the Friends of Carmanah/Walbran website has detailed instructions.

Logging company Teal Cedar Products has been granted an extension of an injunction that will keep environmental activists at bay as the company continues to log in the Walbran Valley.

In a decision delivered Monday, the B.C. Supreme Court ordered that until the end of March, the Western Canada Wilderness Committee and other environmental activists must allow the company to carry on its work unimpeded and maintain a 50-metre safety zone from any motor vehicle engaged in active logging.

Teal Cedar Products is part of Surrey-based Teal-Jones Group.

The ruling came as a major blow to the Wilderness Committee, with organizer Torrance Coste saying the result could be permanent damage to the ecosystem.

“If people are discouraged from getting out to Walbran … if no one knows what’s going on, Teal-Jones will run rampant,” he said.

“That’s what we’ve seen in the rest of the [tree farm licence areas] where Teal-Jones is active. Public access to Walbran is critical to keep these last stands of old-growth standing.”

The court’s decision came after a long day of procedural hearings, punctured by muffled shouts from a sometimes vocal and passionate gallery of as many as 65 environmental advocates.

Madam Justice Jennifer Power acknowledged the gallery Monday, noting it drove home the point that Walbran is an area of significant public concern.

However, Power said she was satisfied that Teal-Jones had the right to log the area, and that protesters will now have to keep their distance.

Power also dismissed an application by activist Marlene Simmons for an adjournment of the proceedings.

Power said while she sympathized with Simmons, who represented herself, she was not persuaded to grant the adjournment.

However, Power did include in the order a clause that would allow Simmons or any other activist to have the order set aside with 24 hours’ notice in order to bring the matter back to the courts when they have counsel or additional evidence.

The Wilderness Committee and other activists want to see a ban on cutting of old-growth trees in the Walbran Valley.

Teal-Jones Group gained a permit in September from the province to harvest timber in cutblock No. 4424, a 3.2-hectare area of Crown land in the contentious Central Walbran, for pulp, paper and solid-wood products.

Coste said the cutblock contains 1,000 year-old trees and a densely packed group of old-growth western red cedars dubbed Castle Grove. “It’s a forest unlike any other on the planet,” he said.

According to Teal-Jones’ submissions, the extension of the injunction, which would have expired Monday at midnight, follows three blockades, the last of which saw a man lock himself to a log placed across the road to prevent anyone from going to work.

The injunction will allow legal protests and activities, but stops protesters from interfering with the company’s harvesting operations. Anyone found violating the injunction could be considered in contempt of court.

Activists began blocking Teal Cedar Products Ltd. from road-building work in November.

While the Wilderness Committee and Coste were named by the company in its court application, the activist group says it did not organize the blockades or civil disobedience, but is championing the rights of individuals to stand up for and advocate for the environment.

Teal-Jones’ counsel said it has the legal right to log the area and that the activists’ fight is with the province. And while the company respects the right of activists to protest, it says those blockades have become a safety issue.

Coste maintains the logging company is trying to block access to the Walbran for the law-abiding public. “In a democracy like B.C., we have a right to get out and witness what’s happening in our forests, to witness ecological destruction and to report back on that,” Coste said during a morning protest outside the court. “Teal-Jones is trying to bar that and we’re here to stand up and say the public is deeply concerned about what is happening in the Walbran.”

A lawyer for the Wilderness Committee argued that the 50-metre zone keeping protesters away from the logging equipment is too large and the injunction period is too long. Initially Teal-Jones had asked that it be extended until September.

Coste told a cheering crowd outside the court that the group is standing up for the rights of individuals to protest and defending the province’s forests.

“We are here in court standing up against Teal-Jones today, but a ban on old-growth logging, a legislated solution to this, [has] to come from the province of B.C.,” Coste said. “We need to put pressure on them.”

Teal-Jones may legally be permitted to log the area, but ethically and environmentally it’s wrong, Coste said.

“We don’t have the cathedrals, the castles that other parts of the world have. These are our links back in time and they should be protected as such, as historical monuments,” he told the crowd, arguing the province should ban the logging of old-growth forests this year. “There are no replacements for these forests. A 1,000-year-old forest takes 1,000 years to grow.”

Read more: https://www.vancouversun.com/business/resources/walbran+valley+logging+buffer+zone+injunction/11631656/story.html?__lsa=e20a-c7f0