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The ancient cedar, located near the parking lot of the park, was attacked by poachers last year. The poachers cut 80 per cent of the way through the tree but were unsuccessful in felling it.

 

The tree however was sufficiently damaged that BC Parks staff had to cut the cedar down for safety reasons.

 

After the damaged giant was felled, the cedar poachers returned at their leisure to cut up and haul out most of the tree.  All that remains of the 800 year-old cedar is a stump – nine feet in diameter.

 

The poachers were still removing sections of the cedar in the last couple of weeks.

 

“We are offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to a conviction because someone needs to stand up for BC’s parks and our provincial government clearly isn’t doing the job,” said Gwen Barlee, Policy Director with the Wilderness Committee.

 

 

“With only 10 full-time park rangers for over 1,000 parks and protected areas poachers know there is almost no chance of them being caught.”

 

The management of BC parks has been a hot potato for the provincial government. A series of unpopular measures have been introduced over the last decade including: weakening the Parks Act, changing park boundaries to allow for industrial development, cutting the operating budget, reducing park rangers by over 50 per cent, and axing government-funded park interpretive programs. Since 1999 visits to BC parks have dropped by over 20 per cent – a decline not seen in neighbouring jurisdictions.

 

“Hopefully the reward will result in someone coming forward to the RCMP, and these poachers will answer for this criminal act,” said BCGEU president Darryl Walker. “These kinds of incidents are the unfortunate result of having too few eyes and ears on the ground to protect our public parks.”

 

British Columbia has only 10 full-time permanent park rangers to patrol 1,000 parks and protected areas covering 14,000,000 hectares. In the summer months 87 additional part-time park rangers are hired, but even at the temporarily increased numbers there is just 1 park ranger to patrol 10 provincial parks. Carmanah Walbran Provincial Park is 16,450 hectares in size.

 

Information on the red cedar poaching should be directed to the Lake Cowichan RCMP detachment.