u/Vanisle-

69.9 hectares (15.4%) of an Old-Growth Management Area near Sayward, BC was deleted last year to allow logging, as a cutblock known as “#40310”. Public comment is currently open on this cutblock. This cutblock was taken from one of the largest OGMAs in the region. The photos in this post are from the new proposed cutblock. The only public notice was an ad in the local newspaper.

Replacement areas are proposed, but that specific data isn’t public yet. Only the deletion shows on iMapBC. Either way, splitting one of the region’s largest OGMAs into smaller, disconnected pieces isn’t the same as leaving it intact. Large, contiguous old-growth supports interior habitat that fragments just can’t replicate.

On the “rotten” trees in this block: the yellow cedar here have mostly hollowed out with age, and that’s completely normal for the species. Heart rot doesn’t kill the tree, it just makes the wood less commercially valuable. Fungi break down the dead core while the tree keeps living off its sapwood. Some of the nutrients from the core get reabsorbed by the tree itself, while more get released into the forest floor over time as the tree ages, drops material, and eventually falls.

The oldest confirmed yellow cedar sample is 1,834 rings. Some researchers suspect certain giant yellow cedars in undisturbed old-growth stands in coastal temperate rainforests could be over 4,000 years old, though it may never be provable, since the same hollowing that lets these trees keep living also destroys the rings that would confirm their age.

That hollowing also creates cavity habitat, including for the Vancouver Island pygmy owl we heard in this proposed cutblock, a blue-listed species already declining from habitat loss.

Comments on FOM #40310 are open until August 20, 2026:

- Email FOM-MID@westernforest.com
- IMPORTANT: Include “FOM #40310” in your comment
- Comments are reviewed and forwarded to the Ministry of Forests, so they actually do matter
- A specific comment carries much more weight than a generic one. Consider mentioning the habitat, the connectivity, the minimal public notice for the OGMA deletion, whatever actually stood out to you, rather than something generic like “stop old-growth logging”
- Full FOM details: here

This block is one of several in Western Forest Product’s latest FOM (Forest Operation Map). Cutblock Watch by 4 the Love of BC is a useful tool if you want to track BC harvest proposals more broadly.

Missed the deadline? Consider contacting BC’s Minister of Forests, Ravi Parmar. OGMA notification standards are very much worth raising with his office or your local MLA. My personal take is that these proposed OGMA amendments should be modernized and posted online…

Western Forest Products has a new Forest Operations Map currently open for comment for mid-Vancouver Island, and cutblock 30027 in particular is highly concerning. It’s the largest proposed old-growth block in the FOM - a stand of old-growth yellow cedar, western hemlock, and balsam fir sitting around 1100m elevation that took many centuries to grow. As you can see in photos, this is an old-growth oasis in a sea of cutblocks and tree plantations. This is near the boundary of Schoen Lake Provincial Park.

Other than the size of the block, a couple other things make this one worth flagging:

- It’s slow growing, effectively non-renewable. At 1100m elevation, especially with yellow cedar in the mix, this forest has taken centuries or even millennia to reach what’s there now. It’s very slow growing. Log it and you’re not getting anything comparable back in many hundreds of years.
- It’s on a steep slope, with real erosion risk. The terrain here is very steep, which makes logging here risky. The last photo in this post is of a landslide from a nearby clearcut on similar terrain, so you can see what can happen when slopes like this lose their root structure. Landslides bury salmon spawning gravel in sediment and debris, and they strip away topsoil - so even after the debris settles, the exposed ground is left far less fertile - making it much harder for a forest to regenerate on that slope compared to a normal clearcut.

Worth noting: this isn’t the only old-growth on the chopping block in this FOM. It appears that cutblocks 30803, 22291, and 11531 are also proposed to harvest old-growth, at a smaller scale than 30027 but still worth knowing about if you’re commenting.

The comment period closes in 4 days. If you miss the deadline, it doesn’t hurt to send a message regardless. If you want to weigh in:

- View the FOM maps: https://www.westernforest.com/company/sustainability/planning-and-practices/fom-mid-island/
- Email comments to: FOM-PMQ@westernforest.com

Western Forest Products has a new Forest Operations Map currently open for comment for mid-Vancouver Island, and cutblock 30027 in particular is highly concerning. It’s the largest proposed old-growth block in the FOM - a stand of old-growth yellow cedar, western hemlock, and balsam fir sitting around 1100m elevation that took many centuries to grow. As you can see in photos, this is an old-growth oasis in a sea of cutblocks and tree plantations.

Other than the size of the block, a couple other things make this one worth flagging:

- It’s slow growing, effectively non-renewable. At 1100m elevation, especially with yellow cedar in the mix, this forest has taken centuries or even millennia to reach what’s there now. It’s very slow growing. Log it and you’re not getting anything comparable back in many hundreds of years.
- It’s on a steep slope, with real erosion risk. The terrain here is very steep, which makes logging here risky. The last photo in this post is of a landslide from a nearby clearcut on similar terrain, so you can see what can happen when slopes like this lose their root structure. Landslides bury salmon spawning gravel in sediment and debris, and they strip away topsoil - so even after the debris settles, the exposed ground is left far less fertile - making it much harder for a forest to regenerate on that slope compared to a normal clearcut.

Worth noting: this isn’t the only old-growth on the chopping block in this FOM. It appears that cutblocks 30803, 22291, and 11531 are also proposed to harvest old-growth, at a smaller scale than 30027 but still worth knowing about if you’re commenting.

The comment period closes in 4 days. If you miss the deadline, it doesn’t hurt to send a message regardless. If you want to weigh in:

- View the FOM maps: https://www.westernforest.com/company/sustainability/planning-and-practices/fom-mid-island/
- Email comments to: FOM-PMQ@westernforest.com

I’ve been documenting old-growth rainforests on Vancouver Island’s northeast coast for the past year, and what happened to this ancient forest on Mt. Roberts hit me harder than I expected.

This was the former hiking route up Mt. Roberts in the Prince of Wales Range, near Campbell River. The route took you through some of the most beautiful old-growth temperate rainforest I’ve ever seen - centuries-old yellow cedar and hemlock, absolutely covered in so many varieties of wildflowers - it was the kind of forest that feels genuinely ancient the moment you step into it. It was growing undisturbed for centuries - likely even millennia.

A few weeks ago, most of it was logged.

What broke my heart most were the twin yellow cedars featured in these photos - two massive trees that had stood together for centuries, gone in an instant. This is part of one of the rarest ecosystems on Earth, and over 80% of Vancouver Island’s productive old-growth is already gone. What was logged here was part of what little remains.

What makes this worse is that this isn’t over. Thirteen additional cutblocks are proposed on the north slope of H’Kusam in the same mountain range, which is one of the largest tracts of intact rainforest left on the island’s east coast. Active old-growth logging is already underway nearby on the infamous Mt. H’Kusam trail. And a road is being planned 55 metres upslope above General Buxton (the 4th largest yellow cedar in BC by volume) putting it at direct risk of slides and windthrow.

I’m documenting all that I can. If you want to follow along, follow my Instagram @ancientcoast.bc.

If this concerns you, BC Minister of Forests Ravi Parmar can be contacted here: FOR.Minister@gov.bc.ca

For British Columbia residents, contacting your MLA as well is even better.

For more information on the 13 proposed old-growth cutblocks, see this Reddit post.