Joshua Wright says the yellow cedar tree he photographed last year was “incredible,” the largest he's ever seen in a decade of hiking around Vancouver Island.
The monumental cedar stood in one of the few intact or nearly untouched old valleys left on the island, says Wright, an attorney who also recorded the bird calls of the marbled guillemot. endangered species according to federal law – within the same forest.
Wright measured the cedar's diameter at 2.79 metres, a size that would provide protection for the tree and also create a one-hectare logging buffer in accordance with provincial legislation.
But when he returned to the area south of Gold River in June, Wright said the tree had been cut down as part of provincially approved logging.
“It clearly exceeded the threshold of what the government should protect and what industry should protect,” he said in an interview.
The tree was cut down under a system that relies in part on logging operators to report the existence of trees large enough to warrant protection.
When Wright saw the yellow cedar standing, it was already marked with spray paint. But visible markings didn't save the tree from being cut down sometime last year.
The Forestry Ministry said it was investigating the logging following Wright's complaint. He did not respond in time for publication to a question about whether he knew about the tree before Wright's complaint.
Rachel Holt, an independent ecologist who has advised the British Columbia government, said it's “very alarming to see example after example” of forests with the oldest and largest trees continuing to be cut down, especially those identified as containing the most at-risk and irreplaceable old growth remaining in the province.
“It’s off the charts, it’s a rare thing in the entire world,” Holt said.
“We've lost sight of that in B.C. We have never noticed this and this is something that needs to change.”
Maps of the province show that the area where Wright documented yellow cedar overlaps significantly with the old-growth tree category, which represents the largest remaining trees.
Holt was part of a provincial advisory group that designated much of the area as “old growth” with “large trees” and recommended that it be excluded from logging in 2021.
However, continued deferment required support from Indigenous peoples, and there was no significant funding available at the time to help communities make up for lost revenue.
An announcement posted on the BC Forest Operations Map website shows that yellow cedar was cleared from land where Matchlee Ltd. Partnership, majority owned by Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation, holds the non-renewable forest license.
In fall 2023, the province announced a $300 million conservation funding fund, saying it aims to “accelerate the protection of B.C.'s oldest and rarest trees.”
But Holt said forests identified as a priority for deferment continue to be logged and First Nations have no meaningful financial alternatives.
“The process failed because conservation funding was not put in place to ensure that no First Nations would be harmed if they decided not to log the ancient forest.”
Representatives from Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation did not respond to requests for comment about the logging.
The minister answers
When asked how much money from the BC Conservation Fund has been directed to First Nations to support delays in old-growth forest logging, the province said there are “instances” of what happens when delays align with conservation interests.
Forests Minister Ravi Parmar said the people he interacts with in every corner of British Columbia “care deeply about forests, care deeply about forestry and old growth.”
Old growth forests have social value, including “for me as an islander,” said Parmar, who represents Langford Highlands, west of Victoria.
“The Ministry of Forests has worked and will continue to work with First Nations across British Columbia to collaboratively manage our forests on their traditional lands, protect old growth and protect the biodiversity of our forests.”
Parmar acknowledged that the province faces “constraints in fiber supply.” wood shortage it is mature enough and economically viable to harvest as it helps strengthen the industry which suffered greatly plant closures and US tariffs.
The minister pointed to forest losses from forest fires and Mountain pine beetle epidemicwhich has declined since peaking around 2005.
“It has nothing to do with government policy, it has nothing to do with reconciliation,” Parmar said of the lack of economically viable timber.
“It has to do with the fact that there are no trees. They will come back, they will grow again. But now they are not here.”
High registration speed
Parmar said the rate of old-growth forest clearing had slowed in recent years under the New Democrat government, although it “will always be part of [B.C.'s] forestry sector.”
But a recent analysis by two other former members of B.C.'s old-growth forest advisory group found that rates of logging since 2021 have been higher in old-growth forests with larger trees than in old-growth forests with smaller trees and a lower risk of irreversible biodiversity loss.
Report Independent ecologist Karen Price and certified professional forester Dave Daoust found that logging disturbed 2.1 percent of the commission's recommended setback area, compared with 0.5 percent of other old growth, making logging four times more likely in forests with the largest and oldest trees.
BC protection for exceptionally large trees
Wright said at the very least the yellow cedar should have been left standing. according to a special regulation on tree protectionwhich came into force in 2020.
The province intended to protect 1,500 exceptionally large trees of a certain diameter; for yellow cedars the threshold is 2.65 meters.
CBC Indigenous visits Hayalthkin'geme's (Cary Newman) store where he uses the Totem 2.0 device for the first time. The post he's working on is made from 14 pieces of second growth red cedar to preserve more of the old trees.
Wright's measurement of 2.79 meters for the Gold River tree was to provide protection for the tree, as well as create a buffer radius around the tree.
When forest managers become aware of a tree that meets the protection threshold, they must report it within 30 days and preserve it.
The Minister of Forestry has the power to grant an exemption under certain conditions.
“We have an ineffective system”
Wright said he filed a complaint about the yellow cedar being cut down. The Forestry Ministry said it could not comment beyond confirming that an investigation was ongoing.
Parmar said the province has mechanisms in place to enforce the rules and impose fines when rules are broken.
But Holt said there is little oversight of B.C.'s forests.
“I literally spend the morning looking at old management areas that don't have old buildings on them, and looking at nearby old buildings that exist and are not protected,” she said.
“We have a broken system here.”
Holt said she recently told a senior Forestry Department official that she was standing on a tree stump that was approximately 1,000 years old.
“And they said, 'Oh, wow.' Like, they didn’t seem to know that we do this every day here in British Columbia,” she recalls.
Holt said the trees covered by the special tree protection rule are “extremely rare” and special, but preserving them won't save the ecosystem as a whole.
The way B.C. set the thresholds means there are “almost no trees,” she said.
“I mean, if a tree qualified and still got cut down, it just shows how flawed our forest management system is,” Holt said.
The War for the Forest follows a new generation campaign against logging that has again captured the attention of Canadians, including Stephanie Quetaselvet Wood, a Sḵwx̱wú7mesh journalist living and writing in North Vancouver who covers issues of Indigenous rights and the natural world.
Wright also said he appreciates the rules aimed at preserving some of B.C.'s largest trees, but it also amounts to “greenwashing” by the B.C. government as it continues to approve the logging of ancient forests while promising to protect them.
“I think the problem is not why such trees are cut down, but why such places are destroyed? This is a more serious issue,” he said.
“When a tree dies, it’s sad… but ecosystems shouldn’t die.”
