Ministry of Environment Ecology

Shining Mountains Project

Overview - Regional and Zonal Ecosystems in the Shining Mountains

" At length the Rocky Mountains came in sight like shining white clouds in the horizon, and as we proceeded they rose in height, their immense masses of snow appeared above the clouds and formed an impassible barrier, even to the Eagle." David Thompson , 1787

The Shining Mountain Project was developed by the British Columbia Ministry of Environment, Lands and Parks for the purpose of determining the distribution and extent of regional and zonal ecosystems that British Columbia shares with the various jurisdictions surrounding the province. Using criteria developed by the former Ministry of Environment, Lands and Parks and the Ministry of Forests, two ecosystem classifications are portrayed, Ecoregions and Vegetation Zonation.

The area depicted includes British Columbia and adjacent areas from 45° 45' North latitude to 61° North latitude, and from the Pacific coast east to the 110° West meridian. This area, because it encompasses two provinces, parts of two territories, and all or part of 5 US states, has no common geographical or political name - the name "Shining Mountains" was used to reflect the Plains Indians' view of the western North American Cordillera. Several government agencies have cooperated in this project, especially, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, the USDA Forest Service - Alaska Region, the US National Park Service - Alaska Region, the BC Ministry of Forests - Research Branch, the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks and Yukon Department of Renewable Resources. In addition, habitat data used to produce this map was provided by several US agencies including the USDA National Forests, Idaho and Montana State Forests, and the Indian tribes in Montana, Idaho and eastern Washington. Ecoregion boundaries for the Canadian portion, outside of BC, were taken from the 1995 "Terrestrial Ecozones and Ecoregions of Canada".

The Vegetation Zones and Ecoregion units were mapped and digitized at 1:250,000, the map produced here is presented at 1:3,000,000. The level of accuracy for boundaries and polygons over the entire map is in the range of 1:500,000 - 1:1,000,000.