PRESENTATIONT Sensitive Habitat Stewardship Strategies - A Comox Valley

ITLE : Perspective
ORGANIZATION: Comox Valley Project Watershed Society
PRESENTER: Don Chamberlain, Program Co-ordinator
CONTACT: Ph: 250-703-2871, Fax: 250-703-2872, Email:chamberlaind@shaw.ca

Introduction
British Columbia's coastal communities are undertaking their own sensitive habitat inventory and mapping
projects at an unprecedented rate. Communities are gearing efforts toward salmon streams, wetlands
and coastal areas. Standard methodologies for inventory and mapping have been developed for all three
of these habitat types, although stream mapping has received the most attention. Pressure on coastal
salmon stocks, wetlands, and rare ecosystems from habitat modifications in settled areas is the main
driving force behind the inventory and mapping activities.

Community groups, in partnership with municipal governments perform most of the habitat data
collection and mapping in developed areas. Projects are conducted to ensure that the data can be
available to meet the needs of municipal land-use planners and volunteer stewardship groups and be
accessible to the community at large. The Comox Valley region, on the East Coast of Vancouver Island
has been at the leading edge of participation in a series of Sensitive Habitat Stewardship projects that are
engaging many sectors of the community.

Project Watershed Society’s Mandate:

Established in 1993 to operate in the
watersheds of the Comox Valley,
from Oyster River to Deep Bay
Creek, the Project Watershed Society
seeks to “encourage people of all
ages and cultures to become
involved in community stewardship
of watersheds”. During its brief Comox
seven-year history, the society has Courtenay
Valley
been building numerous partnerships Bioregion
among community organizations,
citizens, industry and all levels of
government in an effort to address
its mission statement of: “promoting
community stewardship of Comox
Valley watersheds through
education, information and action”.

Project Watershed is recognized locally and internationally for its ability to provide technical expertise, its
ability to create ‘watershed wisdom’ among community members, and for its ability to involve volunteers
in a diverse array of stewardship programs.

By promoting a community approach to watershed stewardship, Project Watershed is able to serve a

population with a diversity of interests: resource industries and their workers, private landowners,
concerned residents, conservationists, and many other special interest groups. We are non-partisan and
seek to involve and include the broadest possible sector of the community in our projects.
Sensitive Habitat Stewardship Strategies:
Community Partnership Strategies

Local volunteers are involved in our project both at the project advisory level and as skilled
Streamkeepers working side by side with qualified technicians and biologists. The databases, GIS, static
maps and reports generated are also utilized in our Project Watershed’s own stewardship projects and by
Streamkeepers groups for community awareness raising and for watershed restoration and protection
planning. We help local groups promote stewardship in their watershed by creating public display
materials and assisting with community meeting facilitation and group formation.

Project Watershed provides accurate watercourse

and wetland mapping data for regional planning
purposes. Sensitive habitat data is presented in
completed GIS formats to planners and engineers
working in regional and municipal governments. The
information has been used in some instances and is
expected to be more in the future for development of
Official Community Plan’s, Development Permit Area
designations, Liquid Waste Management Plans,
Greenways Plans, and Watershed Management
Plans.

Our project advisors consist of government agency representatives, GIS experts, biologists, naturalists
and streamkeepers. These people assist us in priority setting for watershed mapping projects,
partnership development, and information dissemination and provide professional advice and project
evaluation information.

Mapping/Inventory Strategies

• Surveys are conducted in areas of past or future urban development pressure.

• Volunteers assist technical staff in field
surveys and information dissemination.
• An Advisory Committee provides
continual direction and priority setting
advice.
• Strategic planning is conducted every six
months.
• Data collection and products are tailored
to meet individual project partners’
needs.
• Crews act as a team to allow mentoring
of newcomers and sharing in problem
solving.
• Provincially developed standard methods
for generating GIS ready sensitive habitat
data are used. "Sensitive Habitat Inventory and Mapping" (SHIM) procedures have been developed
for community use through a partnership involving staff from Fisheries and Oceans Canada, the
Provincial Ministry of Environment, Lands and Parks, and several community groups including Project
Watershed Society.
• The accuracy of the linework generated from SHIM methods (using Trimble Pathfinder Pro GPS
technology) is within 5m with a 95% confidence limit.
GIS / Database Management Strategies

• All technical staff utilize Microsoft

Excel and Microsoft Access
database entry tools and Arcview 
GIS software to process and review
their own field data.
• An internal Quality Assurance and
Quality Control Program in place.
• Government partners operate
separate QA/QC programs
• Survey crews, to document findings,
generate static maps and narrative
reports.
• A separate Landowner Contact
Database is used for storing
confidential and anecdotal information
gathered.

Landowner Stewardship Strategies

Building on the landowner contact process and

data collected from the Mapping and Inventory
field work, our Landowner Stewardship Program
provides us with an opportunity to present
detailed mapping and feature information
collected during our surveys to landowners. At
this time we also provide private land
stewardship information and advice. This
outreach approach facilitates streamkeeper
group formation and growth, allows us to gather
additional information (historical, anecdotal,
etc.), and promotes stream networking among
neighbours.

Sensitive Habitat Stewardship Products

Planning Maps

The Comox Valley Sensitive Habitat Atlas produced by regional,

provincial and federal government for Development Permit
Areas designation utilises sensitive habitat data generated in
Project Watershed's community based GIS.
Liquid Waste Management Plans

The Village of Cumberland developed their Phase 1 Liquid Waste Management Plan using our GIS data.
Flow data, watercourse and wetland locations, sensitive habitat classifications and channel configuration
information was utilized.

Stream Survey Summary Reports and

Maps

Project Watershed creates a special report and map

for each stream surveyed. The map
shows new stream and wetland
location information, fish species
distribution and annotations of
special features.

The report is a narrative summary of

overview information describing:
• watercourse locations,
• general condition of each stream
segment and wetland surveyed,
• issues with landowner contact,
• restoration/rehabilitation
opportunities,
• priority opportunities for local Streamkeepers, and,
• additional mapping/inventory needs.

GIS Databases

Using readily updateable databases and an

interactive GIS interface tool that our trained
staff can operate, we are able to view, compile
and analyse data spatially and produce map
products tailored for the many and varied GIS Database
needs of our community partners.

Internet Maps with Orthophotos

• User-friendly access to geo-referenced data. It is

dynamic in nature and can produce a product tailored by
a user for their particular need.
• Potentially very useful as an Internet interface for public
access to georeferenced community databases.
• Potential for Internet accesses with pan and zoom and
ability to toggle on and off different layers as desired.
• Generates ‘living documents’ lifted from dynamic
databases as needed.
• Data is readily accessible and free to the public.
Non-GIS Databases

We use dynamic, readily accessible databases, for

data entry and management. It is difficult or
impossible to visualize data spatially in this format.
Information in these databases is georeferenced
and imported to our GIS.

Brochures

Project Watershed uses the

information it gets from it's
sensitive habitat surveys to
launch a series of follow-up
landowner contact projects. In
these watershed specific
projects we disseminate
information gathered and work
more closely with interested
landowners on more detailed
sensitive habitats inventory and
provide stewardship advice. We
produce a user-friendly, issue-
or area specific, brochure and
map for promoting public
awareness and generating
dialogue on sensitive habitat
stewardship principles and
practices.