Thu, 4 Jan 2024
Tags: News

Double the Impact

Photo by Habitat Acquisition Trust

Every year HCTF invests millions into fish and wildlife projects to advance conservation in BC. However, that’s not the only way our funds are having an impact.

In 2018, HCTF began a process to transition all the funds we had invested in financial markets into Responsible Investing portfolios. Responsible Investing is a practice to incorporate environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors into investment decisions.

HCTF currently has over $35 million invested in Responsible Investing portfolios. This includes a number of endowments, as well as funds from short- and medium-term programs where cash is not needed by proponents (project partners) in the current year. HCTF invests these funds in order to obtain a higher return than bank account interest, so more money can go to fish and wildlife projects.

Photo by Amanda Irvine

While funds are invested, they are working to achieve several goals set out by HCTF; these include efforts to reduce carbon emissions and assist in the transition to a low carbon economy. Upon the initial transition to Responsible Investing, HCTF set a goal to achieve carbon intensity that was consistently lower than the benchmark, with a target of 70% below benchmark by the end of year 3. We are proud to report that we have achieved this goal and will continue to maintain or exceed this target. HCTF recognizes that climate change is one of the leading threats to fish, wildlife and their habitats in BC. Designing our financial portfolios to address this threat aligns with our efforts to mitigate climate change through the enhancement and restoration projects we approve each year.

HCTF also utilizes a number of screens to help us select which companies to invest in. We actively screen out companies that are having negative impacts on the environment or biodiversity. Beginning in 2023, another screen was added which factors in companies’ relationships with Indigenous communities; those companies that have known conflicts with Indigenous communities are screened out. HCTF is taking steps to advance reconciliation however we can, including integrating this value across our business decisions.

Photo by Chu Cho Environmental LLP

In addition to screening out companies which may be doing harm, we actively screen in companies who are having a positive impact. This is commonly referred to as Impact Investing. A minimum of 10% of our portfolios are classified as Impact investments, with a target of 20%.

We are doing all of this while still achieving financial returns that exceed benchmarks, ensuring there is sufficient income generated to fund our conservation programs. Through this strategy, funds that are invested in financial markets and funds invested in on-the-ground conservation work are both having a positive impact on fish, wildlife, and their habitats in BC.

For more details regarding HCTF Responsible Investment practices, visit our website at https://hctf.ca/about/responsible-investing-initiative/

 

 

Thu, 5 Oct 2023
Tags: Education / scholarship / t4w / together for wildlife

2023 Together for Wildlife Scholarship Recipients Announced

HCTF in partnership with the First Nations-B.C. Wildlife & Habitat Conservation Forum and the Province of British Columbia’s Together for Wildlife Initiative (T4W) are proud to announce the recipients for the 2023 Together for Wildlife academic scholarships; Alexia Constantinou, Harry Yiduo Zhang, Jamie Clarke, Jeffrey Nishima-Miller, Julia Bizon, Lindsay Whitehead, Megan Winand, Persia Khan, Tyler Jessen, and Westin Cryke.

The Together for Wildlife scholarship is awarded annually to 10 master’s and Ph.D. candidates conducting research that will have a positive impact on stewardship, management, policy, or decision-making of wildlife in BC. The aim of this scholarship is to support reconciliation and collaboration, diversity of perspectives, and building community among Indigenous communities and rural areas of BC.

More Info

2023 Recipients

Alexia Constantinou

Alexia is a Ph.D. student at the University of Victoria working under the supervision of Dr. Jason Fisher, sponsored by Dr. Joanna Burgar at the Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship. Her research focuses on British Columbia’s southern interior fisher population, its decline, and ways to improve fisher habitat by working with First Nations and industry.

More About Alexia

Harry Yiduo Zhang

Harry (Yiduo) Zhang is a Ph.D. candidate of Earth and Environmental Science at the University of British Columbia, Okanagan Campus. He is a member of the Complex Environmental System Lab under the supervision of Dr. Lael Parrott. His research interest is to apply GIS and model simulation to solve practical environmental management problems in complex socio-environmental systems.

More About Harry

Jamie Clarke

Jamie Clarke (she/her) is a master’s student at the University of Victoria, working under the supervision of Dr. Jason Fisher and in collaboration with Holger Bohm, BC’s Ungulate Specialist. Jamie will be testing different camera trap density models and comparing them to aerial ungulate surveys – an industry-standard, but imperfect, survey method.

