This is what my son, Evan Gillespie, when he was a little guy, would have called a "dear-life tree", because it's hanging on for dear life. It's a willow on Portland Island. There are many examples of plants, big and small, hanging onto dear life on the rocky outcrops of the southern Gulf Islands. Brenda

http://www.sierraclub.ca/bc/programs/education/ecomap/georgia_depression/index.html - Sierra Club of Canada, BC chapter's eco-education page about the Gulf Islands and surrounding area, with links to animal and plant information, plus local eco-groups - a great site.

http://www.cpaws.org/community-atlas/gulf-islands.php - this pages gets you to:
http://www.cpaws.org/files/atlas/gulf-atlas.pdf - "Southern Gulf Islands Ecosystem Community Atlas" by the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, a 9-meg, 81-page pdf providing introductory, physical, ecosystem, land ownership, and present human impact information. All terrestrial; marine atlas to follow.

www.shim.bc.ca/gulfislands/ - "Southern Gulf Islands Atlas", a community mapping project by Parks Canada, Community Mapping Network and Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, to foster public awareness and informed management of the resources within Gulf Islands National Park Reserve. Currently only compatible with Internet Explorer in the Microsoft environment; high-speed connection recommended.

http://www.crd.bc.ca/es/natatlas/ - The Capital Regional District's *Natural Areas Atlas*, a great orthophoto site that allows you to zoom from 1:1,000,000 to 1:500 scale, where you can almost count sheep in fields. Includes southern Gulf Islands north to Galiano, but not Thetis, Kuper, Valdes, and Gabriola. To go directly to the maps: http://207.34.170.103/index.asp?extent=full

adaptation.nrcan.gc.ca/app/filerepository/ 4B3877FC41D3415A96E3E7A8A052DA35.pdf - Climate change in southern British Columbia: paleoenvironmental perspectives. A research paper, fairly heavy going, about climate changes over past millennia.