Trip report by Bev Ramey

Our nature walk around Goldie and Flower Lakes was a rich experience with beautiful, close-up observations of plants, mosses, lichens, birds and generally the nature of this wetland habitat within old growth forest. Also wonderful was the sharing of knowledge amongst the participants. Our walk was slated for three hours, but we took four hours as there were many observation stops along the three km of trails. We’d even had plans to stop for sketching, but there wasn’t sufficient time and only a few quick sketches were made.

Twenty-one keen participants, including four leaders, made observations and took photos to upload on iNaturalist. Overall impression is that these wetlands are very important habitat to maintain as natural as possible and especially as rare high elevation wetlands (elevation around 900 m). The already existing walking trails provide sufficient man-made development in this area. The proposal for ‘glamping’ facilities to be built at both these lakes would damage these natural wetland habitats.

We noted that maintenance of the trails was lacking in many locations. (This poor maintenance is likely due to the shortage in the BC Parks budget and lack of park staffing.) In some wet sections of the trail wooden pallets had been placed, but even these have deteriorated and were breaking apart. This poor trail condition likely deters public use.

Some commented that there were few ‘human-biting’ flying insects, but from previous walks they noted that black flies can be abundant here after snow melt and in some years the mosquitoes and noseeums are much more plentiful. Biting insects are not something one would want to experience when ‘glamping’, residing in this area overnight. Whereas biting insects can be acceptable for walkers passing through.

Our group observed over 146 plant species, and many lichens and mosses. We uploaded 560 photos onto iNaturalist. We also observed 15 bird species. Clouds covered the sky above us, temperatures were 13^o – 14^o C, so there was not the sunshine needed to entice butterflies and moths into view

See Google Doc Mt Seymour (Flower + Goldie lakes) Species 2026-07-04
and  observations posted to iNaturalist