Oct 1, 2026 · 59 min · 13 segments
In this episode of August After Dark, Matt August sits down with Murray Wilson, a retired professional forester turned filmmaker, whose documentary BC Is Burning is pulling back the curtain on what's…
Murray WilsonGuest
Matt AugustHost
In your film, you talk about what we've mismanaged in our forests and what we've done in the past, which we're not doing today.
Um, what did you know about where our forest was and the fuel that was on the ground in our forest at that point that I think caused a lot of the problems that happened in 2023?
So 2.8 billion, or 2.8 million hectares burnt in British Columbia, 17 million hectares burnt across Canada.
That year, Canada emitted 23% of the world's wildfire smoke emissions, according to Copernicus, so very significant impacts from that year.
Um, so for me, I looked at it, and i- if you think back on fire, it needs three things.
And heat, when we get a really hot summer, that makes it more difficult for us.
So we've, uh, this summer we have a very hot summer, so it w- makes things worse.
So, but what I saw was we were reducing our forest management in the province.
Our, the allowable annual cut that we, the government sets is around 61 million meters.
So what does that mean? That means less areas getting active management, so our, our forests are getting older, our disease stands are increasing, so the fuel risk is increasing.
When you talk about disease stands, so we went through the p- the pine beetle, which you talk about in depth in your, in your documentary.
It's, it's, it's not a new thing, and those are majority, like, older trees, is that correct?
Yeah, so lodgepole pine stands, and, uh, we have a lot of them in British Columbia, they're what we call an even-age stand.
In your film, you talk about what we've mismanaged in our forests and what we've done in the past, which we're not doing today.
Um, what did you know about where our forest was and the fuel that was on the ground in our forest at that point that I think caused a lot of the problems that happened in 2023?
So 2.8 billion, or 2.8 million hectares burnt in British Columbia, 17 million hectares burnt across Canada.
That year, Canada emitted 23% of the world's wildfire smoke emissions, according to Copernicus, so very significant impacts from that year.
Um, so for me, I looked at it, and i- if you think back on fire, it needs three things.
And heat, when we get a really hot summer, that makes it more difficult for us.
So we've, uh, this summer we have a very hot summer, so it w- makes things worse.
So, but what I saw was we were reducing our forest management in the province.
Our, the allowable annual cut that we, the government sets is around 61 million meters.
So what does that mean? That means less areas getting active management, so our, our forests are getting older, our disease stands are increasing, so the fuel risk is increasing.
When you talk about disease stands, so we went through the p- the pine beetle, which you talk about in depth in your, in your documentary.
It's, it's, it's not a new thing, and those are majority, like, older trees, is that correct?
Yeah, so lodgepole pine stands, and, uh, we have a lot of them in British Columbia, they're what we call an even-age stand.
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