West Thurlow Island

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West Thurlow Island

East and West Thurlow Islands are located on Johnstone Strait just north of Discovery Passage.
Geography
Location British Columbia British Columbia
Coordinates 50°24′18″N 125°36′58″W / 50.405°N 125.616°W / 50.405; -125.616
Archipelago Discovery Islands
Country

West Thurlow Island is an island in British Columbia, Canada. It is part of the Discovery Islands, an archipelago between Vancouver Island and the mainland, whose waters connect the Strait of Georgia with Johnstone Strait and Queen Charlotte Strait.

West Thurlow Island is located north of Vancouver Island, south of the mainland, southeast of Hardwicke Island, and west of East Thurlow Island, separated from the latter by as little as 400 metres.

Just north of West Thurlow Island Loughborough Inlet extends into the mainland. The strait that separates the island from the mainland is called Cordero Channel to the east of the mouth of Loughborough Inlet, and Chancellor Channel to the west. Chancellor Channel also separates West Thurlow Island from Hardwicke Island. Johnstone Strait separates West Thurlow Island from Vancouver Island. West and East Thurlow Islands are separated by Mayne Passage.[1]

West Thurlow lies in the traditional territory of the Kwakwaka'wakw first nations.[2] The island was named for Edward Thurlow, 1st Baron Thurlow, Lord Chancellor of England, by Captain George Vancouver during his voyage through the Johnstone Strait in July 1792.[3][4]

There are a handful of private landholdings on the eastern shore of the island. The majority are located adjacent to Blind Channel Resort, which includes a marina, marine refueling station, general store, post office and seasonal restaurant and accommodations.

Forestry

Logging operations first began on the island with the establishment of the Thurlow Island Lumber Company sawmill in 1918 in the location of what is now the Blind Channel Resort.[4] Settlements around the mill eventually peaked at a population of several hundred in the 1940s, though no permanent forestry camps now remain on the island. West Thurlow currently includes sections of two tree farm licenses, 45 and 47, held by International Forest Products Ltd. (Interfor) and Timberwest respectively.[5][6] The areas are accessible by two dry-land timber sorts at Knox Bay and Butterfly Bay, both on the southern shore of the island. West Thurlow Island lies within the Coastal Western Hemlock biogeoclimatic zone, and its forests consists mostly of western hemlock, Douglas fir and western red cedar.

References

  1. ↑ Details of geography from TRIM 1:20,000 Digital Base Maps of British Columbia, available at Base Map Online Store, British Columbia Integrated Land Management Bureau, Base Mapping and Geomatic Services
  2. ↑ BC Ministry of Education, First Nations Peoples of British Columbia
  3. ↑ Middleton, Lynn (1969). Place Names of the Pacific Northwest Coast. Victoria: Elldee Publishing. pp. 205–206. OCLC 16729415. 
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Blind Channel - History
  5. ↑ http://www.for.gov.bc.ca/hts/tfl/tfl45/tsr3/45tf09ra.pdf
  6. ↑ http://www.for.gov.bc.ca/hts/tfl/tfl47/tsr2/rationale.pdf

External links

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