the
Acorn
The Newsletter of the Salt Spring Island Conservancy
Fall is Spring (if you’re a moss)
By Christopher Drake
Most leaves have fallen, and the landscape is enveloped
in a chilly mist, yet lush green growth still pervades the forests
and covers the rocks of our beautiful coastal ecosystems. As
participants learned at the Moss Workshop on Saturday,
November 26th, the wet days before winter are a time of
bursting forth for the mysterious and magnificent mosses.
Though flowering plants are battening down the hatches
and preparing for winter dormancy, mosses delight in the
dampness and the lack of competition. It may be fall for us,
but for them it’s springtime.
November 25th and 26th was a marvelously mossy
weekend for some islanders. On Friday evening they were
treated to a slideshow and talk given by Dr. Terry McIntosh
and sponsored by the Salt Spring Island Conservancy. The
following day Dr. McIntosh, an accomplished and slightly
eccentric bryologist (moss expert), ran an all-day moss
workshop at the home of Brenda Guiled, and took the dozen
participants on a superb moss walk through the Garry oak
meadows in Ruckle Provincial Park.
Mosses are major components in many Canadian
ecosystems, but they are little understood by most gardeners
and nature lovers. To the undiscerning eye they may all look
http://saltspring.gulfislands.com/conservancy
Number 31, Winter 2006
similar, but mosses are microhabitat specialists, with different
species growing in close proximity and blending together
based on their particular needs. A decaying stump may have
a totally different community from a neighbouring boulder.
Broadleaf maples acquire masses of mosses, as do grand
Garry oaks, and each moss species has specific moisture and
substrate requirements.
What exactly sets mosses apart from other plants? For
starters, they lack roots, and so acquire their water and
nutrients from their environment (though some mosses
do have a basic vascular system). They also fulfill different
ecosystem functions. Due to the low amount of nutrients
in their tissues, few organisms eat mosses. However, they
provide homes to many invertebrate species, and can act
like a nursery for small organisms and seedlings. In addition,
they provide excellent moisture retention and prevent soil
erosion through their rhizoids, which are root-like structures
that anchor the mosses. Furthermore, mosses can form new
plants from small pieces
of an older plant, and Inside:
some species continue President’s Page................ 2
to photosynthesize in Director’s Desk................. 2
temperatures as low as - Features
4º Celsius. What may be Densities....................... 3
most amazing, mosses can Natural History
completely dry out, even Arbutus........................ 3
for years, and then when Inside SSIC
enough moisture is present Erskine Bench............... 5
they will pop back to life Aide Wins Post............. 7
as vigorous as ever. Trail Monitors............... 8
My introduction to Fairy Doors................. 10
mosses occurred in the Events
boreal forests north of Calendar....................... 6
Edmonton, where I was Event Notes
an assistant to a graduate Dr. Richard Hebda..... 6
student researching moss Stewardship
growth after forest fires. It Art Morton................... 7
was fascinating to see how Essential Details............. 11
Continued on page 10
President’s Page
Chance and Challenge
Major private donations this winter have given your
Conservancy a chance to boost its services to this community
to a level we didn’t expect to achieve for some time. It’s a
wonderful opportunity.
The gifts are for operations. They let us double our
work this year, and are likely to continue in coming years.
We want to use them fully in 2006, and to accomplish work
on which we can build, but which can be reduced without
severe impacts if income in 2007 or later doesn’t match our
plans.
Our strategy is this: Our first priority is to increase our
Executive Director to full from half time. We will use the
new money for that, but in 2006 increase our fundraising
Director’s Desk
As we begin 2006, the support of our members and
community in 2005 stands out in my mind. 2005 was the
busiest year ever for the Conservancy. In addition to our
series of regular monthly educational events, we hosted Rob
Butler at a packed AGM, sold-out a John Ford whale event at
ArtSpring, and sold over 400 tickets to the first annual Salt
Spring Eco-Home Tour. We also hosted the Sustainable &
Environmental Home Forum with the assistance of the Salt
Spring One-Tonne Challenge.
In addition to these events, we were notified in April
that we received funding from the Salt Spring Island
Foundation, Vancouver Foundation, and the Government of
Canada Habitat Stewardship Program for Species at Risk to
run a Stewardship Project entitled, “Habitat Protection and
Stewardship of Species at Risk on Salt Spring”. This project
allowed the Conservancy to do vital inventories of Species at
Risk through work with landowners on the Island. Islanders
learned how to identify natural habitats through site visits,
and to protect their land through stewardship agreements,
land management plans, and our first two NAPTEP (Natural
Areas Protection Tax Exemption Program) covenants. The
project also sponsored ten events on the Island, including
a Moss Workshop that is highlighted in this issue of the
Acorn. (More on this successful project in the next issue of
the Acorn)
April was also the month that we officially began our
campaign to save Mount Erskine. Due to the overwhelming
support from members, neighbours, other conservation
organizations, and others who heard about the campaign
we were able to protect 100 acres in less than six months.
This campaign was so successful due largely to the creativity
shown by volunteers, members and friends that led to guided
hikes, calendar sales, popcorn sales by schoolchildren,
raffles, special events and fairy doors.
Through all of these activities, more people found
out about the work of the Conservancy and I am pleased
to announce that we now have 723 Conservancy members!
Thank you all for your support, especially all of you new
 The Acorn - Newsletter of the Salt Spring Island Conservancy
efforts so that we can continue with a full time ED even if
the big gifts of 2006 aren’t equaled subsequently. Our second
and third priorities are to heighten our in-house ability to
provide biological and environmental education services,
respectively. We’ll do this through strategic contracts with
consultants instead of hiring staff because of the flexibility of
the contract approach.
The Conservancy’s resources grew (as measured in
dollars: we could as easily measure through volunteered
time) from a few hundred dollars in 1996 to almost $60,000
in 2005. That’s no mean feat. Now we have a chance to grow
again. It’s a challenge we’ll meet.
– Maureen Bendick
members. Now that we have so many members, we are
looking at ways to communicate effectively while keeping
costs down. One way members can help is to keep their
memberships up to date, saving us the paper, postage and
the time necessary to send out renewal letters. One easy
way to do this is to check your Acorn mailing label for your
membership expiration date, and another is to renew your
membership for three years when it comes due. Another key
way for the Conservancy to spread the word is through email
notification of educational events, and notice of our latest
Acorn. If you are not currently receiving updates or wouldn’t
mind reading the Acorn on our website, please let us know
your email address. Rest assured that we never share, trade
or sell our membership lists or email addresses.
My sincere gratitude to all of the hardworking volunteers
last year who helped at education events, the market, the fall
fair, craft fair and the Eco-Home Tour; our office helpers, the
Board of Directors, committee members, our Stewardship
Project advisors and volunteer stewards, and everyone who
helped in any way to preserve Mount Erskine. Special thanks
to Linda Quiring for the photocopier, and to Anna McColm
and Avril Kirby for the large donation from the sales of your
Salt Spring calendar.
– Karen Hudson
Sharp-tailed snake meeting Photo by Christian Englestoft

