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| Port Renfrew public doc |
Decades
ago, when I first visited Port Renfrew on the west coast of Vancouver Island, the
town still thrived in its prime as a timber town. Most of its inhabitants were
connected with the logging industry in some way. This coastal fishing and
logging town is surrounded by Pacific temperate rainforest in the wettest zone
of the province. The annual rainfall of the Coastal Western Hemlock Zone goes
up to 4,500 mm. Moss covers trees in a thick green felt and hangs like long “green
man” beards. A diverse mix of trees of every size and age create what painter
Emily Carr called “perfectly ordered disorder designed with a helter-skelter
magnificence.”
This is big
tree country. Giant red cedars with multi-pronged crowns rise up thick and
majestic. Fibrous gray-silvery bark
conceals a deep warm-coloured wood. Gnarly-barked Douglas-firs pierce the
forest canopy like giant skyscrapers. Straight
Sitka spruce stand like columns of a cathedral. And tall hemlock too. Trees here
can spread over three meters wide and grow a hundred metres tall.
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| Botanical Beach, near Port Renfrew |
The wet
Pacific temperate rainforest holds the greatest biomass—both alive and dead—of
any ecosystem on the planet, writes Harley Rustad, correspondent with The Walrus and author of “Big Lonely
Doug.” This is because the cycle of life and death is slower in the Pacific
northwest: a fallen cedar log will remain intact for a century, allowing
biomass to accumulate.
While I
appreciated the rainforest and lamented the active logging of old growth, my
focus was on the coast. I’d brought my phycology class from Victoria to
Botanical Beach to walk the low tide. There, on the very edge of a potted
sandstone ledge, along the craggy intertidal shores, I was in search of another
“tree”, the elusive sea palm (Postelsia
palmaeformis), a brown macro-alga that was only visible at very low tide. We
had to time our visit impeccably to find my elusive gem of the sea—which I
happily did. Aside from the sea palm, hundreds of species of plants and animals
inhabit the sandstone tide pools and rocky shoreline of the beach. First used
by Dr. Josephine Tildon of the University of Minnesota in the late 1800s as a
research station for students and researchers, the beach continues to draw
tourists, scholars and locals to its beautiful sandstone-carved scenery.
Fast
forward to 2019. I am driving with my friend Anne up the West Coast Road
(Highway 14) to Port Renfrew from Victoria. Our drive to Port Renfrew took two
hours, which included mandatory great coffee stops such as Serious Coffee in
Sooke and Shirley Delicious, a charming cafe in Shirley. This time, my focus
was on the big trees. I’d hiked through Carmanah decades ago, shortly after it
was made into a provincial park to protect the valuable old growth forest and
giant trees. Since then, I’d left British Columbia and lived in Nova Scotia for
a while, teaching and writing. Then I ended up in Toronto where I currently
teach writing at the University of Toronto and George Brown College. This
recent trip in 2019 was dedicated to my search of old growth forest wherever I
could find it near Port Renfrew—before it was all logged away.
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| Western Redcedar stump in a clearcut |
I’d heard
of the recent actions by timber companies—such as Teal-Jones Group (Edinburgh
Mountain); TimberWest; Interfor; BC Timber Sales (BCTS) in Schmidt Creek; Western
Canadian Timber Products; Forest Products; West Fraser; and others—to log as
much and as quickly as possible before new regulations came in, or simply to
get it all before none was left. The term “extreme old-growth logging” was
coined from the term “extreme fossil fuels” that emerged as
oil, gas and coal industries push into areas that are harder to extract from:
oilsands, fracking, Arctic drilling and ultra-deepwater oil which cause greater
risks and more damage to the environment and the climate. Extreme old-growth
logging applies to both expedient and aggressive logging that often abuses the
BC Forest Practice Code and other legislation and guidelines, such as
clearcutting old-growth too close to rivers and streams or coastlines, and
cutting on steep inclines prone to erosion and landslides. This is quite simply
an insane and greedy timber-grab with no consideration for the diverse
life-filled and life-giving ecosystems of the unique ancient forests they are
destroying.
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| Nina leans on an ancient cedar |
Judith Lavoie of Focus on Victoria writes
that Schmidt Creek has been a textbook case of BCTS ignoring local input,
according to conservation organizations. The steep slopes of the Schmidt Creek valley are above the orca rubbing
beaches at Robson Bight, leading to fears that the world-famous beaches will be
degraded by sedimentation or landslides.
