For immediate release

Tour completes First Stage Through Heart of Spotted Owl Habitat

Vancouver, BC - French cyclists led by Wilderness Committee volunteer Franck Brezille have just completed the first stage of their cross-Canada trip from Vancouver, cycling on logging and gravel roads through an area formerly the stronghold of spotted owls in BC, the lower Fraser, Harrison, Lillooet and Birkenhead River valleys northeast of Vancouver.

Formerly home to at least 30 unique spotted owl territories, but with only 1 confirmed site with a spotted owl remaining (Billygoat Creek, 2008), the area covered by the cyclists along the North Shore mountains to Harrison Hot Springs and then north through the Harrison and Lillooet River Valleys to Birkenhead Provincial Park has a long history of landscape abuse that continues today with old-growth forest logging and run of river hydro development.

Last month, the Wilderness Committees staff scientist Andy Miller led a protest camp at Fire Mountain in the Lillooet River Valley southeast of Pemberton to focus attention on BC government-sanctioned clearcut logging at a Fire Mountain spotted owl site where a spotted owl was last observed in 2005.

"Regardless whether spotted owls still exist at Fire Mountain, which looks increasingly doubtful, these sites from which spotted owls have only recently disappeared should be prioritized for protection and not logged so that young owls bred in captivity have suitable wild areas for release," said Miller.

"Luckily, the one remaining spotted owl site at Billygoat Creek is in Garibaldi Provincial Park. Otherwise I expect the BC government would be sanctioning logging its habitat too. Unfortunately, plans are afoot for logging operations just outside the park, as well as for a run of river hydro project with its associated logging, road-building and destruction of streamside spotted owl habitat," said Miller.

The cyclists visited Doctors Creek, Douglas Creek, Fire Mountain, Rogers Creek and S&M Creek in the Harrison and Lillooet River Valleys, as well as Birkenhead Provincial Park, all areas with recent spotted owl citings, and high quality spotted owl habitat.

Cyclist Franck Brezille, who is also visiting from France, said, "We are very sad to see the way the BC government treats the endangered spotted owl. It is a travesty and they should be held to account."

The tour will next pass through the Okanagan, including the proposed Okanagan National Park Reserve, home to the greatest concentration of endangered species in Canada.

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For more information contact: Franck Brezille, 604-910-5962 or Andy Miller, 604-992-3099