Tag Archives: T J Watt

Forests

B.C. failing to meet promised benchmarks to transform old-growth logging

National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Two years after pledging to take a new approach to the management of old-growth forests, the B.C. government is failing to make the grade, environmental groups say. 

The province promised to act on 14 recommendations in an independent old-growth strategic review to protect the most at-risk big tree ecosystems while transforming forestry over a three-year period. 

But the NDP government continues to lag on its most urgent and important commitments, and hasn’t completed any recommendations most of the way through the stated timeline, a report card issued by the Wilderness Committee, Sierra Club BC, Stand.earth and Ancient Forest Alliance suggests.

Continue reading B.C. failing to meet promised benchmarks to transform old-growth logging →
Forests, Indigenous Nations, Justice

The Last stand: Fairy Creek

By Melissa Renwick, Ha-Shilth-Sa, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Port Renfrew, BC – After over a decade of documenting B.C.’s last remaining old-growth ecosystems, TJ Watt said he hadn’t come across anything quite like the grove of red cedars hidden in the upper reaches of the Caycuse watershed, near Port Renfrew.

“It was truthfully one of the most stunning old-growth forests I’ve been in,” said the co-founder of the Ancient Forest Alliance. “The sheer volume of giant cedars was mind-blowing – every direction you looked was another 10 to 12-foot-wide ancient cedar that could be 800 years old, or older.”

When he returned later that year in 2020, only their stumps remained.

Continue reading The Last stand: Fairy Creek →
Finances, Forests, Indigenous Nations

BC could use Federal funding to end the war in the woods

National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

A coalition of conservationists is urging the B.C. government to use federal funds to end the province’s new war in the woods on Vancouver Island, protect old-growth forest and establish targets for endangered ecosystems.

Continue reading BC could use Federal funding to end the war in the woods →
Forests

Fairy Creek environmental blockade near Port Renfrew

Campbell River Mirror, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Government and company officials continue to avoid comment as an environmental blockade near Port Renfrew reached its fifth day Friday.  Attempts by the Mirror to speak to representatives of logging company Teal Jones and area MLA and Premier John Horgan went unreturned, as protesters continued with a blockade launched Monday to stop Teal Jones Group from punching road access into the Fairy Creek watershed. 

Continue reading Fairy Creek environmental blockade near Port Renfrew →
Forests

Visiting Avatar Grove

2 Comments

By Roy L Hales

Though it is no longer a secret, relatively few North Americans have visited one of the continent’s oldest extant stands of giant old-growth red cedar and Douglas fir. The site was slated to be clearcut, when T J Watt spotted a large cedar close to Route 14 just outside of Port Renfrew, British Columbia, in 2009. Figuring there was likely to be more, he hiked into the forest. The Victoria based Ancient Forest Alliance was born out of the campaign to protect the ten acre site now known as Avatar Grove.

Continue reading Visiting Avatar Grove →