Glade Creek Waterfall

Glade Watershed Protection Society

Since moving to the community of Glade in 2017, and building our home as the homeowner contractor, I have been living in the embrace of the mountains, creeks and streams of the Glade Watershed behind us. I do not take this environment for granted and gratitude fills my heart for the privilege of living here. 

Community means a lot to me, and my community includes all of my kin: the entire ecosystem is part of those I care about. In these smoke filled days with the fires from far away places filling our skies and valleys, we can really see and feel the depth and breadth of our connection. What we do here has consequences far afield as well as to our closest neighbours. This is why I joined Glade Watershed Protection Society when first beginning to connect with my new community. There I met individuals who had been asking questions and seeking a voice in the planning for the future of the Glade Watershed forests, knowing that the health of each area affects the whole. Just as smoke travels across landscapes so does water. The dispersion of moisture is an integrated activity, with water held in the soils of healthy forests benefiting those far away.

The focus of Glade Watershed Protection Society has been up until recently seeking legal ground to have a voice in the decisions and plans for logging in our watershed. This has proven fruitless, exhausting and disheartening (see Narwhale article or our July press release). We could just give up, yet we know that we can’t, so we aren’t. While we hold the lingering legal action that we are in process with, we are turning our attention to creating a Nature Based Forest Plan. Through mapping, interpreting, working with professionals to intimately come to know the life of this watershed, we will have a plan to stand upon, backed by science that is motivated by ecosystem health and well-being, including us humans, rather than by corporate profits. 

There is so much good work to be done to restore our world, let’s build our new economy, our new jobs there.

Barbarah Nicoll

Glade, BC