The Friends of Cortes Island (FOCI) needs to raise $15,000 for core operations, and is also inviting the community to their Annual General Meeting on Tuesday, December 9, at 5 PM, at Manson’s Hall.
FOCI’s Executive Director, Helen Hall, explained, “We all live on this beautiful island which has rich forests, a stunning coastline and a host of endangered species, and I think that’s a big reason why people choose to live here -the natural beauty of the island. FOCI has a really important remit to protect and nurture that natural beauty for future generations.”
Cortes Currents: FOCI has just published its 2025 Annual Report—a look back at a year full of on-the-ground conservation and community projects. What have you been doing?
Helen Hall: 2025 was a very busy year for us. We have been doing everything from a whole island beach cleanup in the spring to maintaining all the regional parks and trails. We’ve helped create a really amazing wetland at the Cortes Island School. FOCI has been continuing to work on the Dillon Creek Wetland, which is helping to reduce the nutrients going into Hague and Gunflint Lakes. We’ve also been doing some important marine work. FOCI just launched a program protecting the vital eelgrass beds around Cortes. We’ve been also working to try and prevent a very invasive species getting hold in Manson’s Lagoon, which is the European Green Crab.”
“A project that I’ve particularly been enjoying, is working with the Cortes Island School. We did a project with them last year where we put in a butterfly shaped pollinator meadow right at the front of the school. We reseeded that and maintained it this summer. It looked amazing.”
“We also worked with the school and Rewilding Water and Earth, which is a consultancy company, to help put a wetland into the back of the playing field. We were supporting it by organizing volunteers, helping with the fencing and planting, and working with the school children. It’s going to be a fabulous place where children can learn about nature, learn about how to look after a wetland, and do creative activities. It has been delightful to work with the school and there are generations of students to come that are going to benefit from these projects.”
“FOCI maintains all the regional parks and trails on the island. We have a team of two people, Alex Bernier and Sam Gibb, who go out every month of the year and walk every single trail and maintain the trails, taking away any fallen trees, cutting back vegetation, picking up garbage, and also doing infrastructure projects, like putting in new boardwalks, bridges and signage. Those parks and trails are pretty amazing places, and a lot of people, residents and visitors, visit them. That’s a really important part of our work. We’ve been doing it for over 20 years and I think a lot of people probably don’t realize that we’re even doing it.
Cortes Currents: What about your work with different species around the island? Is there any news about European Green crabs?
Helen Hall: “One of the most important projects we are doing is trying to protect marine environment in the lagoon, which is incredibly biodiverse and important. This year we’ve been doing two projects monitoring invasive European Green Crabs.”
“We’ve been working with DFO and Klahoose Fisheries trying to trap for them in Manson’s Lagoon. Last year we actually found three green crabs in the lagoon, which were the first Green Crabs found in the Discovery Islands and really concerning for us. They are one of the world’s worst invasive species. They basically can destroy marine ecosystems and they also predate other marine organisms. They actually eat some of the other crabs. We set traps for them all summer long and we didn’t find any, which was good news
“We’ve also been doing a pilot project with the Hakai Institute (from Quadra Island), where we’ve been putting out an oyster bag filled with oyster shells, leaving it on the beach from July right through to November and then taking samples from it to see if we can find green crab larva. That was put on a beach right at the mouth of the lagoon. The samples have gone back to Hakai and we don’t know yet whether any green crab had been found through that.”
“It’s a pilot that started last year in Comox. They didn’t think they had green crabs, but then they found the larvae. So we are doing two things to try and find out about green crabs and if they’re found, DFO would come in to try and eliminate them.”
Cortes Currents: Tell us about FOCI’s new Eelgrass program
Helen Hall: “I went to an Eelgrass Symposium last year in Campbell River and I met up with somebody from an organization called SeaChange. We chatted about starting up an eelgrass program on Cortes. We’ve been working with them and another organization called Project Watershed, slowly starting to work on developing an eelgrass program. ”
“That led to SeaChange bringing up a boat all the way up from Victoria to do some training with us and the Klahoose Guardians to show us how to do eelgrass surveys. That was our first step in that program.”
“ Cortes has eelgrass beds in lots of locations around the island. I’m sure people know this when they’re walking on beaches. They see all the eelgrass washed up at this time of year. It’s an incredibly important ecosystem. A lot of the juvenile salmon live in the eelgrass beds. A lot of juvenile marine organisms live there. We’re looking at where it is and what condition it’s in, and then potentially looking at how to protect those beds. What people have done elsewhere is put in buoys with signs saying, ‘This is an eelgrass bed. Don’t anchor here.’ We are also looking how to restore eelgrass beds where they have been lost’”
Cortes Currents: Those are just a few of the highlights from last year and we’ll be hearing a lot more at this year’s AGM. FOCI is trying to raise $15,000 for core operating costs. What do you need it for and how is this different from the grants you apply for?
Helen Hall: “ We’re looking for funding to enable us to operate as an organization. As a small organization, we’re delivering a lot of great projects on limited resources. We spend money wisely. We watch it very carefully and we try to deliver programs that are really effective on Cortes. If you’re donating to us, your money is being very well used and it is making a difference to the island.”
“Most of the grants are what’s called restrictive funding, which means it can only be spent on one project, which ties us down to how we can use it.”
“The reason we really benefit from getting donations is its unrestricted funding which we need for salaries, insurance, rent and operating costs – which are all essential for us to operate.”
“In the summer we launched what was called our Giving Circle Appeal which was trying to get people to commit to funding us for more than one year. If people could commit to multi-year funding, it means we can plan ahead. It means we can build up what we’re doing. It means we know we can employ staff. Having more stability and more solid funding basically means we can do our job better and we don’t have to spend all the time trying to get funding. Half my time is trying to get funding, the other half is then trying to get the projects to happen.”
We really do need the funding. We understand it might be a financially challenging time for people, but if people feel they can donate to us, it’s very much appreciated by us.”
Cortes Currents: How can people give donations?
Helen Hall: “They can do that by going to our website, which is www.friendsofcortes.org. There’s a tab where you can click on donations and make an online donation. You can also drop off a donation at the FOCI office. We are here five days a week, nine to five. Or put a check in the post, our address is PO Box 278 Manson’s Landing.
“Next Tuesday, the 9th of December at 5:00 PM, we have our AGM at Mansons Hall. Everyone is welcome. It will be a celebration of the work that we’ve done over the last year. We’ll also be announcing the winner of the Jo Ann Green environmental ward. This year we’re doing a little exercise where people can comment on our projects and tell us what they think, or if they have ideas of new projects for us. We’d love to hear from them.”
“After the AGM, we’re offering a free dinner. That’s the chance for people, people to socialize, to meet other FOCI members, to meet the board, to meet the staff.”
Cortes Currents: Stewardship on Cortes is patient work. It’s science and community working side by side. For Helen Hall and the team at FOCI, that’s the reason their current donation drive is important.
Helen Hall: “We feel like we’re offering a lot to the island, not only to the natural environment, but to the community too. Our goal is to try and bring in money so that we can continue this work.
Links of Interest:
- Donation page on the FOCI website
- Friends of Cortes Island website
- Friends of Cortes Island Facebook page
- Cortes Island Resonance series
- Articles about, or mentioning, FOCI
All undesignated photos taken from the Cortes Island Facebook page; top photo is from the Island wide beach clean-up
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