GROUTHTRUTHING

The importance of getting out to the frontlines of resource extraction activity on our coast is the only way to know the truth of how those practices are being conducted. With gumboots to the ground, we have spent an enormous amount of time walking through, monitoring and documenting expansive clearcuts and groves of old-growth flagged to be cut. We have poured over reports, legal documents, and learned the language of the foresters who are in charge of managing how the forests are used in our current system of Professional Reliance. We have spent countless hours in meetings with forestry companies in negotiations to keep the remaining old-growth of Sonora Island standing. The things we have found on the ground do not line up with what is on paper. One thing we learn time and time again is that groundtruthing is an incredibly important step in the process of enacting environmental justice.

STORYTELLING

The power of storytelling is undeniable. It has the ability to change how we perceive the world, and thereby act. The stories we tell ourselves and one another shape the world we live in. While there are a number of impactful ways to communicate story, our mediums to communicate what we find in our groundtruthing work are photography, filmmaking/videography, writing, and presenting. In our work to protect old-growth ecosystems, storytelling through these mediums has made an impact. Photographs of stumps, videos explaining shady forestry practises, posters of logging in the Great Bear Rainforest - these have all held what usually remains hidden to the light of day. Our grassroots work fuelled by our care for the coast has held giant forestry companies accountable for their practices. We believe that when people are shown injustices, they will stand up and act to protect what they love.

WHAT WE STAND TO LOSE

Tavish photographed this old-growth cedar tree on East Thurlow Island. By documenting old-growth still standing, we have a record of what specific trees and healthy ecosystems look like. The importance of intact forests cannot be overstated.

IRREPLACEABLE ECOSYSTEMS

Old-growth forests are irreplaceable in sustaining biodiversity. Original rainforests should be a top conservation priority when it comes to protecting wildlife, and with species extinction rates occurring more rapidly than they ever have before due to the human activity, these original forest habitats are more critical than ever. Old-growth is not a renewable resource. These ecosystems have been growing, layering, and building biodiversity since the last ice-age. To call forestry practices that cut down old-growth ‘sustainable’ is one of the biggest environmental lies of our time.

Returning to East Thurlow Island to check in on these trees, Tavish found that the original forest that stood here had been reduced to a graveyard. This once-productive old-growth ecosystem is now an irreparable scar in the landscape.

“Old-growth rainforest is being logged on the Island at a rate of about 10,000 hectares a year — or two soccer fields per hour. Along B.C.’s south coast and in the inland rainforest, scarce remaining intact rainforests are also being logged at a rate faster than most places on the planet, driving caribou and salmon to the brink of extinction.” - The Province (source)