30% OF PARK’S TREES GOING, GOING, GONE
Risk to humans, infrastructure and wildfire danger cited

by Nate Lewis
(click images to enlarge)

The park board is currently in the process of removing approximately 30 per cent of the trees in Stanley Park.

“In the last few months we’ve been working with a forestry contractor to remove dead and dry trees to support safety in and around the park,” said Joe McLeod, the park board’s manager of urban forestry.

It’s because of the hemlock looper moth outbreak, which started on the North Shore in 2019, and has been impacting Stanley Park for four years. These infestations — which primarily target and kill hemlock trees — usually last for two years. However, due to various climate factors, including warmer winter and spring conditions, the outbreak has lasted longer than expected.

The map above breaks down sections of Stanley Park’s forest by severity of impact from the hemlock looper infestation. While the red areas have the highest proportion of looper impacted trees, they are not necessarily the highest risk areas, the Blackwell report notes. Areas with dead trees close to people and/or park infrastructure, such as the causeway, are considered the highest risk and were prioritized for removal. (B.A. Blackwell and Associates)

The contractor, B.A. Blackwell and Associates, is a forestry consultant company based in North Vancouver. The park board recently released Blackwell’s much-anticipated report detailing how many trees they would suggest to remove and in what areas those trees are located.

Approximately 20,000 trees over 20cm in diameter were deemed dead and recommended for removal in the Blackwell report. This accounts for 30 per cent of big trees in Stanley Park. These large dead trees are being removed because there is a risk they could fall on people or park infrastructure, such as the Stanley Park Causeway. Approximately 14,000 of the large trees that have or will be removed are western hemlock.

“Time is of the essence,” in removing dead trees, city staff wrote in a November 2023 funding report. Falling trees are a risk to public safety, they said, with risks increasing as dead trees begin to decay and lose structural integrity.

Additionally, the Blackwell report found there were approximately 166,000 dead trees smaller than 20cm in diameter. These account for 33 per cent of small trees in the park. These dead trees are being removed not because they pose a risk to public safety or infrastructure from falling but because they create a wildfire hazard in high numbers. It’s these twigs that could act as kindling to light larger trees on fire.

With work along the causeway completed, the park board will be “focusing on replanting the forest with thousands of native tree species such as cedars and Douglas firs and tidying up the park,” in the coming months, McLeod said.

**The causeway has become more visible from surrounding trails after trees were removed to mitigate risk to the highway and its users. (Nate Lewis photo)**

McLeod said the park board has received many questions about the tree removals, particularly where the logs and other tree materials will end up.

“There’s a large number of trees and coarse, woody debris that’s being left on site to provide habitat, as well as opportunities for nurse logs to fuel and generate the future forest that will grow in Stanley Park,” McLeod said.

In addition to logs and debris left on the forest floor you may also see trees with their tops and branches removed. The new tops of the trees, cut jagged by a chainsaw, are intended to become wildlife habitats, according to the park board.

“Many of the trees that have been cut down are smaller hemlocks which have been damaged by the looper moth and are not suitable to be used for timber. This lower quality wood will mostly be processed into pulp or ground into green waste,” McLeod said.

In addition to poor wood quality, operational constraints in the park led to some logs being cut into shorter lengths, making them “unsuitable for repurposing,” according to park board staff.

“The small amount of high value trees that are being removed in Stanley Park that have been affected by the looper insect include a small portion of Douglas fir and western red cedar. These are specifically being shared with local First Nations for cultural use,” McLeod said.

If you walk through Stanley Park these days you will likely see piles of freshly cut trees like this one. (Nate Lewis photo)

Many cut logs and trees flagged for removal appear healthy. However, park board staff explain how the decay process caused by looper moths can be deceiving:

“The hemlock looper insect aggressively feeds on foliage causing various degrees of defoliation. The decay process within the stem wood takes years, so some of the recently cut trees may look fresh or alive, but they are not. Over time, as the wood loses structural integrity from decay, secondary insects and woodpeckers, the failure of tops, branches, and whole trees poses an increasing risk to public safety and park infrastructure.”

