Conserving and restoring Coastal Douglas-fir forests
Monitoring, sampling, and action to protect globally rare forest ecosystems.
The Raincoast Land Trust, established in 2023, currently co-owns and manages KELÁ_EKE Kingfisher Forest (45 acres) and S,DÁYES Flycatcher Forest (13 acres) in partnership with the Pender Islands Conservancy on S,DÁYES (Pender Island) in W̱SÁNEĆ Territory. With the acquisition of these protected areas and spending time on the land, we’re now establishing long term monitoring and sampling protocols, developing management plans, and carrying out active restoration.
This year, we focused on ecological baselines. At S,DÁYES Flycatcher Forest, amphibian monitoring boards were installed alongside the wetland to measure salamander and other species diversity. Vegetation monitoring began at both properties along with surveying the Flycatcher meadow. Collecting long-term data informs management moving forward.
Active restoration at KELÁ_EKE Kingfisher Forest involved removing dense patches of invasive reed canary grass and replacing it with native species along the shores of Gardom Pond. We’re also decommissioning the gravel road at KELÁ_EKE Kingfisher Forest to build a basin for a wetland.
With the W̱SÁNEĆ Leadership Council on the ȻENEṈITEL (Working together to restore our lands and culture) project, we conducted soil carbon sampling and training with InnovaTree Carbon Group. This work will determine baseline soil carbon levels pre-restoration and build community capacity for climate-adaptive monitoring that can guide ecological restoration activities on W̱SÁNEĆ lands. We came together with the Salish Sea conservation community to discuss wildfire risk, conservation covenants, and building ecological resilience in Coastal Douglas-fir forests. The outcomes of these initiatives will inform the updating of 2023’s Fire risk reduction in the Coastal Douglas-fir biogeoclimatic zone: A practitioners report.
This is an excerpt from our annual report, Tracking Raincoast into 2025.
You can help
Raincoast’s in-house scientists, collaborating graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and professors make us unique among conservation groups. We work with First Nations, academic institutions, government, and other NGOs to build support and inform decisions that protect aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, and the wildlife that depend on them. We conduct ethically applied, process-oriented, and hypothesis-driven research that has immediate and relevant utility for conservation deliberations and the collective body of scientific knowledge.
We investigate to understand coastal species and processes. We inform by bringing science to decision-makers and communities. We inspire action to protect wildlife and wildlife habitats.
