Woodlot Salvage Permit Policy and the Effects on Managing Forest Health

In July 2007, a woodlot licensee in the Central Cariboo Forest District (the complainant) filed a complaint with the Forest Practices Board saying that a recent change in the Ministry of Forests and Range’s policy on issuing salvage permits would create a forest health risk on his woodlot.

The complainant has a woodlot licence on Crown land adjacent to his private land parcel. The forest in the woodlot is dominated by Douglas fir, with small amounts of lodgepole pine and spruce. As with many of the Douglas fir stands in the interior, the stands in the woodlot licence have a high degree of bark beetle infestation. The beetle bores into the bark, and heavy infestations can kill the tree. Trees that are weakened by drought, disease or other agents are more susceptible to bark beetle attack and are therefore more likely to facilitate the spread of the infestation.