Massive project launched to protect Vancouver Island estuary from sea level rise

Officials unveiled plans Tuesday for what’s being billed as the largest environmental restoration of its kind ever on Vancouver Island.

The project will see more than 70 hectares of estuary in Cowichan Bay restored and adapted in anticipation of sea level rise.

The work, estimated to cost between $2.5 million and $3 million, is a partnership between the Nature Trust of B.C., the Cowichan Tribes, Ducks Unlimited Canada, the Habitat Conservation Trust Foundation and the provincial and federal governments.

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“The scale is really significant,” said Tom Reid, program manager for the West Coast Conservation Land Management Program.

“If we don’t do this intervention we’re looking at losing 50 per cent of the marsh habitat in the Cowichan by 2050 and almost 100 per cent by 2100.”

The value of estuaries — partially-enclosed coastal bodies of water where fresh water from rivers mixes with salt water from the ocean — cannot be overstated, according to Reid.

While estuaries make up just 2.3 per cent of B.C.’s coasts, 80 per cent of coastal fish and wildlife and 75 per cent of seafood harvested in the region rely on them for part of their life cycles.

-With files from Kylie Stanton

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The habitats are particularly critical to B.C.’s already beleaguered populations of wild salmon. Four species of salmon — chinook, pink, coho and chum — are found in the Cowichan estuary, according to Reid.

“A lot of those species rely on estuaries for residency time as they’re out-migrating from the river, they rely on these marsh habitats to grow, to get ready to go out into the ocean,” he said.

“Already 50 per cent of species of salmon in British Columbia are having some struggles. Without the Cowichan estuary functioning, we don’t 100 per cent know what will happen … there may not be any salmon left.”

The restoration project will be broken into two phases, with the first phase of work scheduled for August when biologists and experts with the Cowichan tribes have determined it will have the lightest environmental impact.

Much of the work will involve the removal of legacy dikes that form human-made barriers to marsh development, while other work will go to crafting new fish channels and forest setback areas.

Over two years, crews will move huge volumes of earth and soil.

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“I’m reminded of that old expression, ‘To plant a tree was yesterday and the next best time is today,'” Minister of Water, Land and Resources Stewardship Nathan Cullen said in a phone interview.

“We have so much work to do to build back and restore marshlands and wetlands. This could be a fantastic model that we can lift up and take to the many other projects that are out there.”

While the work in Cowichan will be a massive undertaking, the ecosystem is just one of 442 estuaries on British Columbia’s coast.

Each of those other habitats could be vulnerable in its own way to the effects of climate change and projected sea level rise.

“We will have results coming later this year that will rank a lot of these estuaries in terms of are they going to be resilient over time, yes or no,” Reid said.

“And if not, what can we do about it.”