Density for Land: Fair Trade?
Our Official Community Plan lets local Trustees negotiate
a trade: the community gets title to an undeveloped part
of a proposed subdivision, the owner gets extra densities
to sell in the developed area. How much land should the
community receive?
The OCP has a guideline (H.3.3.): “...a maximum of
one additional parcel or one additional dwelling unit could
be allowed for each parcel of dedicated land that is equal
to the base minimum average parcel size for the Land Use
Designation where it is located.” H.3.3.2 gives an example.
If land in the Uplands Designation is dedicated, a maximum
of one density could be exchanged for each ha (20 acres)
dedicated.
Notice the word “maximum.” It suggests a sliding scale.
In the example, the fewest acres that have to be dedicated
in exchange for one density is 20, but Trustees could ask
for any number larger than that. The difference must be in
the community values of the land in trade. Usually these are
natural values.
They include possibilities for nature-based recreation of
the sort you can enjoy in a Class A provincial park or similar
CRD area; groundwater recharge, runoff control, stream flow
normalisation, pollution cleansing, erosion control and other
watershed functions; production of oxygen and long term
trapping of carbon dioxide in growing wood; and wildlife
habitat including places for species at risk and vulnerable or
Arbutus
We revere things that are taller and older: parents when we
are young, mountains, cathedrals and trees, for example.
I wonder: What tree do you admire most? Firs and cedars
are too magnificent to be deserved. Apples are too tame,
alders are too weedy. Western maples – a pox on political
correctness - are too conservative. The yew is a troll, a gnome
and a tomten. Our dogwoods, alas, are sickly, our hawthorns
far too prickly. The local oak is drab and trades too much on
its rarity.
I am kin to arbutus. We are out of plumb and prone to
putting on weight; we are several degrees shy of handsome.
We do have a kind of durable idiosyncrasy, if you care to
look for it.
For 30,000 years, give or take, people who lived with
this tree named it in a score of languages, none of them
mine. Foreigners came to claim and rename everything.
On November 5, 1769 Father Juan Crespi saw the tree
near Monterey Bay, California and called it after its likeness
back home in Spain. He wrote the name in his journal, the
act that deleted the past and fixed the future. So the tree
became “madrono” (masc.) or “madrona” (fem.), anglicised
as “madrone,” the strawberry tree. Other Latins along the
Mediterranean called it “arbutus,” and so do we.
Winter 2006
Features
rare ecosystems.
All land also has different locational values like distance
from other protected areas, and a shape affecting ease of
management.
These can be thought of as criteria for judging the
intensity of natural values on the acres offered to the
community. The community should receive more acres if the
land is steep, rocky, or low in wildlife value; recently clearcut;
fragmented into separate pieces or a piece whose boundaries
have been gerrymandered to suit maximum development;
or has suffered severe erosion and is prone to more before
stabilisation.
Recent clearcuts are especially low in community
value because of the long time before many of the potential
values of the land actually exist. Starting with stumps, it is
decades before watershed functions and wildlife production
are normal, before visiting there is much fun, and before
the excess of carbon release from decay is outstripped by
the oxygen produced by green leaves. Standard economic
practice discounts the present value of anything whose
worth lies in the distant future.
I’d welcome your thoughts. We’ll be reviewing our OCP
in the next few years; maybe these ideas should be converted
to guidelines helping Trustees to get a fair trade for the
community.
– Bob Weeden
The arbutus in Cascadia is by far the biggest of the world’s
dozen kinds. A well-grown strawberry tree in Italy might
reach 10 feet tall. Arbutus menziesii, our neighbourhood
tree, often reaches 60 feet. On a slope above the Mattole River
in northern California a madrone arched over conferences
and trade fairs of interior and coastal people for more than
a century. Measured by a botanist in 1910, the “Council
Madrone” was 75 feet tall, had a crown 99 feet across. Its
girth 16 inches above the ground was 24 feet.
The naturalist Donald Culross Peattie never met a tree
he didn’t like; nevertheless, he seemed excessively interested
in ways a tree could be put to use. The arbutus frustrated
him. He liked it, but couldn’t find much value in it. Its fruit is
edible, he said, though likely to lead to cramps (The Natural
History of Western Trees). Hunters seek it because band-tailed
pigeons love its berries, he noted, sounding a bit desperate.
I like the approach Chuang-Tzu expressed in his 4th
Century BC tale of an oak who spoke in a carpenter’s dream:
“I’ve been trying for a long time to be of no use, and this has
been of great use to me.” Joe Meeker (Minding The Earth,
1988) elaborated, “The oak’s strategy for survival was to
be as ugly and deformed as possible, thus gaining full life
for itself by being useless to others.” That seems to be the
arbutus’ strategy, too, and it works. If loggers leave any tree
standing on southeastern Vancouver Island or the southern
Continued on page 