More About Jamie

Jeffrey Nishima-Miller

Jeff Nishima-Miller is a PhD Candidate at the University of British Columbia’s Okanagan campus. Jeff works out of UBC Okanagan’s Centre for Environmental Assessment Research under the supervision of Dr. Kevin Hanna. Jeff’s research focuses on conservation planning, including setting population objectives, conservation goals, and management action design.

More About Jeffrey

Julia Bizon

Julia Bizon is an MSc student at the University of Northern British Columbia in Prince George working under the supervision of Dr. Samuel Bartels. T4W funds will be used to support research for her thesis “Ecosystem Memory and Ecological Restoration of Wildlife Forage and Understory Diversity in a Young Pine Monoculture Plantation in Central-Interior BC”. Julia’s research focuses on the response of forest understory vegetation to a suite of restoration treatments involving stand-thinning and artificial canopy gaps.

More About Julia

Lindsay Whitehead

Lindsay is a master’s student at Thompson Rivers University, working under the supervision of Dr. Karl Larsen. Her research focuses on understanding the impact of natural disturbances, particularly wildfires, on the Western rattlesnake population—a blue-listed and threatened species at risk.

More About Lindsay

Megan Winand

Megan Winand is an MSc student at the University of British Columbia under supervisor Dr. Tara Martin, focusing her studies on wetlands, amphibians, and reptiles. Megan is studying the effects of mitigation translocation on Columbian spotted frogs.

More About Megan

Persia Khan

Persia Khan (she/her) is an MSc student in the Applied Conservation Science Lab at the University of Victoria and works with the Heiltsuk Integrated Resource Management Department (HIRMD) and the Raincoast Conservation Foundation. Persia holds a BSc Honours in Geography from the University of Victoria, and is excited to continue her research in coastal systems and wildlife ecology.

More About Persia

Tyler Jessen

Tyler is a PhD student at the University of Victoria. His thesis aims to advance knowledge on the causes and consequences of climate change on the BC coast, while also providing data that are critical to the successful management of coastal mountain goats, grizzly bears, and black bears.

More About Tyler

Westin Cryke

Westin is a MSc student at the University of Northern BC. His research examines the impacts roads, namely the Jade Boulder Road has on Stone’s sheep, a species with a restricted range and that migrates seasonally.

More About Westin

If you or someone you know may be interested in applying for the Al Martin HCTF Conservation Scholarship, check out the following links:

Background

Apply Now

Wed, 4 Oct 2023
Tags: Education / scholarship

2023 Al Martin HCTF Conservation Fellowship Recipients Announced

The Habitat Conservation Trust Foundation and HCTF Education are pleased to announce this year’s Al Martin Conservation Fellowship recipients: Alessandro Freeman, Oliver Holt, and Zachary Sherker.

The Al Martin Conservation Fellowship recognizes Graduate students wishing to pursue a career in fish or wildlife conservation and management in BC. The recipients receive a scholarship of $10,000 to help fund their graduate research.

Named for Al Martin, a titan in the conservation community. Al had a long and illustrious career starting back in 1977 as a biologist in Penticton BC. After a decade of working as a fisheries biologist, he moved to Victoria to take on several senior positions Manager of Fisheries, Director of the Watershed Restoration Program, Director of the Fish and Wildlife Branch, Executive Director, and Assistant Deputy Minister of the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries.

Al retired after a 30-year-long career in BC public service but continued to be a leader in the conservation community, becoming the Director of Strategic Initiatives for the BC Wildlife Federation and a board member for HCTF. Al sadly passed away in October of 2019 but his impact has lived on thanks to his integrity, humour, and passion for conserving fish and wildlife habitats for future generations.

More About Al

2023 Recipients:

Alessandro Freeman

Alessandro Freeman is a M.Sc. student of Ecological Restoration at Simon Fraser University and the British Columbia Institute of Technology under the supervision of Dr. Douglas Ransome. Alessandro’s research project titled “Determining the Accuracy of the BRAT Model for Identifying North American Beaver (Castor Canadensis) Habitat in Central Interior British Columbia” is assessing the Beaver Restoration Assessment Tool (BRAT) – a GIS-based model developed in Utah, and its ability to accurately determine watercourses of high and low quality for potential damming by beavers to create wetlands.