In addition to the Schmidt
Creek logging, other recent controversies involving BC Timber Sales include its
plans to log 109 hectares of old growth adjacent to Juan de Fuca Provincial
Park, a proposal that provoked a public outcry and is now on hold to allow
consultations with the operator of a nearby eco-lodge; clearcut logging in the
Skagit Doughnut Hole, beside Manning Park, a decision that brought protests
from the US and accusations that BC was breaking an international treaty; and
clearcut logging in the Nahmint Valley, west of Port Alberni, where one of the
biggest Douglas firs in Canada was felled, despite objections from conservation
groups.
The BC Green Party wants a
moratorium on old-growth logging on Vancouver Island, with development of
sustainable forestry practices. Sonia Furstenau, Green Party House Leader,
finds it disappointing that old-growth logging is continuing at the same rate
as under the previous Liberal government. “While there seems to be an
acknowledgement that the world and conditions have changed very quickly, the
practices aren’t [changing],” she said.
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| Giant Douglas fir and cedars in Avatar Grove |
When Anne
and I reached Port Renfrew, I was unprepared for the overt shift in the
community from a commercial fishing and logging town to one dedicated to
eco-tourism and the preservation of old growth forests. No doubt, many in the
community remain staunch pro-timber; but a new face had emerged. One dedicated
to cherishing the old growth forests and tall trees. Port Renfrew has even
branded itself as Canada’s tall tree capital. Their motto, which I saw in virtually all the
hotels, cafes, restaurants and signage is: “Wild Renfrew: wilderness within
reach.” Port Renfrew has long been a gateway for serious hikers of the
Westcoast Trail from Tofino and the more recent Juan de Fuca Trail to the
south. Port Renfrew promotes itself as a centre for outdoor recreation,
wilderness seekers, and those who appreciate the unbridled magnificence of old
growth forest.
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| Gnarly cedar, Avatar Grove |
The Port Renfrew Chamber of Commerce has joined environmentalists in
arguing against the recent government plans to sell 109 hectares of old-growth
forest in seven cutblocks that include two within 50 metres of Juan de Fuca
Provincial Park. Environmental groups (such as Ancient Forest Alliance) and
forest ecologists have argued for a decade that the trees act as a buffer
against climate change and the loss of endangered species. The chamber insisted
that the trees are more valuable standing and that clearcutting will hurt
tourism. They cited the example of Avatar Grove: “We know from the Avatar experience
that old-growth forests attract tourists — not just locally but from all over
the world…It’s a lot better than cutting them down, because you cut them down
once, you run them through the sawmill, they build somebody’s deck and that’s
it. But, if you leave them standing, people come over and over again to look.”
Places I visited include the following:
Avatar Grove: Just a fifteen minute drive from Port Renfrew
on fairly good dirt road lies Avatar Grove, a centuries old forest ecosystem of
giant cedar, Douglas-fir, spruce and hemlock that was saved from logging
through major efforts by activists such as the Ancient Forest Alliance and the
discovery of giant trees worth protecting.
Big Lonely
Doug: farther down the dirt road past some old growth in
the middle of a clearcut stands a single giant Douglas-fir. “In 2011, a logger named Dennis Cronin stood under one
of the largest trees in Canada and said no. He wrapped green ribbon around the
Douglas fir’s nearly 12-metre circumference and saved it from being cut down.
After the forest around it was gone, and images of a single enormous tree left
standing on its own in the middle of a clear-cut began to be circulated, the
tree, located just outside Port Renfrew on Vancouver Island, became a symbol
for the dwindling old-growth forests in British Columbia,” writes Harley Rustad
in the Globe and Mail.
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| Extensive root system, Avatar Grove |
Nina is a Canadian scientist and novelist. She worked for 25 years as an environmental consultant in the field of aquatic ecology and limnology, publishing papers and technical reports on water quality and impacts to aquatic systems. Nina has written over a dozen eco-fiction, science fiction and fantasy novels. An award-winning short story writer, and essayist, Nina currently lives in Toronto where she teaches writing at the University of Toronto and George Brown College. Her non-fiction book “Water Is...”—a scientific study and personal journey as limnologist, mother, teacher and environ- mentalist—was picked by Margaret Atwood in the New York Times as 2016 ‘The Year in Reading’. Nina’s most recent novel “A Diary in the Age of Water”— about four generations of women and their relationship to water in a rapidly changing world—will be released in 2020 by Inanna Publications. www.NinaMunteanu.ca; www.NinaMunteanu.me