Natural History

Arbutus
Continued from page 
Gulf Islands, it will be an arbutus. Being
useless can have its drawbacks, leaving no
counterbalance to the occasional suburban
homeowner who, disliking the arbutus’
annual summer leaf moult, sees no reason to
let it live.
The arbutus did once find itself being
of use. Long ago, the Coast Salish say, some
people were trying to survive a great flood.
Tossed here and there by the tempest, they
finally found an arbutus, not yet drowned,
on Mount Newton near Victoria. They tied
their canoes to it and were saved. Ever since
then, those people have avoided harming an
arbutus, never cutting it for firewood.
I’ve used the ugly-oak strategy myself,
all my life. I was not naturally gifted with
skills of the hands, and as a boy I avoided
learning from my practical father because
that’s what boys sometimes do. Growing up,
I saw that friends who could make and fix
things spent their time, willy-nilly, making
and fixing things. I was careful with my
courting promises. Having now offered the
proof of innumerable demonstrations, I find
myself accepted as useless. The arbutus and
I will live forever.
Peattie did like madrones. He spoke of
their glowing bark, their candelabra flowers,
their richly coloured fruit – but it was their
individuality that most impressed him.
They have no standard form. A conifer that
isn’t ramrod straight and symmetrical is an
oddity, a tree that has been in a fight. Most
deciduous trees are straight boled in a forest
and have a predictable form in the open. The Photo by Terry McIntosh
madrone’s motto is, “any which way but up.”
There are madrones with flaring bases like elephants whose “Even when granted ample space,” (Peattie again) “ the
trousers dropped. There are madrones with triple trunks, Madrono is apt to have an oddly twisted stem, to develop
each soaring for salvation in its own direction. Madrones irregular limbs, and to produce a crown broader than high
curl snugly around other trees they touch, even embracing and often canted over like an umbrella turned to a slanting
their narcissistic selves, or intruding between halves of fallen rain.”
boulders. Perhaps the arbutus still thinks it is a flexible shrub like
And they lean. Many a shoreline arbutus, beginning small its cousin the manzanita, its lithe gene and its Sumo gene at
and upright, grows yearly outward from the sky-seeking firs odds with each other, the one self-willed and gymnastic, the
beside it, finding light toward a morning or evening horizon. other muscle-bound.
Soon the tree, massive in middle age, cantilevers over the Seeing a full-grown madrone alone in a meadow, I often
ocean. It is held by roots grown to fill long fissures in the puzzle about its form. Is its shape mere mechanics and
country rock, buttressed by its ground-level collar, braced at chance, the outcome of early visits by deer, the unpredictable
every crook of its indecisive trunk by extra heartwood. Such snap of snow-burdened limbs or of recovery from blight?
leaners call the boy in me to shinny out and up until half-slip, Did it grow in woods later stripped away by a pioneering
half-intent sets me a’swimming. I have just enough sense to farmer, leaving the tree caught in inflexible age like a widow
resist now, but I lie along the smooth, muscular, terra-cotta unable to reshape herself to life alone? Has it lived in the
trunk with my bare arms around it. Leonard Cohen’s lines open from the first, forming itself subtly to the weight of
float up: “They are leaning out for love / And they will lean prevailing winds or the cumulative brightness of particular
that way forever / While Suzanne holds the mirror…” azimuths of the surrounding sky?