More About Alessandro

Oliver Holt

Oliver is pursuing a lifelong dream of achieving a Master’s of Science from the University of Northern British Columbia. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Forestry from the University of British Columbia and has worked extensively in the forestry industry. Oliver’s research is focused on bringing to light the uncertain future of northern mountain caribou.

More About Oliver

Zachary Sherker

Zachary is a Ph.D. student at the University of British Columbia working with Dr. Scott Hinch. His research focuses on the impacts of floodgates on juvenile Pacific salmon habitat access. This research will be used to improve passage by synchronizing automated floodgate operations with the timing of fish movements and will provide concrete evidence for the need to replace aging floodgates and reintroduce imperiled salmon populations to their historic habitat.

More About Zachary

If you or someone you know may be interested in applying for the Al Martin HCTF Conservation Scholarship, check out the following links:

Applicant Info Apply Online

HCTF Scholarship Program

Wed, 4 Oct 2023
Tags: Caribou / caribou habitat restoration fund / chrf / News

Project Profile & Lessons Learned: Goldway Road Restoration

Goldway Road Restoration - Chu Cho Environmental LLP

In 2018 Chu Cho Environmental identified several candidate roadways for restoration within the Chase caribou herd range with input from forest licensees, caribou biologists, and Tsay Keh Dene Nation. In total, Chu Cho Environmental and Tsay Keh Dene Nation have now completed restoration work on 3 roads within the Chase caribou herd boundary since 2019. Collectively, these projects have been a part of the larger Chase Caribou Road Restoration Program (CCRRP), with the Goldway road being the most recent restoration project.

Planted Seedling – Chu Cho Environmental LLP

Sean Rapai of Chu Cho Environmental shares the challenges and lessons learned on this project including those around permitting, post-treatment monitoring and longer-term considerations.

Permitting: The historical presence of anadromous salmon in Johanson Creek, combined with the presence of bull trout and steelhead trout impacted the window for fording Johanson Creek with an excavator. It was necessary to submit an application to Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) with the proposed plan and timing window of the work. The Letter of Advice was eventually secured which indicated work could proceed as planned. Best practices were outlined as well as recommendations for the fording process. This proved challenging, but the project did receive approval from DFO.

Monitoring: Ecological restoration treatments could take five or more years to begin to show results. With monitoring, we are attempting to answer a long-term set of questions and return to the site in the years immediately following restoration. Monitoring can be very costly as assessing control treatments is often restricted to the use of a helicopter. Chu Cho Environmental investigated the feasibility of using remotely piloted aircrafts (drones) as a more cost-effective method of monitoring restored areas in the short-term. This method was explored for monitoring remote roadways and restored areas.

Drone-based monitoring: Based on recommendations from 2021, Chu Cho Environmental deployed drone-based remote-sensing surveys to monitor vegetation using derived NDVI indices. Data was collected to a resolution of 1 m2 and can be paired with future surveys to track vegetation establishment and growth along large stretches of the road. While the use of a drone as a monitoring tool in this restoration program is in the preliminary stages, the ease of data collection and results suggest this is a viable means of evaluating vegetation indices on pre and post restoration roadways.

Stability of ecological restoration treatments: Year one monitoring of the ecological restoration techniques used in the project showed strong persistence of these treatments. The rough-and-loose soil contouring was stable, intact, and holding water, and planted seedlings had a high survival rate.

Recontouring inhibits human access: Areas recontoured with the rough-and-loose treatment had the least evidence of use by humans, including those on horseback. Aggressive recontouring of roads at strategic locations may be considered a viable tool to discourage trail usage and eliminate all-terrain vehicle use.

Snow alters access by motorized vehicles: Snowmobile use of the road was observed when the snow had accumulated above restoration efforts (i.e., above height of felled trees and mounds). While the effect of such anthropogenic use has yet to be studied here, considerations may be required for future restoration efforts or access management restrictions on snowmobile use.

Functional restoration: Felled trees were intact, and it was observed that larger diameter trees felled from steep cut banks created better movement barriers. Conversely, smaller diameter trees felled for functional restoration did not provide as good of a visual and physical barrier and is suggested that when small diameter trees are the only available source, they are felled in stacks. High survival of planted seedlings, following mechanical site preparation, suggests that tree planting is likely to provide visual screening over the long term, and may represent a more effective long term means of functionally restoring these roadways.

