Caring for Our Shores – Section III: Mapping and Monitoring
Imagine that when you bought your land the previous owners passed on a series of maps, charts, and surveys that marked thriving clam and oyster beds, stands of sea asparagus, seal haul-outs, and eagle trees. You would have been able to make informed decisions about your new property: where to place your beach paths and docks, how to orient your sundeck for the best view. You would also have known about sensitive populations of wildlife that shared your land and how to avoid harming them.
That kind of information is not only a communication from one landowner to the next, it is a powerful tool. For instance, when cartographers surveyed the Georgia Strait in the 1700s, they measured depths of water along the coast, significant kelp forests and oyster beds, and unique land ecosystems such as the prairie meadows on Cortes Island. Today we can use their findings as a scale of how things were and to understand how far we must go to put things back in order.
Ahead to Section IV: The Law and the Shore
To order a copy of Caring for Our Shores: A Handbook for Coastal Residents in the Strait of Georgia, contact:
The Cowichan Community Land Trust Society
#6-55 Station Street, Duncan, B.C, V9L 1M2
P: 250-746-0227, F: 250-746-9607
The Marine Ecology Station
Sidney, B.C,
P: 250-655-1555
Images used with special permission from Kerry L. Werry. To view more pictures of ocean creatures found in B.C waters, visit the B.C Diving and Marine Life I.D Page.