 The Acorn - Newsletter of the Salt Spring Island Conservancy

 I felled an arbutus once to give our garden another daily
hour of sun. (It was a trade, I convinced myself, because
a decade earlier I had planted four arbutus, now vigorous
20-footers.) It was spring when the madrone fell, the wood
so wet that the splitting wedge splashed water across the
sliced rounds. The wood split cleanly but unpredictably,
each grainless piece curving like a spall of flint. As the axe
rang and a block fell I admired its colours, pink to rose
with streaks of magenta, fast fading. I was reminded of a
ptarmigan posed in the winter’s angled sun, its feathers a
softly glowing pink. Captured, a ptarmigan in hand has that
miraculous gleam. Hours dead, the bird is merely white, the
white of drywall, of chalk, of common paper.
Corporations may disdain arbutus but a lot of animals
find it essential to the business of living. Salmonberries and
red-flowering currants are visas for rufous hummingbirds to
enter Cascadia in spring, but arbutus flowers are the manna
of courtship and nesting. A big arbutus in April is a mass
of greenish-cream flowers, millions of bells tolling for the
nectar-sippers. A hummingbird claiming such giants soon
is frantic with the impossibility of defending or consuming
the whole feast. Early bees blunder around the carillons of
flowers, sometimes startling a bird from its probing. The
flowers fall fast, and are tugged by thatcher ants to their
seething, sun-warmed nests.
Turn the moon six times to October. The madrone is
heavy with orange-red fruit. The migratory berry-pickers
– the same crew that just stripped my mountain ash – flock
to it. Robins by the score, varied thrushes, starlings, cedar
waxwings, flickers, pileated woodpeckers and Steller’s jays
belly up to the table. Less shamed than O. Henry’s poor
classmate at the reunion banquet, the birds brazenly jam fruit
into gular pockets, fly to a nearby tree for an incredibly short
time, then, matters settled, return. Pileated woodpeckers, I
noted, average 14 berries per trip. Meanwhile, all the fuss has
startled resting insects; yellow-rumped and orange-crowned
warblers attracted to the hubbub soon snap them up.
Deer eat new leaves of arbutus when they form in
summer – madrones have their own calendar – and pick
out certain young arbutus to consume in winter. The thick
leaves are home and larder of leaf miners, too. The larvae,
one to three per leaf, leave silvery trails as they feed. Watch
one, tiny and green, parallel a leaf vein. Back and forth swing
the head and minute jaws and another swath of soft tissue
has gone. The track, one-sixteenth of an inch wide, wanders
along a vein, crosses to another, reverses, loops, and forms
a tangled maze. The leaf looks like a meadow mown by a
muscular drunk.
Madrones soon get holes in them. The stub of a wind-
snatched limb decays into the heartwood. A hard, tangential
blow of a falling neighbour scars the arbutus. The scar begins
to heal from its edges; in the centre rot takes hold, leaving an
unanswered question as to the race’s outcome. Birds hope for
holes. Sapsuckers, flickers, downy and hairy woodpeckers,
winter wrens and chickadees nest in them. On winter nights
brown creepers, nuthatches and chickadees huddle inside.
Winter 2006
It is a clear lesson. No arbutus – no tree – lives alone.
One September afternoon we strolled along an old
logging trace that crossed an abandoned field and entered
a wood. It was hot at the sunny edge of the forest. Tiny
flies darted up and down in a shaft of light, swerving from
invisible or imagined enemies into concealing shade only to
reappear in their demented dance. Except for the infrequent
single call of a gull along yonder shore, it was quiet. We
listened into it, as one is compelled to do. Ever so faintly
we heard a sibilant ticking as if tiny beetles were sharpening
their jaws – no, it was more of a falling sound, like coarse
pepper being shaken onto newspaper. We realised that the
arbutuses all around us were shedding their red-brown bark
in the drying heat. In thin, curling shreds and polygons it lay
everywhere. I felt as if we had intruded into a private act, a
quiet changing of garments meant not to be seen but to be
presented, like a woman now dressed for a ball, as a finished
miracle.
I am falling in love with a tree.
– Bob Weeden
Bench Installed on Erskine
Photo by Judy Oliver
A bench was recently placed on the top of Mt. Erskine to
commemorate the many people who made the acquisition
of this property possible. The bench was made by Ian Fraser
and was transported – along with concrete, tools, and wood
for forms – to the top of the mountain by Brian Hayward
and his tractor and the help of Larry Appleby, Roland
Boudreau, Jean Gelwicks, Ben Goodman, Bill Harrington,
Charles Kahn, Tony Kennedy, Peter Lamb, Jude Oliver, Sam
Sidneysmith, and Sheri and Jim Standen. Roland Boudreau,
Brian Hayward, and Mike Hogan masterminded the bench’s
installation. Thanks is also due to Martin Williams who
generously allowed us to transport the bench and equipment
up his road.

