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Assessment must be done before blowdown salvage

The consultant should provide advice on how to proceed in the most environmentally sensitive manner.
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Assessment must be done before blowdown salvage

The recent windstorm on Dec. 20 was a very unusual and extremely forceful weather event. Climate science predicts more extreme weather events and higher frequencies of those events. The size of blowdown in the North Cowichan municipal forest reserve, estimated around 8,000 cubic metres, is huge and constitutes an enormous loss of valuable trees.

Salvage of such a magnitude of trees should not be undertaken by the municipal forestry department without a prior environmental assessment by a qualified and independent ecological consultant. The consultant should also provide advice on how to proceed in the most environmentally sensitive and least harmful manner.

The affected areas are just too large, with too many ecosystem-based complexities that need to be considered. We can’t let salvaging go ahead just as business-as-usual. To do so would be utterly irresponsible.

Here are just some of the important aspects of any salvaging that need to be considered:

• Compaction of forest soil in large areas during salvage operations, resulting in further loss of water retention and destruction of the soil biotope

• Potential destruction of particularly vulnerable parts of the forest, such as riparian areas, steep slopes, thin soils, critical wildlife habitat etc. by heavy machinery

• Large-scale removal of nutrients stored in downed and subsequently decomposing trees that nourish the whole forest ecosystem, from soil microbes, fungi, worms, beetles and other insects all the way to birds and mammals

• Consequences in the watershed, i.e. silt and sand overload of streams and creeks, adversely affecting sensitive fish habitat, including downstream water bodies like Somenos Marsh, Somenos Creek etc.

• Damage to surrounding vegetation, including valuable standing trees

Also, we should learn from this massive wind throw: why is it so huge? Is the forest surrounding the large number of clearcuts much more affected than other areas? How could a change in forest management help mitigate the impacts of future windstorms?

These are all crucial questions that need to be answered through an in-depth analysis by an environmental consultant before any salvage operation. The municipal forest department does not have the resources to address the ecological complexities and implications in the wake of the windstorm.

Our municipal council, it appears, is becoming open to the notion that change in our forest operations is vital to improving the health and vanishing biodiversity in our forests.

An environmental assessment is a critical step on the road to such change.

We cannot undo destruction once it’s done. We can, however, avoid further and unnecessary destruction through a thorough environmental assessment that will guide subsequent salvaging activities.

Sabine Almstrom

Duncan