A logging plan threatens ancient and globally rare forest in the Seymour River area of BC’s Inland Temperate Rainforest. The area is part of 'the Hub' for the largest and most viable of the southernmost caribou herds in BC. Since 2014 we’ve lost five caribou herds in the Columbia Basin. Act now to protect the Columbia North herd and their old growth forest home.
A cumulative logging plan by BC Timber Sales (the province’s own logging agency) and Louisiana Pacific would log more than 620 hectares of predominantly old and ancient forest in provincially identified core caribou habitat. The loss will severely fragment ancient forest, degrade caribou habitat, limit connectivity, and put the Columbia North caribou herd at greater risk of extinction. Protecting the old growth forest of the Seymour and its tributaries is crucial.
Louisiana Pacific, who has proposed 366 hectares of logging in the Seymour watershed, is currently in the process of selling and transferring their timber licences to Pacific Woodtech. The transfer is currently open to public comment and the province is reviewing whether the transfer is in the public interest. Pacific Woodtech has the choice to not go forward with logging in the Seymour.
The province's 2020 herd census highlighted just how important the Seymour River area is: 90 of the 159 Columbia North caribou counted in the Columbia North caribou census were in ‘the Hub’. The province has committed to protecting caribou and old growth, and yet they continue to allow logging of critical caribou habitat and irreplaceable old growth.
Send the BC Government, Louisiana Pacific, Pacific Woodtech and BC Timber Sales a message: We want protection, not logging, for ancient forests and caribou habitat in the Seymour.
Photo: Patrice Halley