Valley Bottom Habitat Restoration at Nature Conservancy of Canada’s Osoyoos Oxbows

Nature Conservancy of Canada

NCC is Canada’s leading land conservation organization, working to protect Canada’s most important natural areas and the species they sustain. Since 1962, NCC and its partners have helped to protect 2.8 million acres, coast to coast with 1 million acres conserved in British Columbia since 1974. NCC has been active in the Regional District of Okanagan Similkameen since 2002. Since that time, NCC has secured 4350 acres of high priority habitat by working with private landowners and has provided funding to other land trusts and the province to enable them to secure 6800 acres of high priority ecosystems.

This project increases restoration efforts on NCC’s Osoyoos Oxbows Conservation Area (OOCA), a crucial piece of South Okanagan valley bottom habitat. OOCA includes critical habitat for the federally listed Great Basin spadefoot, western tiger salamander, Great Basin gophersnake, desert nightsnake and pallid bat. Other federally listed species observed on the property include bobolink, long-billed curlew and western painted turtle.

This project is the last year of a 3-year request. Approved by Regional District Okanagan Similkameen Board and $12,590 was allocated from the South Okanagan Conservation Fund in 2023. The project is expected to complete by January 31, 2025.

Bat Friendly Communities of the South Okanagan

The British Columbia Conservation Foundation with Community Bat Programs of BC

The British Columbia Conservation Foundation (BCCF), a charitable not-for-profit society developed an important niche managing and administrating conservation projects in partnership with various funders. This enabled BCCF to support the efforts of local conservation organizations in their efforts to enhance and conserve fish and wildlife populations. For over 50 years, BCCF has implemented conservation projects working with First Nations, all levels of governments, non-governmental organizations, industry, private groups, and educational institutions.

Over the next three years, the BC Community Bat Program (under the British Columbia Conservation Foundation) – Okanagan Region will be working towards establishing Bat Friendly Communities with partners in Kaleden, Penticton, Naramata and the Osoyoos rural area. They will raise awareness about the importance of bats through presentations, community events, recruiting volunteers, offering Bat Ambassador training workshops, and forming working groups that can implement Bat-Friendly Communities. Also, they will be mapping where bat colonies using anthropogenic structures are located, as well as monitoring bat populations with annual bat counts. Bat conservation is important in the Okanagan as it has the highest diversity of bats in Canada and most of them are listed ‘at risk’.

This project is the first year of a 3-year request. Approved by Regional District Okanagan Similkameen Board and $33,787 was allocated from the South Okanagan Conservation Fund in 2022. The project is expected to complete by January 31, 2025.

Fairview Antelope-brush Restoration Project

The Oliver and District Heritage Society

The Oliver and District Heritage Society (ODHS) operates both the Museum and Archives facilities in the town of Oliver, B.C; located on the unceded traditional and ancestral territory of the Syilx Okanagan Nation.  Incorporated August 6, 1980, as the Oliver Heritage Society, the name was changed in 1998 to the “Oliver and District Heritage Society” to reflect the welcome support from the Regional District of Okanagan Similkameen and the Town. The Oliver & District Heritage Society is a not-for-profit organization governed by a Board of Directors. They preserve and present the history of Oliver BC; Canada’s Wine Capital, and surrounding district through exhibits, educational programming, special events, heritage walking tours, and more.

The Oliver and District Heritage Society (ODHS), as the newly appointed organization responsible for maintaining the historic Fairview townsite, wish to steward this site according to educational, historical and ecosystem values. A key aspect of its stewardship vision is to protect, enhance and educate the public about the 70 acres of globally imperiled and provincially red-listed Antelope-brush/needle-and-thread grass habitat on this site.

This project is the first year of a 3-year request. Approved by Regional District Okanagan Similkameen Board and $33,831 was allocated from the South Okanagan Conservation Fund in 2022. The project is expected to complete by January 31, 2025.