Conservancy Events

Upcoming Events Event Notes

botany of grasses; and the origins and geography of
February 24 – 25 (Friday/Saturday): Who Gives rhododendrons and magnolias.
a Hoot - Owls of the Salt Spring Region with popular He was the expert advisor on the Burns Bog Ecosystem
Victoria naturalist, Darren Copley. February 24, 7:00 Review, and was the first Faculty Coordinator of the
pm -Slide presentation followed by OWLING (for pre-
Restoration of Natural Systems Program at the University of
registered owling group. Possible owling expedition on
Feb. 25 for pre-registered group.) Victoria.
Recently, Dr. Hebda oversaw the extraction, identification
March 24 (Friday): How Will Global Climate Change
and interpretation of pollen and other plant remains
Affect Salt Spring Island? Illustrated presentation by
Dr. Richard Hebda, Royal BC Museum and University associated with Kwaday Dan Sinchi, an ancient hunter whose
of Victoria botanist and speaker extraordinaire. remains were found at the edge of a glacier near the Yukon-
Community Gospel Church, 7:00 pm. BC border, providing insight into life and travels.
May 12 (Friday): AGM Lions Hall 7:00pm Dr. Hebda will be speaking March 24th at the Lions Hall
at 7:00 pm. Mark it on your calendar now.
June 2 – 3 (Friday/Saturday): How Does the Dragon
Fly? Slide presentation and nature walk by Victoria
Biologist/Conservationist Claudia Copley. Slide show at
Lions at 7:00 pm. Pre-register for walk on Sat. morning:
538-0318.
August 6 (Sunday): Eco-Home Tour, 10-4pm

Climate Transformation
– Not Change
The Concepts and Challenges of Looking at Our Future
(Ecological and Otherwise) at Many Scales
The Conservancy has been fortunate to get extremely
qualified and interesting speaker in the past, and 2006 will
be no different. Dr. Richard Hebda is at the top of his field
and as one of his past students said to me, “One of the best 2005 Eco-Home Tour Photo by Karen Hudson
teachers I ever had.” Read these qualifications and see if you
agree, he is a must to come hear.
Dr. Richard Hebda is the Curator of Botany and Earth Thank you to our business members:
History at the Royal British Columbia Museum. He curated
the Climate Change in BC Exhibition currently on display. Anchorage Cove B&B Salt Spring Centre of Yoga
He is also an Adjunct Associate Professor in Biology and Baker Beach Cottages Salt Spring Centre School
the Schools of Earth and Ocean Sciences and Environmental Balmoral By The Sea B&B Salt Spring Coffee Co.
Studies at the University of Victoria. Barb’s Buns Salt Spring Home Design
Dr. Hebda received his B.Sc. Biology in 1973 from Beddis House B&B Centre
McMaster University and his Ph.D. in Botany from UBC Bold Bluff Retreat Salt Spring Island Chamber
in 1977. He is the author of 80+ scientific papers on Bootacomputer of Commerce
environmental history of the last 15,000 years, 200+ popular Creekhouse Realty Ltd. Salt Spring Kayaking
articles mainly on bulbs and native plants, and three books. Green Acres Resort Salt Spring Way B&B
He has also (co) edited three books and participated in Gulf Island Picture Framing Saltspring Linen & Dry
numerous TV, radio and newspaper interviews. He acts as Island Escapades Cleaning
advisor to many public organizations. Island Star Video Saltspring Soapworks
His research interests are the vegetation and climate Neil Morie - Architect Spindrift at Welbury Point
history of Vancouver Island and southern interior of BC; Murakami Auto Body & Sprague Associates Ltd.
BC ethnobotany; climate change and its impacts; landscape Repairs Terra Firma Builders Ltd.
history in the Gulf Coast of Mexico; restoration of natural Salt Spring Books The Wine Cellar
systems and processes; ecology of Garry oak ecosystems;

