
Trees are seen as the quintessential renewable resource. Cut one down, plant one, and it all evens out. But this isn’t exactly true. Consider the 1,000 year old giant trees that make up British Columbia’s Old Growth forests. Ontario used to to have trees like these, massive White Pines that were cut down to become the backbone of the British Empire as ship masts. Ontario’s massive White Pine forests are now all gone. Most Eastern North American Old Growth is gone, along with the huge number of creatures that depended on these forests for food and shelter.
Ancient forests are not something you can grow back. If it takes a thousand years, it is not renewable. This was a fact put forward in a recent Sierra Clube report on diminishing BC forests entitled, B.C.’s Old-Growth Forest: A Last Stand for Biodiversity and was also acknowledged in a following government report on old growth: A New Future For Old Forests: A Strategic Review of How British Columbia Manages for Old Forests Within its Ancient Ecosystems.
Now sure, if you want to, you can point to the large number of protected forests and parks that BC has. You can argue that old growth will be conserved. That there will always be some of it left. My argument though is that we shouldn’t be getting rid of any of it. Let me lay it out.