In the past 50 years, eutrophication has become the most serious environmental threat to lakes worldwide. Eutrophication is a common issue in many urban lakes on Vancouver Island including Langford Lake, Elk/Beaver Lake, and Quamichan Lake with deteriorating water quality that is a concern for the ecosystem as well as human health.

On October 13-14, the first-year cohort went on a weekend field trip to Squamish to tour restoration projects run by the Squamish River Watershed Society (SRWS). Continue reading →

While the concepts and ideas we cover in the classroom are the foundation for our work in restoration, learning the nitty-gritty details of how to apply them is equally important to success. Enter field school: two intensive weeks learning the practical techniques for monitoring and data collection. These skills will let us will let us evaluate if our projects are working and adapt them to be more successful. Plus who doesn’t love going outside to muck around? It’s  a big part of the reason why most of us are here. Continue reading →

On October 9, the first-year cohort went on a field trip to Stanley Park to do intertidal sampling and learn about experimental design. We assisted Dan Esler from the USGS to gather data on the distribution of Pacific blue mussels (Mytilus trossulus) in the intertidal off the northwest side of Stanley Park as part of a larger project on trophic relationships in nearshore marine ecosystems. Continue reading →