Our Mission

To promote awareness and stewardship of wetland ecosystems and their connections to surrounding lands and waters. If you love salamanders, frogs, marshes and bogs, you can help them thrive by supporting our work. 

About ASSOCIATION OF WETLAND STEWARDS FOR CLAYOQUOT AND BARKLEY SOUNDS

We engage people to take care of local marshes, swamps, bogs and surrounding forests - places that provide habitat for a diversity of fascinating plants and animals. We focus most of our attention on frogs and salamanders because they live both in water and on land. Helping these sensitive moisture-loving creatures survive means we will maintain high quality water resources and habitat connections across the landscape.

One of our key projects involves engaging community members as research assistants in finding ways to reduce roadkill of amphibians in coastal British Columbia. This project is affectionately known as "SPLAT" - "Society for the Prevention of Little Amphibian Tragedies". We work with government agencies in British Columbia to install crossing structures (culverts and fencing) at places with concentrated movements and roadkill of frogs and salamanders, especially the Northern Red-legged Frog and Western Toad, two species at risk in Canada. We then monitor how well the crossing structures work to reduce roadkill and improve habitat connectivity over time.

In our other projects, we share information and promote stewardship of important breeding wetlands to protect them from habitat destruction, pollution, invasive species, and disease. We invite university students and keen volunteers from local communities to help survey egg masses, tadpoles and juvenile amphibians so we can track how populations are doing over time. We find that the best learning and passion-building happens in the field! Our surveys have led to the protection of 64 hectares of coastal wetland and forest habitat near Ucluelet and Tofino in British Columbia. We gratefully work on our applied conservation projects within the traditional territories of the Huu-ay-aht First Nations, Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation, Toquaht Nation Government, and Yuułuʔiłʔatḥ Government.

We tell people about our work through public slideshows, workshops, school programs and by providing scientific advice to land owners and land-use planners. We highlight the connection between productive wetland habitat, water quality and human health in our presentations. That way, people will understand the importance of conserving these places for human well-being as well as for wildlife.