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Safe Haven film screenings planned for B.C. communities

Safe Haven to be shown in B.C. communities in 2025! The film highlights the globally significant Inland Temperate Rainforest encompassed in VWS’s Rainbow-Jordan Wilderness Park proposal. It is a sequel to Damien Gillis and VWS’s first film Primeval, which was instrumental in helping to achieve protection of the Incomappleux ancient forest as a conservancy in 2023. The film has already been selected for the Colorado Environmental Film Festival, the Fernie Mountain Film Festival, and won Best Environmental Film through Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival.
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OPEN LETTER BY COALITION CALLS ON BC GOVERNMENT TO PROTECT BC GRIZZLY BEARS

Fifty-five environmental and animal care organizations, conservationists, scientists and nature-based businesses have signed a joint letter to the BC government opposing a new plan that would profoundly change the management of grizzly bears. The plan would set up a system of local and regional wildlife advisory committees across BC, for the purpose of creating their own, separate grizzly bear management plans. The signatories have serious concerns that the document signals a possible reinstatement of the grizzly bear trophy hunt in BC.
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ACTION ALERT! BC Government Plans Harmful Changes to Grizzly Bear Management

The BC government is asking for input (by Oct 6, 2023) on a new Grizzly Bear Stewardship Framework that could open the door to trophy hunting and lead to extirpation of at-risk population units. While grizzly bear population data is still limited and detrimental impacts on population units are increasing, the province appears to be dishing out the power to decide the fate of the at-risk species to special interest groups and local or regional committees, instead of keeping wildlife management in the hands of qualified biologists...

Current Campaigns

Wildlife Conservation

MOUNTAIN CARIBOU – The battle to save the critically endangered Deep-snow Mountain Caribou.

LARGE CARNIVORES – VWS opposes wolf culls and maternity pens for caribou cows, and focuses on the real problem: habitat destruction.

WESTERN TOADS – A project to protect biodiversity by reducing human-caused mortality of threatened western toads.

GRIZZLY BEARS – A welcome but fragile end to grizzly bear hunting.

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Inland Temperate Rainforest Park Proposals

VWS has achieved decades of research in the Inland Temperate Rainforest region of British Columbia. The result is a portfolio of three proposals for new parks that would protect high-biodiversity old-growth Inland Temperate Rainforest and many species at risk. WATCH THE SHORT FILM, Primeval: Enter the Incomappleux.

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Grow BC Parks Campaign

Fifty-eight scientists, organizations, businesses and advocates across British Columbia are calling for a major expansion of BC’s Parks and Protected Areas to preserve biodiversity and take meaningful action on climate change.

The Grow BC Parks Coalition is petitioning the Provincial and First Nation governments of British Columbia to immediately protect BC’s remaining intact natural areas.

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Chilcotin Wildlife Protection

Tsilquot’in, Friends of Nemaiah Valley, VWS and others are working to protect BC’s last 1,000 wild horses from government culls and other threats generated by the cattle industry. These are the last of tens of thousands of wild horses that once ran free in the interior BC grassland belt. The last wild horse cull was in 1988. Lacking any legislative protection, they are constantly under threat of indiscriminate shooting and government culls.

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History of Valhalla Wilderness Society

Valhalla Provincial Park stretches from the far shore of Slocan Lake in British Columbia, to the mountaintops.

Valhalla Provincial Park was created in 1983 after eight years of hard-won battle by the Valhalla Wilderness Society (VWS). VWS went on to successfully spearhead campaigns for the Khutzeymateen Grizzly Bear Sanctuary, Goat Range Provincial Park, and the Spirit Bear Conservancies on Princess Royal Island. The charitable organization also played one of the key roles in the protection of South Moresby National Park Reserve. Its Endangered Wilderness Map of 1988 initiated the movement to double BC’s park system to 12% of the province. VWS has led park campaigns that now protect over 560,000 hectares. The work resulted in numerous national and international conservation awards received by Chairperson Colleen McCrory.

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our beloved wilderness

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The Inland Temperate Rainforest is the traditional territory
of many First Nations including in the south area, the Sinixt.

Valhalla Wilderness Society

Champion of conservation since 1975. We are a BC-Based wilderness conservation organization, specializing in the creation of parks and protected areas for wildlife and ecosystems.

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Email: info (at) vws (dot) org

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