 The Acorn - Newsletter of the Salt Spring Island Conservancy

 Inside SSIC

Good Stewards: Art Morton

Now, when Salt Springers are cutting trees at breakneck narrows. For Art it all boils down to respecting the natural
speed to “let in the sun” or “open up the views,” what a environment. “You can make use of it,” he says, “but do it
pleasure to visit the 12 acre property of Art Morton, where with respect and retain as much of the forest a possible”. We
the natural forest closes in like a soft blanket. Some of us agreed that people coming here now, often see the beauty
have found sadly that letting in the sun also means letting but don’t realize what has been lost. Luckily for us, Art’s
in the broom and invasive grasses that drive out the delicate forest will not be among those sad losses.
native plants. As a logger who had spent many years cutting – Maxine Leichter
trees, Art Morton’s vision was to preserve the forest. Through
a covenant held by the SSI Conservancy, that is exactly what
he did. Former Student Aide Wins Post
Art’s driveway makes a tunnel through the trees. Soft
light breaks through around small ponds. Because the Yvette Reusen, a volunteer student aide with SSIC in 2004,
covenant on Art’s property does not allow removal of plants, topped the list of applicants for a posting with the Ministry
it will preserve for ever the beautiful and delicate plants of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality (Netherlands)
that grow only in the shade of the forest or near these small in summer 2005. This is a major achievement because
ponds. For example, each spring a carpet of delicate pink few positions are available each year. Yvette also received
and white twinflowers (Linnaea borealis) appears. Art used her diploma from the University of Lorenstein last year.
to run an ad in the Driftwood inviting children to visit this Congratulations, Yvette!
“elf habitat.” Many will recall the work Yvette did for the Conservancy
When Art and his wife retired to Salt Spring Island in in formalizing a method for recording the flora on our
1985 they cleared only enough forest for the house and Andreas Vogt Nature Reserve. She applied the method to the
vegetable garden. Art conserved both water and electricity upper half of AVNR with the help of Robin Annschild. Her
by building a small retaining wall to hold water uphill from report is in the SSIC office. Somehow she found the time
the garden so it can be watered year round without using to teach youngsters about plant identification during our
electricity. Art mentioned that many property owners are Education Committee’s Middle School tours of the Reserve
not making use of similar opportunities to gather water led by Kate Leslie and Jean Gelwicks.
during the wet months. How, you ask, did Yvette celebrate her twin achievements
Art selected the Conservancy to hold the covenant in the Netherlands? Someone capable of levitation or
because we are local and can keep a watch on the property. levity snapped this photo of one phase of the party. Yvette
The covenant prevents any plants from being removed possesses one of the two heads. Note the immense dikes in
outside of a few specific areas, such as around the house. the background. Now there is a nation that is concerned
The covenant also protects the property from being about global warming!
subdivided. Art says he found the entire covenant process – Charles Dorworth
to be pleasurable and educational. He
praised Maureen Milburn’s careful work
with him on the covenant language.
He also enjoyed Robin Annschild’s visit
to survey the property to prepare the
baseline study that is required. She was
able to show him a Garry oak he had
never known was there. He plans to
leave the property to a family member
who will carry out his conservation
goals. But since covenant is in place,
he feels comfortable knowing no matter
who owns the property in the future,
the Conservancy will assure the forest
is protected.
When I asked Art about his
experiences as a logger, he speaks about
all we have lost, the majestic cathedrals
of old growth trees and the abundant
salmon runs. He reminisced that in
1945 you could stand at the dock
at Crofton in winter and see salmon
jumping non-stop across the entire Yvette takes to the air over the Rhone Valley

Winter 2006 
Inside SSIC
SSIC Trail Monitors and Broom Leader
The right people at the right time! We have many volunteers
who should be recognized more prominently but these folks
are ones you will encounter on our Reserves.
In September 2005 our Land Management and
Restoration member Ruth Tarasoff was perusing the file of
members who had volunteered for action and found the
name of Larry Appleby, who had expressed an interest in
trail location and maintenance.
A newer resident on Salt Spring Island, Larry is an
enthusiastic hiker and has shown a willingness to accept
responsibility for tasks to benefit the SSIC. By November’s
end, he and Owen Benwell, from Trail and Nature Club, had
cleared the Manzanita Ridge Nature Reserve Trail of downed
trees and branches. Larry is your MRNR Trail Monitor!
Terry Ridings, long-term resident and frequent hiker in
the vicinity of the Andreas Vogt Nature Reserve, agreed to
take responsibility for the AVNR and will also provide some
attractive and badly needed signs for the trails. Terry has,
in fact, been performing maintenance on the area for some
time without specific title purely because he felt it needed
to be done.
Our Trail Monitors speak with the voice of the SSIC. If
they suggest a course of action, please give them the respect
they deserve. Also, feel free to call to their attention any
work you believe needs to be done. This work will keep the
trails safe and clean and also meets a requirement of our
insurance. Monitors will provide our office with a notice of
their monitoring at least once per month.
Terry Ridings in AVNR Photo by Brian Smallshaw
 The Acorn - Newsletter of the Salt Spring Island Conservancy
Last but by no means least, we have Loralee Scaithe,
who emigrated from Alberta and has agreed to accept
responsibility for control of intrusive alien species on AVNR,
and possibly elsewhere on Saltspring. A delightful person
and effective Personal Counselor on Salt Spring Island,
Loralee will be seeking your help as volunteers, in initially,
Scots Broom removal work.
– Charles Dorworth
In Perpetuity...
...is a long time. Nevertheless the Conservancy’s hope is
that lands we acquire will get the best protective care for
approximately that long. We can’t look ahead even half-way
to infinity. Each successive Conservancy generation has to
think and plan as far ahead as it can.
Our Andreas Vogt Nature Reserve has neighbours; over
time we’ll have a succession of them. Private land adjoins
ours on three sides. We can expect more houses and people
nearby for a number of years to come, which likely will
mean more encroachments by walkers and riders onto the
Reserve. Conversely, we not only open our trails on AVNR
to unscheduled visitors, we actively organize visits for
education purposes. We can’t keep everyone on our trails
nor prevent wanderers from trespassing onto neighbours’
properties.
We are truly pleased, therefore, that Bernie and Sharon
Reynolds are helping to secure our mutual privacy along our
eastern boundary. Mr. Reynolds brought his behemoth front
end loader to AVNR’s SE corner to pile old logs, remnants
of logging 20 years ago, across an abandoned extraction
road. The logs will be a bit untidy for 3 to 5 years, but the
red alders and locally-occurring conifers we planted among
them will hide the logs during that time. The logs will decay
into excellent salamander habitat and finally disappear in a
decade or two, leaving a barrier of living trees behind.
If you see Bernie in town or use his cleaning service
(Reynold’s Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning) thank him for
us!
For our part, we have strung and flagged a wire to mark
the edge of our property shared with Sharon and Bernie.
It won’t stop hippos or ‘squitoes, but it will be noted by
straying strollers.
Crown lands abut our west side. The Crown parcel was
not logged when AVNR was, so the trees are a lot older. That
is great, not only because they are lovely but also because
they give us an idea of what AVNR will look like in a lifetime
or so. However, the bigger the trees get the more risk that
the Province will sell stumpage (term of art: they sell trees,
the stumpage is left). For years the Conservancy has tried to
persuade the Province to give parkland status to all Crown
lands on Salt Spring Island, a goal especially appropriate to
AVNR.
– Charles Dorworth
 crown land crown land

