Organizations Leading the Market Action

Castle Special Management Area

The popular Castle Special Management Area is public land located in the Rocky Mountains and foothills between the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park and Crowsnest Pass in southwest Alberta and within the trans-boundary Crown of the Continent ecosystem.  A sawmill located outside the region, Spray Lake Sawmills in Cochrane, west of Calgary, and the Alberta Sustainable Resource Development Depart­ment (SRD) are set to log the core of this “protected area” commencing early June 2011, unless stopped by the public opposition.

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of Spray Lakes Cut Blocks in the
Castle

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Spray Lakes Cut Blocks

FSC Certification

The Castle falls with the Crowsnest Forest (C5 FMA), which is that portion of the Rocky Mountain Forest Reserve located between the south boundary of Kananaskis Country west of Calgary, and the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park.  Together with the peace park, it is the headwaters of the Oldman River Basin of southern Alberta, which consists of 70 municipalities including the City of Lethbridge.  The Castle provides an unprecedented third of the annual water-flow in the Basin.

 

The Bow Forest (FMUs B9, B 10 and B11) located to the north of the Crowsnest Forest and Spray Lake Sawmills are currently undergoing a pre-assessment to determine if it will enter into an FSC certification process.  However, the sawmill and SRD have not entered into any FSC pre-assessment process or FSC certification process for any part or whole of the Crowsnest Forest (C5). Indeed, the Castle “protected area” would be a High Conservation Value Forest and set aside from logging under FSC criteria, if the Crowsnest Forest was FSC certified. 

Some forestry companies are signatories to the Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement, and are working together with environmental groups to improve logging practices and protect areas like the Castle from logging.  Canfor, Weyerhaeuser, Tolko, West Fraser, Daishowa, Millar Western and Al-Pac are all part of the Agreement.  Spray Lakes, Sundance, Alberta Newsprint Company, Foothills Forest Products, Manning Diversified and many others are not.

Pending Block-Cut / Clear-Cut Logging

The block-cut logging (commonly called clear-cut by the public) is scheduled within the very same Castle Special Management Area that the Alberta Government had said is a protected area and announced as “a milestone in the preservation of Alberta’s natural heritage for future generations” in 1998.  The province still lists it

as one of Alberta’s 81 Special Places coming out of its Special Places 2000 program and that lengthy consultation on new protected areas (1995-2001).

The public first learned of the 2005 logging license April 2010, when Spray Lake Sawmills and SRD decided to log in 2011; pre-empting new regional-planning and ignoring the 1998 decision.  No public consultation was held before SRD decided to issue the license, nor before it ap­proved logging to commence June 2011.  The logging, planned to occur over two logging-seasons, amounts to five percent of the mill’s timber supply during its current five-year operating plan.

 

Your prompt action is needed to save the popular Castle Special Place / Special Management Area located in the headwaters of southern Alberta from block-cut  (commonly called clear-cut) logging by a sawmill located outside the region.  Spray Lake Sawmills located west of Calgary is set to start logging operations June 2011 and plans to take what they estimate as 3,750 truckloads of logs from the protected area over two logging seasons.  It's short-term jobs at the expense of local, long-term ones associated with tourism and outdoor recreation.  Such large-scale logging has not occurred in the Castle Special Place since 1998, when the Government of Alberta announced it had added it as the new Castle Special Management Area to “Alberta’s protected areas network.”  The Government described it then as “a milestone in the preservation of Alberta’s natural heritage for future generations.”

The Sustainable Resource Development Department approved the logging last year for the logging license they had issued to the sawmill in 2005 and for the sawmill's requested expansion of the license; both without public consultation and ignoring the 1998 protected area decision.  The Spray Lake Sawmills and Alberta Sustainable Resource Development are intent on logging the Castle Special Management Area despite:  

•    No pine beetle outbreak and it being at low risk of a future                     outbreak from this native Rocky Mountain beetle.
•    Regional land-use planning stipulating watershed protection,             tourism and recreation as the highest priorities for the area; not         block-cut/clear-cut logging.
•    Since 1934, the historically most extensively logged drainages in       the Castle (those of the Carbondale) being  where all the major          fires (> 2 sq. km) have occurred.
•    Few intact forests in Alberta’s southern headwaters and less than       9% of the Castle remaining with trees over 150 years of age,              when the natural landscape there should be a third old-growth          forests.
•    The Castle providing an unsurpassed 1/3 of the annual water              flow for most of southern Alberta; specifically the water stressed,       Oldman River Basin and its 70 municipalities, including Lethbridge.

ACTION CHECKLIST

•    Write a short letter to Premier Stelmach. Use the white box at the end & write your letter in it,              using your own words and making use of tips below.  You can change the wording of the                  Subject if you wish.  Click to send when done.  Copies will also automatically go to local MLA,          Evan Berger and the opposition MLAs: Bridget Pastoor, Liberal; Paul Hinman, Wild Rose;              Rachel Notley, NDP; and Dave Taylor, Alberta Party.
•    After you send your letter, please take a moment and call MLA Evan Berger (403-553-2400).             Berger is the local MLA. Let him know of your opposition.
•    Print & post the poster with maps & photos. Download the poster in (1.74 MB) or (199 KB)             format, open and print with your computer's picture printing function at letter size and post, or for       more impact, save to memory stick & print at ledger size (11" x 17") at a local print shop & then       post in public places.
•    Ask friends & family to join the action and send them the link to this action alert.
•    Stay in the news & action loop by "liking" Stop Castle Logging on Facebook.  If not on                         Facebook, you can still (http://tinyurl.com/4v7pp7y)

TIPS FOR WRITING LETTERS

•    State what the Castle Special Place / Special Management Area means to you.
•    Ask Premier Stelmach to stop the pending logging of the Castle.
•    Use your own reasons and/or draw from the action alert above.
•    Ask that your concerns are represented in the Alberta Legislature.
•    Request a reply.

FOR MORE INFORMATION

•    Poster with maps & photos: (1.74 MB) or (199 KB).
•    Read the Government of Alberta’s highlights of their (www.castlespecialplace.ca) and .
•    Ad hoc network’s (www.stopcastlelogging.org)

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