Mid Island Co-op is proud to sponsor the 32 nd Annual Brant Wildlife Festival. Your Mid Island Co-op is truly local. Since 1959 we’ve been 100% community owned, and with now over 70,000 active members, today we’re stronger together than ever before. As a member of Mid Island Co-op you’re choosing to be a part of something bigger and can feel good knowing that your purchases are helping to give back to charitable organizations in the community, to support local jobs, and to keep profits invested right here in the island communities where you live, work, and play.
As long time Brant Festival supporters since 2010, Mid Island Co-op is pleased to once again contribute to this unique celebration of nature. We hope you’re able to participate in all that the ‘Brant Capital of Canada’ showcases for locals and visitors alike. With so many new and exciting events taking place over this year’s 10-day festival, it’s shaping up to be the best one yet!
We continue to grow and diversify our business lines with 16 Gas Bars and 16 Liquor stores serving communities from Lake Cowichan to Port Hardy.
The Black Brant geese we see feeding along the shores of Parksville are on a remarkable and arduous journey of migration from California and Mexico to northern nesting grounds. Our beaches provide an abundant food source for the geese, which need to gain weight and strength before making another non-stop flight. A disturbance caused by something as simple as a child running on the beach can have drastic effects on the geese while feeding which is the reason our beaches are temporarily closed to dogs on and off leash at this time of the year.
Amazing sandy beaches and picture postcard views
Each year, we are excited to welcome the Brant to the shores of Parksville Bay Beach and Rathtrevor Beach, two of the most beautiful beaches on the east coast of Vancouver Island. Residents and visitors to our region also love these spectacular sandy beaches and the picture-perfect view of the Salish Sea. At low tide, the ocean recedes about a kilometre from shore, revealing warm beaches which stretch forever.
From our beaches, you will see across the Salish Sea to the mainland. The coastal mountain range and the Sunshine Coast, including communities like Gibsons and Sechelt, are located on the mainland to the north and west across the Strait. The islands you see from our beaches are part of the Gulf Islands. Lasqueti Island is only about 73 square kilometres and the larger island to the northeast of Lasqueti is Texada Island, which is the largest of the Gulf Islands at about 50 kilometres in length.
Bring the family and plan to stay and enjoy the best beaches of Parksville. Bring your bathing suit, plan for a picnic, bring along your skimboard, stand-up paddle board, and of course your sandcastle building skills.
Parksville Beach, part of Parksville Community Park, is a remarkable sandy, walk-on beach perfect for swimming and picnicking. A waterfront walkway along the beach is ready for your leisurely sunset stroll.
Near the beach you will find the Lions Ventureland Playground, splash park, beach volleyball courts, skatepark, sports fields, outdoor gym, as well as the many festivals and special events throughout the summer months.
Rathtrevor Beach Provincial Park is one of the premier vacation destinations on Vancouver Island.
Rathtrevor offers majestic old-growth woodland, beautiful ocean sunsets, and a wide, sandy beach with campsites nestled among the trees. At low tide, the ocean is an ideal place for visitors of all ages to play in the sand and explore the shoreline. When the tide rolls in over sunbaked sand, the warmed water is perfect for swimming and at low tide, the receding ocean exposes tide pools ready for exploration and fun.
The City of Parksville, with a population of 13,642, is an active community which blends families with young children, urban professionals, retirees, long-time residents, and new arrivals who have chosen to live in Parksville for the quality life, the region’s natural environment and developed amenities. An excellent combination of retirement, business and recreational opportunities, facilities and services make Parksville a great place to live, work, play, visit, and prosper. More info at Parksville.ca
Estimated Daily Brant Count Report – 2022
By the Arrowsmith Naturalists
For THE NATURE TRUST OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
James Goodwin
Count Coordinator and Compiler
The 2022 Brant Primary Counts covered the full length of the Parksville Qualicum Beach Wildlife Management Area (PQBWMA). The ten primary counts (Table 1) took place weekly from February 22, to April 26, during daylight hours. The PQBWMA was divided into three areas
and each area was assigned a team of 2 – 3 observers. All team counts were within the same two-hour window to avoid double counting where possible. Counts were ideally taken at approximately mid-tide (3.4M) when food sources were exposed on the beach or floating in
shallow water.
Count locations included the following named places which were also used in previous counts within the PQBWMA and Strait of Georgia (SOG).
Area 1: Little Qualicum River Estuary, Marshall Stevens Wildlife Area (MSWA), Surfside Dr. West and East, Kincade Rd., Qualicum Beach viewing stand, Seaside Nature Park (SNP), Qualicum Beach, Beach Creek, Judges Row.
Area 2: Seacrest Place, Butterball Dr, Johnstone Rd, Admiral Tryon Blvd. East and West, Columbia Beach, French Creek Marina.
