Many district offices across the province celebrated National Forest Week in style and captured their events on film.

Arrow Forest District: District staff held a poster contest for school children and visited six classrooms to talk about forestry.

Bulkley-Smithers Forest District: Seven hundred students had a choice of 10 stations to visit as they walked through the woods.

Cariboo Forest Region: Ten Grade-5 classes came to the district’s open house. The life underground display set up by research staff proved to be widely popular.

Chilliwack Forest District: Over 500 people participated in the district’s grand opening and open house of their new office. The helicopters and protection branch’s mobile command centre were very popular.

Clearwater Forest District: Staff held a different activity on each day of National Forest Week. Staff visited close to 800 children in classrooms and led 300 on forest walks. They set up displays in front of the local grocery store and gave away about 2,000 seedlings. One of the most popular activities for kids was the salmon game that follows the route of Clearwater salmon – all the way to Alaska. Kids are given four tags at the beginning of the game and they have to surrender a tag each time they are touched by a danger, similar to that faced by salmon, e.g. fishing nets, waterfalls, bears.

Fort Nelson Forest District: Staff held a colouring contest for kids in kindergarten through to Grade 4.

Fort St. James Forest District: All of the town’s Grade 5 students participated in a forestry day hike, which was a big hit. The students took pictures with disposable cameras and then made posters of their pictures for display at a local trade fair.

Kispiox Forest District: Staff visited 21 classrooms and conducted 10 walks. One of the favourite activities was the in-house logger sports for district staff, who found it a great way to reduce stress.

Kootenay Lake Forest District: Staff set up a mall display in Nelson where they gave out about 500 seedlings.

Creston Field Office–Kootenay Lake District
Horse logging in Creston – is it something in the water?

Creston Field Office–Kootenay Lake District
Children log the old-fashioned way and watch today’s heavy equipment cut logs at two of the six stations on an annual tour organized by the Creston Field Office and local licensees. About 180 children participated in the tour.

Lillooet Forest District: Staff visited six classrooms, held a tree planting along a community trail, held a poster contest for school-aged children and developed a retrospective web site to fit the National Forest Week theme, Learning from the Past, Building for the Future. The site is at: www.for.gov.bc.ca/kamloops/district/lillooet/index.htm

Mid-Coast Forest District; In addition to the Community Forestry Family Day, when over 20-dozen hot dogs were consumed, district staff visited eight classrooms and conducted seven forest walks, led a family hike and set up displays in Hagensborg and Bella Coola.

Smokey made an appearance for his fans at Community Forestry Family Day in Hagensborg.

Samuel Frisby, 5, and Kaleb King, 4, compete in the nail drive – one of four events held as part of kids logger sports. In total, 62 children competed and all received a medal of participation.

Penticton Forest District: Staff visited two classrooms, participated in a career day, gave a presentation to a local Cub pack and posted two virtual tours on its web site.

Quesnel Forest District: About 450 students learned about forest machinery, soil and tree identification and measurement on a tour. Staff held a seedling-growing contest for two Grade 5 classes. Seedlings that students started growing in January were on display and judged at the local mall. Staff assisted local Beaver, Cub and Scout groups with Scoutrees, their annual tree-planting event.

A few of the 45 children led by Robson Valley forest district staff on a walk of the West Twin Old Growth Recreation Trail. The district, with local licensees, held pancake breakfasts in McBride and Valemount and raffled off value-added products made by local artisans.

Salmon Arm Forest District: Staff visited three classrooms and participated in the school district’s career fair.

Squamish Forest District: Staff conducted five tours of a demonstration forest and had 500 people visit their display booth in Whistler.

South Island Forest District: About 1,300 people visited the district’s information booth at the Forest Discovery Centre in Duncan.

People gather around the South Island District booth at the farmers’ market in Port Alberni.

Smokey the Bear with some friends. Smokey and the Protection Branch’s Mars water bomber were both very popular.

www.for.gov.bc.ca/pab/nfw