At almost any time during each year we have multiple activities going on. As well, there are various issues that we are either involved in, or monitor since they affect us on Bowen Island.
- Marine Atlas Project
- Nature Reserve management
- Speaker Series
- Public events
- Work parties, trails and rehabilition work
- Monitoring the herons on the Island
- Past projects
Marine Atlas Project
In January 2019 the Bowen Island Conservancy and its partners launched a project to publish a Bowen/Nexwlélexm Marine Conservation Atlas to foster public awareness of, and engagement in, local marine conservation issues, and to celebrate the recovery of our marine neighbourhood. We published the Atlas in the Spring of 2020 and it has become a valuable resource for the community.
Nature Reserve Management
We manage two Nature Reserves on the Island, on behalf of the Islands Trust Conservancy. We conduct improvement and restoration activities, including maintaining and upgrading trails, and planting new trees where appropriate. We also monitor the Nature Reserves to ensure that they remain undisturbed and that the ongoing health of the local eco-system is maintained.
Two Nature Reserves that we currently manage are Singing Woods and Fairy Fen.
If you take your dog to a Nature Reserve
We want all of our visitors to enjoy themselves as much as possible when they are in our beautiful Nature Reserves. We hope and expect that dog owners will maintain control over their dogs at all times, and keep them in view. One of our Board members has been bitten by an off-leash dog in Singing Woods, and jumped upon by an off-leash dog on the way to Fairy Fen. We do not wish to see this kind of occurrence in the future.
Please note that dogs are not permitted at all in the Wild Coast Nature Refuge.
Speaker Series
Each year we put together a “Speaker Series” where we arrange presentations on a variety of conservation-related topics, featuring informative speakers from on and off the Island. These sessions are very well-attended and generally run from September to April each year.
Our past presentations include:
- The Howe Sound UNESCO Biosphere Region Initiative
- A tour and presentation at the Terminal Creek Salmon Hatchery presentation and tour
- A screening of the Great Howe Sound Recovery films
- The Squamish River Watershed Society
- The Green Shores Initiative
- The 2015 UN Climate Change Conference
Public events
We periodically hold public events such as our outing to Apodaca Provincial Park in September 2012.
Work parties, trail building, and rehabilitation work
Making selected wild areas accessible enough so that people can experience them and learn about unique Bowen eco-systems is a hands-on task often involving tools and perspiration! Periodic maintenance is a must. We welcome volunteers for any and all of these projects! We will post information related to work parties as they arise.
Conservation Covenants
We are sometimes involved with establishing Conservation Covenants to protect the natural environment of the Island. A Conservation Covenant is a voluntary agreement to conserve land or special nature features. It represents an agreement between a land owner and another organization or group of organizations that act on behalf of the community. We are able to provide advice and insight into the process of placing a Covenant, and we usually involve the Islands Trust Fund in the process. Some lands may be available for hiking or personal enjoyment, while other lands may need to be protected in order to preserve their unique features.
Why do we care about herons?
The Great Blue Heron is a very large bird, growing to over one metre in height. It has blue-grey body feathers, a white head, a yellow bill and a black stripe above each eye. We have a number of heron nests on Bowen Island and it’s important that they be left alone and quiet. Great Blue Herons, their nests and their eggs, are all protected by the BC Wildlife Act, and by the federal Migratory Birds Convention Act. Their nest trees are also protected year round, on both public and private land. […]
Past projects
We were involved with:
- The development of Headwaters Park, in 2009;
- The building of the Quarry Park Stone Circle moss garden, in 2009
- Forage Fish protection from 2014 to 2016: In 2014, Conservancy members formed an Island team to conduct periodic surveys of select Bowen beaches to test for forage fish eggs. This project continued until December 2016, when we turned over further sampling surveys to the Sea Watch Society. Up to the end of 2016 no eggs had been found. There are several possible explanations for this:
- Forage fish do not spawn on Bowen Island beaches (and we don’t know why), or
- We’ve been looking in the wrong places on the selected beaches, or
- We’ve missed eggs during collection of samples, or
- Something else.