Environment BC

Terra preta is the Portuguese name of a type of soil which is thought to have almost miraculous properties. The newspapers are flooded with reports about “black gold,” scientists believe that two of the greatest problems facing the world – climate change and the hunger crisis — can be solved by it. The beauty of it is that everyone can do something about it because since 2005 the secret of producing this black soil has been revealed — and it is a secret that seemed to have been lost foreve …

A thorough look at the many benefits of the ultra-fertile soil called terra preta and instructions on how to make it.

Terra preta, meaning “black earth” in Portuguese, is a very dark, fertile soil first made by the original inhabitants of the Amazon Basin at least 2,500 years ago. According to a growing community of international scientists, this ancient soil, sometimes referred to as biochar, could solve two of the greatest problems facing the world: climate change and the hunger crisis. T …

Winner, 2016 Lane Anderson Award for Best Canadian Science Writing
Shortlisted, Basil Stuart-Stubbs Prize for Outstanding Scholarly Book on British Columbia.

An illustrated narrative that interweaves the shifting seasons of the Northwest Coast with the experiences of a conservation biologist surveying thousands of kilometres of open ocean in order to uncover the complex relationships between humans, marine birds and the realities of contemporary biodiversity.

At Sea with the Marine Birds of the Ra …

An illustrated narrative that interweaves the shifting seasons of the Northwest Coast with the experiences of a conservation biologist surveying thousands of kilometres of open ocean in order to uncover the complex relationships between humans, marine birds and the realities of contemporary biodiversity.

At Sea with the Marine Birds of the Raincoast combines the natural and human histories of Pacific Northwest marine birds with Caroline Fox’s personal story of her life as a conservation scienti …

How much do we value clean water? Enough to stop our industrialized way of life from degrading it? The documentary play The Watershed follows an artist and her family in the struggle to chart a sustainable course between economic prosperity and environmental stewardship.

Largely constructed from original interviews conducted by the playwright, The Watershed brings to the stage a multiplicity of ideological perspectives and conflicting visions for Canada’s natural resources, and its characters s …

Billy Proctor has spent his life doing the time-honoured work of generations of upcoast men—handlogging, fishing, clam digging, repairing boats, beachcombing. Then Billy began to see that the coast he loved was dying around him. The thriving runs of Pacific salmon, oolichans and herring that he could remember from his early years were vanishing—some to near extinction—and he understood that it was time to give something back.

Heart of the Raincoast is the story of Billy Proctor’s life, an …

Originally published in 1998, this updated edition has a brand-new cover and interior design, with a new foreword by Alexandra Morton.

Billy Proctor was born in 1934 and has spent his entire life in a remote coastal community called Echo Bay, BC on an island off northern Vancouver Island. Proctor has always done the time-honoured work of generations of upcoast men—hand-logging, fishing, clam digging, repairing boats, beachcombing.

But Billy eventually began to notice that the thriving runs of Pa …

From the 1920s to 1952, George and Else Seel lived about sixty kilometres south of Burns Lake near the small farming settlement of Wistaria on the western shore of Ootsa Lake. Like many early twentieth century settlers who migrated to BC's Central Interior, the Seels came in search of opportunity and prosperity, but the harsh environment posed challenges they could not have imagined. The community was remote and the winters were long, but eventually, along with their fellow settlers, they learne …