BC

Has the web of life been broken, beyond any hope of repair?

by Maggie Paquet ©

Back in autumn 1999, newspapers and at least one national magazine carried an article by Tom Reimchen of the University of Victoria Biology Department on the links between bears, salmon, and forests in the coastal ecosystems of British Columbia.

Our threatened fishing industry prompts a 10-point program to protect BC salmon.

by David Ellis

The first forecasts are in for commercial salmon fishing for 2000, and, not surprisingly, they're not good. Harvest opportunities for Fraser sockeye might range "from limited to none," says the DFO, and the northern troll fleet will probably be shut down for the season due to the concern for coho and chinook.

Hard times in BC's export economy are fuelling an effort to lift the moratorium on offshore oil and gas development.

by Oonagh O'Connor, Living Oceans Society

The exploration and development of offshore oil and gas have been prohibited on the west coast of Canada for almost 30 years because of the threat they pose to our environment and coastal economy. Now downturns in BC's resource export economy have some people promoting offshore oil and gas.

by Paula Linquist

A 1994 BC Ministry of Forests (MoF) Risk Assessment of Gypsy Moth in British Columbia states"... the direct impact of an established gypsy moth population on BC's natural resources would likely be small." Despite this, MoF officials have applied for a Pesticide Use Permit to aerial and ground spray the Burnaby Lake area up to 4 times for gypsy moths. The biocide of choice is a combination of 2.1% live bacteria, Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) and 97.9% unknown chemicals which are kept hidden by the Trades Secret Act.

Keep an eye open when you cross the Strait ... that might be the Fraser River Plume you're looking at.

by Paul LeBlond

Islands are defined by the waters that surround them. In our case, it's the Strait of Georgia and the channels that connect it to the ocean, from Puget Sound in the south, to Queen Charlotte Strait in the north, a coastal realm often called the Salish Sea.

It's been a long, hard struggle, and it's far from over ... but efforts to restore BC's top oyster producing area to health are finally starting to pay off.

by J. Cates

The Rave is passe. The Septic Social is way cooler, at least in the Baynes Sound area of the British Columbia coast.

Remember CORE? It was supposed to manage Vancouver Island forests for all values. Well, now you can forget about it. It's toast.

by Paul Senez (with files from Sierra Club of BC)

In the last decade, Vancouver Island has been subjected to an alphabet soup of land use planning exercises.

Pipelines and Co Gen frame the future of energy on Vancouver Island, but its time for a serious national discussion about greenhouse gases. The Georgia Strait Crossing isn't a Done Deal yet.

by Arthur Caldicott

The Georgia Strait Crossing is a proposal to construct a pipeline to bring natural gas to Vancouver Island from "the mainland" - the continental part of southwestern British Columbia.

In spite of a "Summer of Discontent" in 1999, the inescapable feeling is that the battle to protect wilderness from clearcutting has just begun.

by J. Cates

The Upper Elaho Valley is one of British Columbia's few remaining pristine wilderness areas. Three hours north of Vancouver, in what the government's tourist brochures call Sea to Sky country, this area is host to hundreds of 1,300-year-old Douglas fir trees and is the southern most coastal habitat of grizzly bears. The area is within the proposed Stoltmann National Park Reserve, as well as Squamish and Lil'Wat First Nation territories.

Opposition to biodiversity protection measures has been aggressive and on-going.

by Jim Cooperman

On Sept. 28, Jim Cooperman (former BC Environmental Network [BCEN] forest caucus coordinator and BC Environmental Report editor), was invited to address the Association of British Columbia Professional Foresters' (ABCPF) executive council about ongoing issues regarding forestry in British Columbia. This is a summary of the talk.