Kootenay Conservation Program (KCP), a partnership of over 85 organizations, leveraged significant funding in 2024 towards land stewardship in the Columbia Valley that, in turn, supports community well-being. With funding from Environment and Climate Change Canada for the Kootenay Connect Priority Places initiative, KCP has brought in millions of dollars to support monitoring and restoration work throughout the Kootenays, including the Columbia Valley.
“We are extremely proud of KCP, and the ability of our partnership to work collaboratively towards shared conservation goals that benefit local ecosystems and communities” says Juliet Craig, KCP Program Director. “Collectively, KCP partner organizations have a large conservation impact on wildlife and the habitats they depend upon in our region.”
In 2024, field inventorying and monitoring of species at risk continued to build local knowledge and inform land management with the support of Kootenay Connect Priority Places. Last summer, 810 new active badger burrows were documented, contributing to a total of over 2,400 badger burrows that have been located and mapped in the Columbia Valley over the past four years. This conservation work enables a baseline for understanding local wildlife by monitoring impacts to their populations over time and guiding conservation measures such as designation of Wildlife Habitat Areas to protect badger habitat.
Last year KCP partners also continued to research and explore ways to enhance the invaluable Columbia Wetlands. With support from Kootenay Connect Priority Places, the Columbia Wetlands Stewardship Partners (CWSP) assessed 371 wetland sites on the Westside Benchlands for vulnerability to drought and suitability for restoration using human-built dams called “beaver dam analogues” to retain water. Four beaver dam analogous were installed, demonstrating a simple and cost-effective way to provide ecosystem benefits that mimic natural beaver dams. Positive results include raising the water table, improving floodplain connectivity, creating small open water ponds to help slow water in the stream, moderating stream temperatures, replenishing shallow groundwater stores, and nourishing streams with sediment.
West of Columbia Lake, CWSP completed detailed surveys of beaver dams in Upper Marion Creek in 2024, and located 24 active beaver dams and 5 active beaver lodges. These active dams hold more than 33,000 cubic metres of water on the landscape, create marsh, swamp, and fen wetland habitats, and help regulate the flow and temperature of Marion Creek, all of which support biodiversity, including species such as the provincially blue-listed Westslope cutthroat trout. Given the lack of permanently inundated wetlands in the broader benchlands of Columbia Lake, these wetlands and the beaver dams that maintain them are particularly important in providing wetland habitat and water to the adjacent conservation properties managed by the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) and The Nature Trust of BC.
“The collaborative partnerships supported through Kootenay Connect Priority Places have enabled local people and organizations to pool their expertise and collectively address priorities that will significantly improve our chances for protecting our region’s biodiversity and ecological resilience in the face of a changing climate,” explains Marcy Mahr, Kootenay Connect Manager.
KCP has also leveraged conservation funding by working with the Regional District of East Kootenay (RDEK) to establish the Columbia Valley Local Conservation Fund (CVLCF), a dedicated fund to support high priority local conservation projects in rural areas and municipalities between Spillimacheen and Canal Flats. Since 2008, the CVLCF has supported 129 stewardship and land securement projects, contributing nearly $3.1 million, which has leveraged nine times that amount in external grants and in-kind contributions. The fund has supported projects such as ecosystem restoration, species at risk recovery, invasive species management, water quality monitoring, and supporting farmers to take extraordinary stewardship measures.
In 2024, the CVLCF also supported the purchase of the Geddes Creek Conservation Area by NCC. Adjacent to Kootenay National Park, this area is an important contribution to the Radium wildlife corridor, as recognized by KCP’s Kootenay Connect Priority Places initiative as an area critical for at-risk species and wildlife movement. This important land purchase was made possible through funding from the partnership between NCC and Parks Canada, the Fish and Wildlife Compensation Program and the CVLCF.
All this work would not be possible without the support of our local and regional funders, including Columbia Basin Trust and the Fish and Wildlife Compensation Program. The KCP Team and Board would like to acknowledge the important contribution of these funders, as well as KCP partners, as we look ahead to 2025 projects that continue to benefit ecosystem health and our Columbia Valley communities now and into the future.
For more information about these initiatives and much more, please visit KCP’s website, kootenayconservation.ca.
Lead image: A field technician assesses a natural beaver dam in the Columbia Wetlands as part of CWSP’s Columbia Valley Local Conservation Fund project. Catriona Leven / CWSP photo
