25 proud years of effort and accomplishments in protecting Vancouver Islands remarkable natural forests.

Since 1988, members of Carmanah Forestry Society, (CFS), have explored, developed and maintained trails in significant forests and wilderness areas throughout Southern Vancouver Island. Almost immediately we became involved in forest planning and adopted the mission to educate the public, decision makers and industry of the need to reform forestry practices, protect future tourism and recreation areas and most important: to ensure that extirpation and the extinctions of species would not take place through logging of critical habitat.

CFS has consciously chosen to remain small and local and provides effective services to the community without the huge overhead or infrastructure that plague larger groups. Our mandate has been to provide safe, easy access to the giant trees and spectacular rainforests within this natural wonderland, coupled with well-researched opinion and science as to why these specific areas need protection. We have produced a wonderful access map but also have collaborated with industry to mitigate or minimize damage in cases where a “win” was impossible. The “selective logging sites” at Hadikin Lake and East Walbran/Botley Ridge are areas where some logging has taken place, (sometimes more than we wanted), but varying amounts of primeval forest were maintained. Ideally, in the future, these areas will provide a forest laboratory, to scientifically measure and to provide insight into what level of selective logging still allows for species habitat to function.

The Recent Issues and Events page is designed to be a community calendar and notice board as well as a summary of significant issues, announcements and changes that affect forestry and land usage on Vancouver Island.

The CFS History and Accomplishments page covers highlights of our involvement, participation and growth as well as highlighting victories and losses.

The CFS Campaigns page presents ongoing issues and areas of extreme concern that we wish to influence, from land-use status through to forest policy, governance and the administration of our natural forests and resources.

Our Official Complaints page accesses various complaints that CFS and other Conservation Groups have filed against plans, policies or individuals as well as a history of our activity in this area. This will not include our detailed input into Forest Development Plans, but will archive past issues so as to demonstrate the lawlessness and lack of enforcement of forestry in British Columbia.

Our Legal Decisions page will provide the reader with noteworthy legal cases that CFS and other groups have taken as well as their success. In many cases important legal documents will be posted or linked. Our recent victory involving the Supreme Court at Cathedral Grove and many other legal cases describing the lack of “species at risk” protection are documented in their original legal text with an accompanying opinion piece.

Our Government Policy Problems page describes how pro-industry provincial policies prevent good environmental steward. We trace the history of enforceability and the de-regulation attitude of government and how it allows industry to treat public forests as their own, with the minimum of interference. The failure of the NDP and now the Liberals in protecting conservation and environmental interests as well as the introduction of Professional Reliance, Arbitrary Caps, Timber Targets, Privitization, and other initiatives is discussed.

Our Photo Gallery will provide you with a collage of wonderful photos of nature and our efforts as well as the effects of logging from both the land and air. Click on the “cyber tour” to enjoy a slide show for a few minutes.

How You Can Help provides an entry point into volunteering, or providing other means of support. It also describes actions you can take to affect land use and forest practice decisions and policy making. This includes our popular “Trailbuilding” as well as in-town or cyber efforts that assist in developing campaigns and protecting nature. We are at a turning point and need skilled and motivated volunteers to help us implement programs, to build issues, research and be effective at protecting those animals, plants and creatures that have no defense against the industrial development processes.

Our Trailbuilding and Exploring page details CFS’s trailbuilding accomplishments over the past decade and a half as well as our present needs. It will also provide descriptions of how you might become directly involved in helping to make the jungles of Vancouver Island more accessible. Expectations, our purpose and areas of safety will be clearly articulated. Individuals, school and other groups are welcome to entertain the possibility of adopting and maintaining rainforest trails as partners with CFS. This bonding with the land creates a deep understanding, experience and appreciation of nature that follows participants throughout their lives.

Our Rainforest Tours page will provide you with some sample tours, planning needs as well as contact information should you wish to attend one of our regularly scheduled tours or create a custom tour adventure for your family or group. It will also provide you with a realistic description of the levels of difficulty and physical requirements when venturing into the wilderness. These tours have provided thousands with a first glimpse of a primeval forest and helped to solidify a conservation ethic. We deal with nature and forests on the ground, locally, and compliment the larger environmental corporations.

Our VI Maps page will provide you with a history of Vancouver Island’s problems as well as a series of tools to explain our campaigns in graphic detail. Satellite Images and logging planning maps will be used to support and demonstrate our ideas and opinions.

Maxine’s Tree is a beautifully illustrated children’s book, which demonstrates how one little girl’s effort can influence the world. This book was the topic of censorship by the forest union of the day, the IWA, and the amusing story of how this conflict over a child’s book resolved is documented. You can also purchase copies of this book.

The Access Maps page provides you with free downloadable pages of areas that we are working in, as well as the opportunity to purchase our excellent South and Central Vancouver Island Recreation Map.

The Links page will provide you with a host of excellent environmental conservation pages of groups across the province and world engaging in similar problems or directly working at protecting the heritage of BC and other Natural Forests.