PSPS Blog
Welcome to the PSPS Blog, your go-to source for stories, insights, and updates from Pacific Spirit Park Society. Here, we delve into the heart of Pacific Spirit Regional Park, exploring its rich ecosystems, sharing the latest on our conservation efforts, and highlighting the incredible work of our community of volunteers and partners. Whether you’re passionate about environmental stewardship, curious about local wildlife, or simply love spending time in nature, the PSPS Blog offers a window into the vibrant life of the park. Join us as we share knowledge, celebrate successes, and connect with the natural world around us.
Could Pacific Spirit Park eventually be home to the Tallest Trees in the World?
One of my favourite bits to do on my Forest Walks begins by first asking participants what the tallest tree in the world is. Usually people are quick to answer that it is Redwoods in California. Some can even give the name of the tallest tree in the world: Hyperion. A...
Holly Hubris: Why Our Spikey Leaved Adversary Took Over British Columbia Forests
Every once and awhile I try and do some 'big tree' hunting in British Columbia. I've discovered something a bit distressing when I do find these big trees. Almost always there is an English Holly (ilex aquifolium) growing somewhere near the Big Tree. It doesn't matter...
Why are there so many Living Stumps in Pacific Spirit Park?
In the opening of his popular 2015 book, The Hidden Life of Trees, Peter Wohlleben describes coming across what he thought was a moss covered stone in a forest, only to discover after removing the moss that it was actually tree bark. I’ll let Wohlleben describe what...
Acorns Everywhere – What a 2025 Oak Mast Year may mean for Pacific Spirit Park
English Oak via Unsplash Fall 2025 has proven to be a lucky season so far as we are in midst of the still unexplained ecological phenomena of an Oak Mast Year. Somehow Oak trees across the North Hemisphere have all collectively decided to produce an above-average,...
Library Fill Hill – Can a Giant Pile of Dirt near Camosun Bog Become a Native Forest Again?
Imagine walking into your favorite local forest one day only to discover that it was now just a massive pile of dirt. Thanks to a nearby construction spot, an incredible amount of dirt had been dumped: Ten feet high and taking up the area of a soccer field. Trees...
Those Fluffy White Seeds that cover Vancouver every late spring? Unlocking the secrets behind them could be a very powerful tool in fighting climate change.
Republishing an old blog post of mine from 2021 that's very relevant in late May and early June. Those Fluffy White Seeds that cover Vancouver every late spring? Unlocking the secrets behind them could be a very powerful tool in fighting climate change. Every late May...
A Forgotten ‘Miracle Drug’ – A brief history of the Cascara Tree in British Columbia
About a month ago I was browsing the shelves of Woodward Library - UBC’s Science and Forestry Library – and stumbled across a book published in 1942 that sent me down a research rabbit hole about a native common tree in Pacific Spirit Park. The book in question,...
Racism, Shingles, and Honey – The Complicated Modern History of Hollow Western Redcedar Trees
Stanley Park’s giant Hollow Tree used to be a world-famous landmark. Tourists and locals engaged in increasingly ridiculous behaviors of seeing just how much could fit inside of it. Many tourists and locals had a photo of them inside the tree…while inside a car. In a...
Unravelling the mystery of the Douglas Fir Sugar Craze in the 1920s
In February 1920 the American Forestry Magazine ran the all-capital headline “DISCOVERY OF SUGAR ON DOUGLAS FIR”. The opening paragraphs of the article is worth reading for the pulsing excitement: Long before the first white man came to North America with his luxuries...
Rethinking our human-focused approach reveals Ancient Trees much older then we think in Pacific Spirit Park
What is the oldest tree in Pacific Spirit Park (PSP)? We don’t know exact ages, but if you are looking for old trees, especially big old trees, you would find them on the cliff slope forests of Wreck Beach or in the Ecological Reserve along Sword Fern trail. The...