Area 3: Parksville Community Park (PCP), Parksville Bay, Englishman River mouth, Mariner Way, Arlett Rd., Craig Bay, Rathtrevor Provincial Park, Brant Point, Madrona Point.
Brant Count Volume for 2022
Brant may stay in the PQBWMA for 1 – 2 days or as long 2 weeks, therefore we cannot use the total count of all Brant seen on all our Brant Counts. Instead, we take the yearly total on 6 peak counts and regress the volume according to a method courtesy of Sean Boyd, Environment
Canada.
All Brant counted during the 10 primary counts = 6277
The six peak counts: 448+410+485+1285+1541+848= 5017
Regressed volume for 2022 = 3761 (5017 x 0.67 + 400)
Regressed volumes for 6 peak counts:
2015 = 9091 2019 = 5586
2016 = 4710 2020 = 6597
2017 = 12,202 2021 = 5625
2018 = 12,693 2022 = 3761
Brant volumes peaked Apr.05 to Apr. 19 then dropped dramatically. This seasons Herring Spawn was the lowest in years. Commercial fishermen were unable the fill their quotas. Even though quotas had been reduced from 2021 levels. Most of the spawning was north of Nile Creek, off Hornby Is. and near Comox. Lack of spawning Herring in local waters left no herring eggs piled on the tide line or drifting on
the water surface to entice Brant to stay. Lack of eel grass along the high tide line possibly indicates there was less feed for migrating
Brant as well.
Disturbances to wildlife. Disturbances to feeding Brant by walkers and dogs, on and off leash, continues to be a problem. Improved signage at beach accesses and public education seems to have reduced the number of dogs on the beaches but there are still numerous disturbances by people enjoying a walk on the beach at low tide. Walkers that are totally unaware they are chasing up the birds before them.
Bald Eagles are also a source of frequent disturbances.
Small numbers of Brant were reported from each count area.
North: at Surfside Drive West, Little Qualicum Estuary, there were 56 Brant along the shore.
Central: French Creek and Columbia Beach, a total of 60 Brant were observed flying east in small groups. There were 9 beach walkers and 2 dogs running loose on the beach.
South: Rathtrevor and Parksville Bay. As previously observed the majority of the Brant were found in these locations. At Rathtrevor Beach there were 443 Brant along the shoreline and 7 eagles that flushed the birds several times. At Mariner Way there were 4 Brant flying.
Parksville Bay sheltered 285 Brant but they were also disturbed several times by eagles and beach walkers.
Planning the 2021 Brant Wildlife Festival was like entering uncharted territory. The public health restrictions meant that we could not have gatherings or our traditional events, but with determination and public support, the self-directed festival was a success.
This year we got creative in raising Nature’s profile during a pandemic. We engaged local businesses with the #SpottheBrant promotion; we created educational videos and news articles about special natural places; we met online and outside to catalogue the biodiversity in our region.
So where do we go from here? How can we continue to celebrate and support our beautiful natural environment throughout the year? As a resident of Oceanside, what can you do to make this place even more amazing?
Explore:
The Arrowsmith Naturalists: arrowsmithnats.org is a sizeable and vigorous group. They hold many outdoor trips and educational opportunities. Visit various ecosystems, learn to identify mushrooms, go birding! Find out about living within the Mount Arrowsmith Biosphere Region: mabr.ca
Visit the North Island Wildlife Recovery Centre and find out about wildlife and see the great work they do with injured wildlife: NIWRA.org
Volunteer:
There are many stewardship groups looking for a hand and it’s a great way to make friends. Help eradicate invasive plants, assist with water quality and flow measurements, work with stream restoration, help with tours, work on websites, learn new skills.
The Friends of French Creek Conservation Society, Broombusters, Qualicum Beach Streamkeepers, Mid Vancouver Island Habitat Enhancement Society, and many more groups are looking for volunteers.
Protect the Environment:
Help wildlife and the planet. Oceanside’s population will be doubling before long. This creates an ongoing threat of habitat loss and ecosystem diversity loss that affects people and wildlife alike. Respond by conserving land and restoring natural places.
The Nature Trust of British Columbia is celebrating 50 years conserving special places in BC. The Nature Trust is very active on the island and right here in our back yard. Much of the land around the Englishman River Estuary has been protected by The Nature Trust as well as conservation lands near the Englishman River Regional Park.
As the largest land trust in BC, The Nature Trust of BC has protected more than 178,000 acres of significant land in the province. Learn about their priority projects and donate on their website: www.naturetrust.bc.ca
Join the Festival:
If you have ideas for the festival next year, get in touch with us! Hopefully, we will again be able to come together in nature and have some fun. The Brant Wildlife Festival relies on community support to continue. COVID has made the festival particularly difficult these last two years.