Winter 2006

Inside SSIC

Fairy Doors a Best Seller

We all know that the fairies live on Mount Erskine. We
met some of them at the Mount Erskine celebration
handing out programs, awards and cake. Their homes
on the mountain are how parents get their children to
climb happily to the top, assured that a fairy home is
just around the next corner.
This allure the fairies have on people also sold
large quantities of Fairy Door Fir Soap at Salt Spring
Soap Works this summer (all proceeds going to the
acquisition of Mount Erskine) but did you ever think
that fairy doors, just the doors with no homes attached,
would be a big seller at the Beaver Point Christmas Craft
fair? Well they were.
The fairy power once again did its magic. The
Conservancy sold 50 fairy doors making a nice little
profit that was well worth the effort. The Conservancy
wants to thank all the fairy door painters who gladly
created the beautiful little doors, as well as those who
bought them and bought raffle tickets. The fairies be
with you.
– Jean Gelwicks Photo by Gordon White

Fall is Spring
Continued from page 
the mosses that first colonized a burnt area were completely
different from the ones that lived in the old forest, and I
realized that mosses, like trees, follow succession and have
incredible diversity. Our favorite mosses we called “The
Three Moss-keteers”, a trio of lush and pervasive mosses that
dominate the older spruce stands. One of those mosses is
quite competitive in local forest ecosystems: Stair-Step Moss
or, simply, Step Moss (Hylocomnium splendens), a very
distinctive moss that puts up a new “step” of leaves every
season.
Though some workshop participants were mainly
interested in learning to appreciate and identify these
miniature plants, others wanted to learn about incorporating
more mosses into their gardens. Various theories exist, such
as mulching mosses and mixing them with buttermilk
or yoghurt and spreading them on the rock or ground.
Unfortunately, though moss plants are extremely resistant to
fungus, when they are mulched they become very susceptible
and can quickly rot, especially if they are put in the wrong
habitat. However, because they have no root system, they
can easily be picked and transplanted, and this is a great way
to bring them into your garden landscapes. It is best to find
mosses that live in a similar location and habitats to the area
in which you wish to plant them, and then transplant those.
Only take some of the mosses from the middle of a patch, and
if the patch is small it is best to leave it alone. Either put the
transplants directly into your garden or put the transplants
into pots partially filled with soil from your garden. Leave
the pots where you wish the moss to grow, make sure they
are watered, and pull any weedy plants: mosses will pack the
pots and be ideal for transplanting.
On a conservation note, care should be taken when
buying hanging baskets with moss lining (the type
commonly sold in nurseries and garden centers), as well
as the bags of moss that are sold to make hanging baskets.
Some unscrupulous moss collectors will literally rake a forest
stand empty it of ground cover to collect basket materials,
which can be terribly damaging to the ecosystem. The same
goes for buying peat, which mainly consists of Sphagnum
mosses. Though often touted as a sustainable product,
peatlands take many years to develop and are being strongly
affected by global warming, and often peat is not harvested
in an ecologically sensitive manner. Try to use other natural
and local materials to increase moisture retention in soils.
To identify mosses on your property, a good book to
begin with is Pojar and MacKinnon’s “Plants of Coastal
British Columbia”. Get a small hand lens, get on your hands
and knees, and get personal with these exquisite plants.
Features such as the growth habit, the branching pattern,
the leaf shape, and the location provide the clues you need
to identify your mossy neighbours. And remember that most
of the dry, brown moss that you see in summer is not dead;
it’s just waiting for its own special spring.
For more information: mossmandrake@yahoo.ca

