| Abstract/Description or Keywords |
To assess the effectiveness of this policy, in May 2001 the B.C. Ministry of Forests in partnership with the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans and Pierre Beaudry & Associates Ltd., and with funding from Forest Renewal British Columbia (subsequently Forest Investment Account), initiated the Prince George Small Streams Project. This co-operative field project was designed to scientifically evaluate if the Prince George District Manager (PGDM) policy was maintaining the necessary ecological attributes for healthy fish habitat. The project was designed to quantify the temporal, geographic, and among-stream natural variations in late summer / fall temperatures, and to detail channel morphometrics and substrate descriptions, erosion sources, litterfall, shade, benthic invertebrates, periphyton biomass, water chemistry, nutrients, woody debris, the downstream export of organic material, and invertebrate drift. The project provides an interdisciplinary research approach to the study of a small-stream riparian zone management prescription in the central interior of British Columbia. It was developed to assess the physical, chemical, and biological response of small streams to the riparian retention strategy within an adaptive management framework. Secondary project objectives included evaluating the effect of riparian harvesting on natural disturbance regimes (e.g., blowdown) on the ecology of small streams, evaluating the effectiveness of the PGDM Policy as a partial-cut silviculture alternative for the management of riparian areas adjacent to small streams, and increasing knowledge about the dominant watershed process controlling the ecology of small streams and how these processes can be managed for sustainability. |
