Starting as soon as Monday (June 16), Island Timberlands plans to apply pesticides to kill maple and alder trees on its privately owned lands north of Cliff Gilker Park, near the B&K logging road in Roberts Creek.
The move has some neighbourhood residents crying foul. Brett Heneke lives on Day Road and said trails in the area are heavily used by mountain bikers, trail walkers and horse riders. Gough, Clack and Roberts creeks all pass through cutblocks that will be affected. Island Timberlands manager of community affairs Mackenzie Leine said the pesticide will be delivered through a basal application of glyphosate (sold in stores as Vantage and Roundup) and triclopyr (which also goes by the brand name Release). "It's actually a benign application of herbicide," she said, noting there will be no broadcast spraying involved. All neighbours within 150 metres of the treatment area boundaries were notified in a letter sent out on May 26, meeting the minimum 10-day notification period required. Any water sources identified, such as wells, will be given a 30-metre radius of protection.
The application won't begin until the weather stays dry for a few days, she added.
These are all minimum margins of protection required under the province's 2003 Integrated Pest Management Act, said Dan Bouman, executive director of the Sunshine Coast Conservation Association. The act requires a forestry operator to detail what pesticides they'll use and what areas they will target - not enough information with which to evaluate the possible risks to the ecosystem and to those living nearby, Bouman said.
"The system this new act replaces had provisions in place for a member of the public to appeal to higher bodies," he said. "Now, the public has no right of appeal."
At the June 5 infrastructure services committee meeting, the Sunshine Coast Regional District (SCRD) board passed a motion, put forward by Gibsons director Barry Janyk, that Island Timberlands be requested to find alternatives to using pesticides. The SCRD will also send a letter outlining the SCRD's pesticide policy to Stuart MacPherson, the executive director of the private managed forest land (PMFL), and copy it to the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO). "Essentially, it's a request for alternatives to pesticides to be used," said Roberts Creek director Donna Shugar, who was approached by several residents about the issue.
"We [the SCRD] don't actually have any legal authority over their forestry activity. But this is something the community is opposed to."
Near Roberts Creek, Island Timberlands will manually treat (i.e. use a brush saw) to keep deciduous trees at bay. Leine said there's no reason for concern about any cumulative impact on any of the creeks.
Heneke is concerned about the effect of the pesticides on bear and deer populations whose habitat includes the cutblock and on tailed frogs, a high population of which can be found in Gough Creek. "Ultimately, we'd like to see that land as a protected wildlife corridor," he said. A petition was started on Tuesday by neighbourhood residents, who plan to present it to Island Timberlands before the pesticide program begins.
Nanaimo-based Island Timber-lands is the second largest private timberlands holding in B.C. The company is half owned by Brookfield Asset Management, a Bermuda-based partnership whose board of directors includes business mogul Jimmy Pattison and former New Brunswick premier Frank McKenna.