10 The Acorn - Newsletter of the Salt Spring Island Conservancy

 Essential details

Garry Oak Seedlings
Thanks to a very generous donation by Paul Linton, the
Conservancy now has about 600 Garry oaks, gathered as
nuts in 04, planted, and now potted in 8” pots in good
dirt. We are selling them as a fundraiser for $10 each, or
3 for $25. We encourage Salt Spring landowners that live
in current or former Garry oak ecosystems to plant oaks,
and we can provide information on the best way to do so.
Please call 538-0318 to arrange purchase of oaks, or for
more information about endangered Garry oak ecosystems
on Salt Spring.
Office Update
Items Wanted:
Donations of any of the following gratefully received.
Office Items Other Items
Vacuum cleaner Saws, clippers
Speaker phone Compass
Laptop computer Loppers
Small refrigerator Hand secateurs
We would also appreciate donations of gifts, such as new
books or items related to nature or conservation, to give to
our educational speakers, who volunteer their time.

Help Wanted: Folk Art Kindling!

• Do you like talking to friendly people? Paul Burke of Blue Horse Folk Art has 20 burlap coffee bags
• Do you have 4-8 hours a week that you could volunteer of wonderful pieces of pine and other woods that make great
to the Conservancy? kindling! $15/ bag, all proceeds to SSIC. Pick up at 175
North View, 537- 0754.
We need YOU to help us schedule volunteers. We have the Firewood is still available for those who may need more after
volunteers, we just need some help calling them. our cold wet winter. Suggested donation to the Conservancy
Please call Karen 538-0318 for more information. is $100 per cord. Please call 538-0318.
The Acorn is the newsletter of the Salt Spring Island Conservancy, a local non-profit society supporting and enabling
voluntary preservation and restoration of the natural environment of Salt Spring Island and surrounding waters. We welcome
your feedback and contributions, by email to ssiconservancy@saltspring.com or by regular mail. Opinions expressed here
are the authors’, not subject to Conservancy approval.

Editor: Bob Weeden
Layout: Brian Smallshaw
Membership Application Volunteer Opportunities
Youth (Under 16) 1 yr @ $15 _ We have a Volunteer Application Form
Board of Directors: Senior or Low-Income: 1 yr @ $20 _ 3 yr @ $60 _ that best describes areas you wish to
Samantha Beare (Treasurer)
Maureen Bendick (President)
Regular Single 1 yr @ $25 _ 3 yr @ $75 _ help in. For now, which areas interest
Nigel Denyer Regular Family 1 yr @ $35 _ 3 yr @ $105 _ you? Please check off:
Charles Dorworth Group/School 1 yr @ $35 _ 3 yr @ $105 _ r Office Work (typing, filing or
Jean Gelwicks
Maxine Leichter
Business 1 yr @ $55 _ 3 yr @ $165 _ computer work)
Steve Leichter r Information Table at Saturday
Linda Quiring (Vice-president) Name: _ ______________________________________ Market (May through September)
Brian Smallshaw
Ruth Tarasoff
Address: _ ____________________________________ r Education Programs
Bob Weeden (Secretary) _ ____________________________________________ r Annual Fundraising Events
Doug Wilkins Postal Code: __________________________________ r Information Table at SSI
The Salt Spring Island Phone:_ ______________________________________ Community Events
Conservancy Email:________________________________________ r Joining a SSIC Committee (Land
#201 Upper Ganges Centre, Restoration & Management,
338 Lower Ganges Rd.
Mail: PO Box 722, r Please send me the Acorn via e-mail. Fundraising, Covenants,
Salt Spring Island BC (We NEVER give out member’s email addresses to anyone!) Acquisitions, Education,
V8K 2W3 r This is a renewal for an existing membership Stewardship, or Environmental
Office hours : Tues/Wed/Thurs
10 am - 3 pm Governance)
Phone: (250) 538-0318 Donations r Other: _______________________
Fax: (250) 538-0319 In addition to my membership fee above, I have enclosed
Email: The Salt Spring Island
my donation in the amount of:
ssiconservancy@saltspring.com
Web site:
http://saltspring.gulfislands.com/
$50 _ $100 _ $250 _ $500 _ $1000_ $2500 _ $5000 _ Conservancy
Ganges PO Box 722
Other ___________
conservancy Salt Spring Island BC
Tax receipts will be provided for donations of $20 or more. V8K 2W3
Printed on 18% recycled paper

Winter 2006 11
 the Salt Spring Island
Con servancy
Ganges P.O. Box 722
40026325
Salt Spring Island, BC
V8K 2W3