Hazelton leads B.C....			...with sheep experiment
			by Maggie Carew

There is a new venture happening in the Hazelton area. Grazing sheep are replacing herbicides to control weeds on replanted forest cut blocks. This is the brainchild of Bruce Chandler, who came to Hazelton from his native French Island, Australia, in July, 1992. He had met and married Renee, from B.C. "We met in jail," laughs Renee, and explains that one of the old penal colonies had been converted into a vacation resort.

Bruce Chandler, pioneer in controlling "weeds" with sheep

Sheep have been Bruce's livelihood all his life, and he brings his knowledge and expertise to this experiment - a first in B.C. He pastures sheep on cut-blocks, where they eat the fireweed and other plants that get in the way of the young trees struggling to grow and renew the forest. The weight of snow bends the fireweed until it leans against the saplings and causes them to grow crooked. He pointed out an example of a very young spruce which had been bent in two directions in two successive winters. The tree will be useless as timber and will probably break long before it matures. The sheep eat the growth that the chainsaws can't get, says Bruce. But chainsaws are still needed to clear the brush that the sheep don't eat.

The black-face sheep like to roam

The cost of this method compares very favourably with the more conventional use of herbicides for bush clearance, but there are also many spin-offs which can be profitable. One sheep clears about ¾ hectare a day. The average cost is about $365, as compared to about $530 for the ground-level application of herbicides. Aerial spraying is cheaper still, but it is also harder to control. Bruce rents sheep from farmers in Alberta and Saskatchewan, and has to pay for their shipping. He is paid by the users of the cut blocks, who are the local forestry companies. Today, he is running 1100 sheep on a block belonging to Kitwanga Lumber. 200 of them are his own. About two-thirds are white-faced breeds, primarily wool producers. The whites tend to flock, while the black-faced sheep, valued for their meat, have a tendency to scatter.