Environmental Trends 2007

Ecosystems

Ecologically Intact Land in Protected Areas in B.C.

The presence of roads is a consequence of human activities that typically have large impacts on ecosystems, such as industrial forestry, mining, agriculture and urbanization. Roads open up areas to human disturbances, alter wildlife habitat and fragment the landscape.

Map of ecologically intact areas (i.e., areas without roads) that are more than 5 kilometres from a road and over 2,000 hectares in size.

In terms of intact land as defined above (i.e. areas without roads):

• About 31 per cent of the land area in B.C. is intact. Only 8 per cent of the province is both protected and intact.

• Over one third of the protected land area in B.C. is within 5 km of a road.

• The largest tracts of intact land are along the central and north coasts and in northwestern B.C. Protected areas in these regions are embedded in large tracts of intact land.

• About half of the intact land in the central and southern interior, the lower mainland and most of Vancouver Island is found in protected areas mostly surrounded by roads and isolated from other intact areas. This is a concern because l ack of connectivity between intact areas may leave native plants and animals more vulnerable to extinction.

• There is no intact land in the Taiga Plains ecoprovince; the Boreal Plains ecoprovince has less than one per cent remaining. Both of these ecoprovinces are in north eastern B.C. , where seismic lines fragment the landscape.

For detailed information, including graph data, see In-Depth Report [pdf].

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