British Columbia Floods: How Restoring Wetlands and Watersheds Could Help Prevent the Next Disaster | The Canadian News

As British Columbia begins the long task of rebuilding after historic floods and looks for ways to repeat itself in the future, one group says it’s time to look to nature as a model.

The BC Watershed Safety Coalition took Global News on a tour of one of their restoration projects on McKay Creek in North Vancouver, where they say a revitalized wetland was able to help the area around it weather the heavy rains. of November.

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“What we know is that by investing in our watersheds, investing in our natural defense systems like wetlands, riparian buffers, how to restore our forests, helps create more resilient communities and more resilient and safe neighborhoods when it comes to the changing climate that see, ”said Coree Tull, Co-Chair of the coalition.

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The coalition, which includes non-profit groups such as the Wild Coast Ecological Society and institutional bodies such as the BCIT Rivers Institute and the Port Coquitlam Department of Engineering and Public Works, focuses on non-partisan work to protect watersheds and their watersheds. associated ecosystems.

Coalition members began working to restore lost wetlands around McKay Creek in 2019 with federal and provincial funding, explained Krystal Brennan of the Wild Coast Ecological Society.


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The group removed invasive grass species that had drained the groundwater and excavated to recreate a natural inlet and outlet for McKay Creek. Within a year, the birds had returned, and last year salmon also appeared, Brennan said.

When rain from a series of atmospheric rivers hit the province last month, causing flooding and landslides in southwestern British Columbia, the restored wetlands helped prevent a similar result in the creek.

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“I’ve been working here since 2015. Whenever there’s a big rain event … that stream would flood and the water would rise so fast and we’ve even seen it spill onto the roads,” Brennan said.

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“This time, with all the water we’ve seen here, it has barely risen. This wetland was able to absorb a lot of water … and it also provided an outlet, so when the water got too high in the stream, it was able to drain into the wetland. “


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Tull said projects like the one at McKay Creek have an upfront cost, but are cheaper in the long run than damage from weather disasters.

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Plus, they can be effective in helping prevent some of the worst results of fall and winter problems, like flooding, and summer problems, like heat.

“Wetlands like McKay Creek here, hold water and then slowly release it in the summer when we have those hot, dry weather events that prevent drought,” he said.

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“It allows us to protect our communities from future droughts, floods and fires that may come.”

The British Columbia government has committed to developing a watershed security fund, but Tull said the government has done little since then to advance the goal.

She said the twin heat and flood disasters of 2021 show that now is the time to kick-start that project, to help the province build natural defenses against future shocks.

© 2021 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.



Reference-globalnews.ca

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