A handful of the trees flagged for removal near Beaver Lake are host to bat boxes managed by the Stanley Park Ecology Society.

**Bat boxes near Beaver Lake. (Nate Lewis photo)**

“We are in contact with the consulting firm conducting the work in the Park, and will coordinate with them on the removal of the bat boxes when it's time to take down those trees. We will certainly find another place for any bat boxes that get taken down that will be just as good or better than their current locations,” SPES conservation technician Marisa Bischoff told TWEJ.

OLD GROWTH CONCERNS

There are a few hundred significant old growth trees in Stanley Park, including Canada’s biggest maple tree and largest red alder, according to Colin Spratt. Spratt is a member of the BC Big Tree Committee, which advises for UBC Forestry’s BC Big Tree Registry, and the operator of the tour company Ancient Trees of Vancouver.

“There are certain parts of the park where you have significant stands of old growth that are intact, that have the same forest dynamics they would have roughly had originally. I call them little miracle sections of Stanley Park, which are actually fairly original and intact. It would be a shame for humans, after 1888 all the way to 2024, for us just in this moment muck it up,” Spratt said.

The amount of trees being removed in the park is unprecedented in the last 100 years, and that comes with uncertainty. Having read the Blackwell report, the park board’s approach does make sense to Spratt from a forestry management perspective.

None of the significant old growth trees that Spratt and others have identified, which are listed in the Big Tree Registry, are scheduled for removal.

The Blackwell report makes no mention of these old growth trees that lie among other trees being removed. Spratt’s concern is that these old growth ecosystems or the trees themselves could be damaged during the high intensity removal process.

“[They are] going into what I would consider the museum part of Stanley Park [between Tatlow and Lees trails] there in terms of like, Cathedral Grove-esque old growth, where I think it should be smaller crews with less heavy machinery. It would be a shame if there are diggers and logging roads in there,” Spratt said.

**At Prospect Point there are new logging roads, heavy equipment, and log sorting areas next to very old cedar and maple trees, according to Spratt. (Colin Spratt photo)**

“Old growth habitat is of utmost importance and operational procedures are being taken to ensure these habitats remain ecologically functional,” a park board spokesperson told TWEJ.

The Stanley Park Forest Management Plan, which underpins the park board’s approach to old growth in the park, identifies one small remnant stand of trees adjacent to Tunnel Trail and Pipeline Road.

THE PRICE TAG

In late January, city council unanimously approved a $4.9 million adjustment to the park board’s budget in order to continue funding immediate removal work. The park board already spent $1.9 million from their budget for initial work in 2023.

The report presented to the councillors described the situation as “urgent” due to the “immediate safety risk” of damaged trees.

According to city staff, more money will be required in the “near future” to fund the full scope of the project. This means the total amount spent on tree removals and restoration in Stanley Park will likely exceed $7 million.

Regarding the budget adjustment, city manager Paul Mochrie said, “It’s certainly not optimal and we would not be looking to come to you the first meeting in January with a significant adjustment like this but… [the budget for looper moth mitigation] was being confirmed in parallel with the [2024] budget development process.”

“There may have been opportunities for quicker action here,” Mochrie added.

The $4.9 million will be drawn from the city’s general stabilization reserve, which will need to be replenished through future property tax increases and/or operating surpluses, according to the staff report.

Due to various factors, the park board expects the return on any leftover commercially viable logs to cover less than five per cent of the overall project cost.

RESTORATION

Beginning in spring 2024, the park board has said they will restore each tree removed through dedicated tree planting in impacted areas.

“We want to assure you that restoration efforts in Stanley Park are focused on creating a more resilient forest for centuries to come,” McLeod said.

Elaborating on that, a park board spokesperson told TWEJ that other ecological enhancements were ongoing to support both long-term forest health and current habitat. In addition to leaving woody debris and nurse logs behind, invasive species removal by the park board and SPES will continue.

The restoration component of the work in Stanley Park has not yet been funded in the 2024 budget.