On November 26, 2002, a hunter submitted a complaint to the Board that wildlife is not adequately considered when the district manager approves grazing on Crown land, and that the district’s enforcement of cattle trespass is ineffective. As well, the complainant is concerned about how fencing affects wildlife and hunting.
The Fraser Headwaters Alliance (the complainant) complained to the Forest Practices Board about a plan to harvest trees to reduce the threat of mountain pine beetle in the Horsey Creek to Small River area of the Rocky Mountain Trench, about 50 kilometers southeast of McBride.
The complaint is about forest development near the south end of Bonaparte Lake, 65 kilometres northwest of Kamloops. An individual complained to the Board that logging and road building is contaminating drinking water, harming fish habitat and reducing water availability during drought periods. The complainant is also concerned that logging is harming biodiversity and damaging moose habitat.
The complaint issues are broad and potentially involve two forest districts and four forest companies. The Board therefore focused the investigation on what the complainant said was the most important issue – the management of water resources at the southwest end of Bonaparte Lake.
The Forest Practices Board has completed an assessment of the health of riparian areas subject to cattle grazing on Crown land across four forest districts in the southern half of British Columbia. Ten indicators of riparian health, or proper functioning condition, were measured at 391 sites in Cranbrook, Kamloops, Horsefly and Penticton districts. Half of the sites were on streams and half on wetlands and lakes.
Cattle lightly use the majority of riparian areas. Approximately 12 percent of riparian areas are heavily used based on our estimates of forage utilization. Overall, 71 percent of the sites are at proper functioning condition, 16 percent are functional at risk and 13 percent are non-functional. Significant differences were found between districts, with the percentage of sites at proper functioning condition ranging from 49 percent to 97 percent. The largest proportion of sites at proper functioning condition occurred in the moister biogeoclimatic zones, while the drier zones had the greatest proportion of nonfunctional sites. Riparian health scores and faecal counts in riparian areas were better in community watersheds than elsewhere. Individual pasture management was found to be a significant factor in maintaining riparian health.
In November 2001, the Freeman Brook Community Waterworks Association submitted a complaint about the control of cattle around several small streams near Freeman Brook, northwest of Salmon Arm. The complainant claimed there were multiple contraventions of the range use plan by Grouse Creek Ranch (the licensee). The complainaint also asserted that the Ministry of Forests (MOF) didn’t enforce the requirements of the range use plan. The Board decided to investigate whether the grazing and range practices complied with the Forest Practices Code of British Columbia Act and regulations, and whether the requirements of the range use plan were enforced by MOF.