The Goldway road lies within the range of the Chase caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) herd, which is considered by the federal government of Canada to be part of the Northern group of the Southern Mountain population of Woodland caribou. This herd is listed as threatened on Schedule 1 of the Species At Risk Act (SARA).

Tue, 19 Sep 2023
Tags: F&W / Fish & Wildlife / News

Additional Funding Available for Marbled Murrelet and Northern Goshawk Projects

Marbled Murrelet near south Vancouver Island. Photo by Jenna Cragg.

Ongoing efforts to help two threatened birds in B.C. will get a lift this year. The Province of B.C. has dedicated $257,000 towards projects that support the Northern Goshawk, laingi subspecies (“NOGO”) and the Marbled Murrelet (“MAMU”), to be administered by HCTF.

Proposals are to be submitted through the regular Fish & Wildlife (formerly Enhancement & Restoration) Grant SurveyApply application process. They will then be evaluated according to their alignment with either the NOGO or MAMU Implementation Plans and their respective Implementation Actions – see Actions and Performance Measures tables:

Marbled Murrelet Implementation Plan
Northern Goshawk Implementation Plan

The application deadline for Fish & Wildlife Grants is Friday, November 3, 2023, at 4:30pm PDT. Intake is now open!

For questions regarding the NOGO/MAMU funding or Fish & Wildlife Grants, please contact HCTF’s Grants Officer Amy Perkins at amy.perkins@hctf.ca or 250-940-3014.

Adult male goshawk captured in the Squamish area. Photo by Melanie Wilson.

Wed, 6 Sep 2023
Tags: Habitat Acquisition / News

Morrison Creek Headwaters acquisition ensures protection of rare fish species

A lily pond in the Morrison Creek Headwaters - photo from Comox Valley Land Trust

The Comox Valley Land Trust (CVLT), in collaboration with the BC Parks Foundation, recently announced the acquisition of 275ha of land to create the Morrison Headwaters conservation area on Vancouver Island.

Located near the Village of Cumberland in the Comox Valley Regional District and within the traditional territory of the K’ómoks First Nation, this project acquired nearly all the unprotected land in the headwaters of the watershed.

A Morrison Creek Lamprey – photo from Comox Valley Land Trust

The streams of the creek provide spawning and rearing habitat for an abundant run of Coho salmon, occasional spawning of Pink and Chum salmon, and habitat for several trout species such as Rainbow, Cutthroat, and Dolly Varden. Perhaps most notable though is that Morrison Creek and its tributary streams are Critical Habitat for the Morrison Creek Lamprey, a rare form of Western Brook Lamprey. The Morrison Creek Lamprey is listed as Endangered on the Species-At-Risk schedule 1 as it exists only in Morrison Creek, and the headwaters area now protects the vast majority of its habitat.

“The acquisition of the Morrison Creek headwaters by the Comox Valley Land Trust (CVLT) and BC Parks Foundation (BCPF) with the support of HCTF is a remarkable achievement that significantly advances conservation in regionally and globally significant ways. At 680-acres, the headwaters of Morrison Creek includes a complex of riparian areas, streams, springs and wetlands along with associated upland forests,” says Tim Ennis, Executive Director of the CVLT.

Morrison Creek – photo from Comox Valley Land Trust

“The somewhat overlooked area nestled between the City of Courtenay and Village of Cumberland is an important refugium for wildlife of all kinds, from bears and cougar to deer, birds, butterflies, bats, amphibians and reptiles. The land is now protected forever as a conservation area.”

Since 1981, HCTF has helped secure valuable habitat in British Columbia through conservation land acquisitions. With incredible biological diversity, B.C. is home to more vertebrates than any other province in Canada and over 600 ecosystem types; acquisition of conservation lands like the Morrison Headwaters is an effective, though difficult, means of protecting fish, wildlife, and their habitats.

The Comox Valley Land Trust formed in 1999 to promote, protect, conserve, and restore the land, waters, and habitat of the Comox Valley. It now protects approximately 600 hectares of ecological significance.

This project was made possible through the partnership of the Comox Valley Land Trust and BC Parks Foundation, with funding from Environment and Climate Change Canada, Sitka Foundation, the Habitat Conservation Trust Foundation, the Pacific Salmon Foundation, the Courtenay Fish and Game Protective Association, B.C. Hydro’s Fish & wildlife Compensation Program, and over $500,000 from other individuals and organizations through a fundraiser.