Okanagan River Restoration Initiative – Okanagan Falls Restoration

Okanagan Nation Alliance

Okanagan Nation Alliance (ONA) formed in 1981 as the inaugural First Nations government in the Okanagan and among other functions, works to provide technical fisheries assistance for the Nation and its eight member communities, including the Penticton Indian Band, and acting as a liaison between federal and provincial fisheries agencies and other non-government organizations.

This project will restore a uniform, channelized river section in Okanagan Falls by backwatering one or more of the four vertical drop structures with nature–like river features and re-engaging historic floodplain habitat downstream, in the Vaseux-Bighorn National Wildlife Area. Main goals: 1) restore diversity, complexity, and functionality of ~20,000m2 of riverine habitat in the Okanagan mainstem, 2) re-engage and enhance ~50,000m2 historic floodplain habitat, and 3) follow a syilx TEKK-based vision combined with western science tools to achieve goals. This project takes an ecosystem-based approach, targeting multiple species including Chinook Salmon, Rocky Mountain Ridged Mussel, Yellow Breasted Chat, Western Screech-Owl, and Blotched Tiger Salamander, among others.

This project is the first year of a 3-year request. Approved by Regional District Okanagan Similkameen Board and $84,952.25 was allocated from the South Okanagan Conservation Fund in 2022. The project is expected to complete by January 31, 2025.

Students Plant for the Future

Okanagan and Similkameen Invasive Species Society (OASISS)

Established in 1996 the Okanagan and Similkameen Invasive Species Society (OASISS) is a non-profit organization dedicated to the prevention, detection, and management of invasive species in the Okanagan-Similkameen.

Students in the South Okanagan will learn about locally important grassland, shrub-steppe and riparian ecosystems and the negative impacts of invasive plants on these habitats. Over a three-year period, youth from School Districts #67 and #53 will be directly involved in planning, implementing, and monitoring invasive plant removal and indigenous plant restoration projects. Up to 2 hectares will be restored as students learn the value of being land stewards of local environments through place-based learning.

This project is the first year of a 3-year request. Approved by Regional District Okanagan Similkameen Board and $19,060 was allocated from the South Okanagan Conservation Fund for 2024. The project is expected to complete by January 31, 2025.

Road Mortality of a Threatened Snake Population in the South Okanagan

Thompson Rivers University (TRU) in partnership with the Province of BC

TRU is a comprehensive, learner-centred, sustainable university that serves its regional, national, and international learners and their communities through high quality and flexible education, training, research and scholarship. The principal investigator on this project will be Karl Larsen, who is professor in wildlife ecology and management in the Department of Natural Resource Sciences at Thompson Rivers University. Larsen has been conducting ecological and conservation work on small, terrestrial vertebrates for over 30 years, he has had six MSc students conduct thesis work on conservation threats facing rattlesnakes in the Okanagan, including two focusing on the White Lake situation.

Snakes and other reptiles are susceptible to being killed on roads. In fact, road mortality is one of the most significant threats facing many species at risk in the South Okanagan. Under-road tunnels (‘ecopassages’) are seen as an important solution, yet these structures are expensive and their effectiveness for many species is unknown. This is a particularly critical issue in the South Okanagan where road expansion and traffic volumes will continue as the region attracts more residents and visitors. This project will assess the response of rattlesnakes (a species at risk) 4 other at-risk reptile and amphibian species to underpassages that are currently deployed in the White Lake Basin. The project will provide recommendations for improvements for underpasses to increase their effectiveness for reducing roadkill for species that are at risk and susceptible.

This project builds on previous years of research in the White Lake Basin. This an extension of the third year of a 3-year request that was approved by Regional District Okanagan Similkameen Board and $28,230 was allocated from the South Okanagan Conservation Fund in 2023. The South Okanagan Conservation Fund dollars are matching significant confirmed funding from other sources. The project is expected to complete by January 31, 2025.