Trestle #18, Myra Canyon Railway
OCTOBER 1-3, FROM SUMMERLAND TO KELOWNA
Selkirk College Forestry Students
Working Together: Integration and Collaboration – The Necessary Ingredients to Achieve Results in Natural Resources Management
Natural resource activities have changed on the land base of British Columbia as a result of both physical (climate) and social pressures. The increase in forest fires has resulted in a renewed awareness of the importance of protecting communities and the values that we as society deem important. The other change agents are the recognition of the need to incorporate integration and collaboration into the activities that occur on these same lands as well as the interest the general public has in ensuring that the values that they deem important are managed and protected.
“Working Together” is the theme of this year’s Fall Field Tour, and we’ve chosen sites to visit where collaboration is a necessary ingredient to achieve the desired results in natural resource management.
We will see how the planning of the Forest Enhancement Society for harvesting for wildfire mitigation has provided steps in the journey of integration of First Nation values, how changes in harvesting and planting practices can achieve multiple objectives, and how interface wildfire has led to a change in social license, to allow timber harvesting to occur where it was previously viewed as a negative practice.
On the tour we will see how innovative silviculture practices, post wildfire, were used to reforest areas in the dry fir belt of the Okanagan. One of the sites will foster discussion of the results of planning and planting 15 years after the Okanagan Mountain wildfire. At another we’ll see how mechanical mulching was used to manage regeneration in stands with ~one million stems/hectare.
We will look at the integration of recreation values with forest practices in the Okanagan where tourist visits are typically over 4 million. We’ll see the site where the first targeted grazing in the province will occur to reduce the risk of wildfire near an area of Kelowna near a golf course and associated subdivision.
All this … and more! Come join your colleagues on a field tour that will change your ideas and perspectives on the way you do your work!