If you have enjoyed the festival, please consider making a donation.
Forage fish are the foundation of our marine food web. With Pacific sand lance, surf smelt and Pacific herring, these little fish support many of the more obvious icons that we associate with our coast, such as rock fish, salmon, seals and Orcas. Forage fish create the richness of species needed to keep our Salish Sea healthy.
Surf smelt spawn in the sand and gravel beaches that many of us walk along every day, and yet few of us have seen these fish. These secretive species spawn at night, when we can’t see them, and they leave no visible evidence that they have even been there.
With their hidden lives, finding the exact beaches where these forage fish live takes a lot of work. Volunteer organizations, such as the Mid Vancouver Island Habitat Enhancement Society and Qualicum Beach Streamkeepers, conduct surveys of the beaches in winter months when the fish spawn. They take measurements and remove sand and gravel samples for microscopic examination to find the tiny eggs from spawning. This work is showing that most beaches in this area are likely used by sand lance and surf smelt.
But this puts important spawning habitat close to where we live and often in conflict with what we build. Seawalls in particular are a threat to forage fish, as they alter marine currents and change the composition of the sea bed – to the detriment of spawning forage fish.
Pacific herring, on the other hand, are highly visible to us, particularly during spawning. Herring spawn in the spring, laying eggs in the intertidal and subtidal zones along much of our coast. Eggs are attached to marine vegetation, where they attract predators, including people who for centuries have enjoyed “roe on kelp”. Other animals have learned to take advantage of this short-termed offering, with seals, sea lions, bald eagles, gulls and other birds enjoying a feeding frenzy of both the herring spawners and their exposed eggs. The animals aren’t alone, as the commercial herring fleet goes into its own kind of feeding frenzy.
Many biologists consider the Pacific herring as the singular fish species that drives the northern ocean ecosystem. Herring are so rich with protein and essential oils that if predators are denied herring, they can suffer from nutritional deficit. For example, there is evidence that with ocean warming, more southern fish species are moving into the north Pacific, displacing native herring stocks. Animals accustomed to herring are now eating more of these “junk food” fish and starving with a full stomach.
No one knows if this will happen in the Salish Sea, but the prudent thing to do is prepare for change.
Our coast is host to some amazing plants and animals, but perhaps none as important as the often ignored and very vulnerable forage fish species. When you look out at the Salish Sea, remember the little guys, and that from sand grain to salmon, it’s all connected.
Forage fish are the foundation of our marine food web. With Pacific sand lance, surf smelt and Pacific herring, these little fish support many of the more obvious icons that we associate with our coast, such as rock fish, salmon, seals and Orcas. Forage fish create the richness of species needed to keep our Salish Sea healthy.
Surf smelt spawn in the sand and gravel beaches that many of us walk along every day, and yet few of us have seen these fish. These secretive species spawn at night, when we can’t see them, and they leave no visible evidence that they have even been there.
With their hidden lives, finding the exact beaches where these forage fish live takes a lot of work. Volunteer organizations, such as the Mid Vancouver Island Habitat Enhancement Society and Qualicum Beach Streamkeepers, conduct surveys of the beaches in winter months when the fish spawn. They take measurements and remove sand and gravel samples for microscopic examination to find the tiny eggs from spawning. This work is showing that most beaches in this area are likely used by sand lance and surf smelt.
But this puts important spawning habitat close to where we live and often in conflict with what we build. Seawalls in particular are a threat to forage fish, as they alter marine currents and change the composition of the sea bed – to the detriment of spawning forage fish.
Pacific herring, on the other hand, are highly visible to us, particularly during spawning. Herring spawn in the spring, laying eggs in the intertidal and subtidal zones along much of our coast. Eggs are attached to marine vegetation, where they attract predators, including people who for centuries have enjoyed “roe on kelp”. Other animals have learned to take advantage of this short-termed offering, with seals, sea lions, bald eagles, gulls and other birds enjoying a feeding frenzy of both the herring spawners and their exposed eggs. The animals aren’t alone, as the commercial herring fleet goes into its own kind of feeding frenzy.
Many biologists consider the Pacific herring as the singular fish species that drives the northern ocean ecosystem. Herring are so rich with protein and essential oils that if predators are denied herring, they can suffer from nutritional deficit. For example, there is evidence that with ocean warming, more southern fish species are moving into the north Pacific, displacing native herring stocks. Animals accustomed to herring are now eating more of these “junk food” fish and starving with a full stomach.
No one knows if this will happen in the Salish Sea, but the prudent thing to do is prepare for change.
Our coast is host to some amazing plants and animals, but perhaps none as important as the often ignored and very vulnerable forage fish species. When you look out at the Salish Sea, remember the little guys, and that from sand grain to salmon, it’s all connected.
