New Biosphere Committed Members - July

We are pleased to welcome Clos du Soleil Winery, Tightrope Winery, Sperling Vineyards, Quaaout Lodge & Spa at Talking Rock Resort, and Le Vieux Pin Winery to our Biosphere Community!

Clos du Soleil is a tightly-knit team with a common philosophy: our land and the life it contains is a gift, and as stewards of the land it is our privilege to produce wines which are a reflection of this land. Based in the Similkameen Valley, Clos du Soleil is a small artisan winery and estate vineyard. Managing Director and Winemaker Michael Clark states, “Organic certification is really central to our whole approach at Clos du Soleil. We put a great deal of effort into producing wines of place; wines that speak of the land on which they were grown. Organic practices are a crucial part of that process by encouraging healthy soils, and healthy vines, which make for more expressive wines”.

Learn more about Clos du Soleil here.

From the beginning, Graham & Lyndsay knew they wanted Tightrope Winery to be a sustainable business. After all, the property was also to be the home to their young family, and they wanted to ensure it would be a healthy environment for their family for generations. Graham embarked on a journey to create a framework for sustainability and became one of the founding Directors with Sustainable Winegrowing BC (SWBC). Tightrope’s sustainability efforts go beyond environmental stewardship and they also focus on social equity, economic development and how the greater community is affected.

Learn more about Tightrope Winery here.

Sperling Vineyards has been four generations in the making and they have been certified organic since 2017. Sperling Vineyards also recently became a member of Regeneration Canada, a movement supporting soil regeneration. Ann Sperling explained, "We are part of this organization to help get the word out about farmers who are committed to grasslands, permanent cover crops, and farming that benefits the environment. Our treed perimeters, bushes and permanent cover crops sequester carbon from the atmosphere unlike conventional agriculture with tillage that releases CO2."

Learn more about Sperling Vineyards here.

Quaaout Lodge & Spa at Talking Rock Resort is proudly owned by the Little Shuswap Lake Band. The Resort sits on Skwlax Territory and is home to the Secwepemc people. Little Shuswap Lake Band members conceived the idea of a hotel to spur economic development with a sustainable business venture, offering employment and long term security for the band and its members. Guests can reconnect with nature and the culture of the land, with Secwepemc culture woven into each experience.

Learn more about Quaaout Lodge at Talking Rock Resort here.

Named for the solitary majestic old growth pine of their Oliver estate, Le Vieux Pin sits perched amidst the famed vineyards of the Black Sage Bench. Since releasing their first vintage in 2005, Le Vieux Pin has captured the essence of traditional French winemaking, along with the bold New World character distinct to the region. Le Vieux Pin uses low input viticulture and non-interventionist winemaking to make exclusive vintages that carry with them a sense of time and place. They believe that engaging in sustainable and organic practices should be done for the good of the land for the good of those who work it.

Learn more about Le Vieux Pin here.

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Workplace Accessibility Grant: Applications Now Open

The Workplace Accessibility Grant program provides up to $1,000 in support to small business employers in British Columbia by providing direct financial assistance towards creating an inclusive work environment for persons with a disability(ies).

The grant can be used for the following (but not exclusively for):

• Environment: ramps, lighting levels, accessible washrooms, adaptions to vehicles, etc.

• Attitudes: anti-bias training

• Practices: training to review and amend interview processes, ASL interpreting for new staff orientation, accessibility audit of workflow, etc.

• Policies: funding for legal and consulting advice in revising policies, time for staff to revise policies, etc.

• Information and Communication: job task checklists in pictorial form, ASL version of policies, application forms accessible to screen readers, reprinting hardcopies of material in large font, Braille versions of documents, update web-pages for accessibility, etc.

• Technologies: purchasing software that enables production of accessible documents, flashing fire alarms for Deaf employees, specialized headsets, tablet for communication, laptop to allow some one to work from home, specialized tools, etc.

This Grant Program is available for companies with between 1 and 50 employees (both part time and full time), including yourself. Businesses must be based in and operate within British Columbia, and have been registered in BC at the time of submission.

Tin Whistle Brewing's quest to become a carbon-neutral brewery

Founded in 1995, Tin Whistle Brewery is the original craft brewery of the South Okanagan and now they are one of the first carbon neutral certified breweries in BC. Tin Whistle worked with Climate Smart to measure and reduce their carbon footprint and ultimately achieved certification by reducing its electricity, natural gas, refrigeration and transportation use, installing a new compressor and lighting and purchasing carbon offset credits from the Great Bear Rainforest.

"You have to understand what your carbon footprint is and then go about getting that to zero," said Alexis Esseltine, owner of Tin Whistle Brewery. “We know beer, like all products, has an impact on the natural world, whether it’s through the grains grown and transported to our facilities or the energy, water and waste from production,” she said. “We knew we could make great beer, and we also knew we could lessen our impact.”

Four key areas were identified as impacts

Ingredients

Sourcing locally and thoughtfully makes a difference

Water & Energy

Big batch brewing can be wasteful

Packaging

How we package our products matters

Transportation

Shipping and delivery can quickly add up

By identifying these impacts, Tin Whistle Brewing has created action plans for each of the four areas.

In addition to Tin Whistle’s commitment to being carbon neutral, they promote investing in their local community by donating 5 cents from every can to a local charitable partner and sourcing ingredients as locally as possible. The next milestone that Tin Whistle is pursuing is making a selection of their beer certified organic.

They also plan to work towards a near-zero waste production process. Right now, the spent grains leftover after the brewing process are given away to a farmer who feeds it to his pigs and cows. Tin Whistle is looking at monetizing the spent grain by selling it to a company that will dehydrate it and mill it into flour.

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South Okanagan Biodiversity Protected

A breathtaking natural landscape in the South Okanagan will now be protected from development forever, thanks to a $1.8-million land purchase by the Nature Trust of BC. The non-profit land conservation organization bought 151 acres (61 hectares) of ecologically important land, known as the Park Rill Floodplain, to expand the White Lake Basin Biodiversity Ranch conservation complex in the South Okanagan.

“It’s important to conserve and protect this land, especially in this area, because of pressures from development and climate change,” said Okanagan conservation land manager Nick Burdock. “We were actually approached by this landowner. The landowners are very much interested in the conservation of nature.”

The biodiversity hot spot is home to at least five federally listed at-risk species, including the western tiger salamander, Lewis’s woodpecker, Great Basin spadefoot toad, Great Basin gopher snake and western rattlesnake. Other animals in the protected landscape include peregrine falcons (special concern), Western Screech Owls (threatened), American Badgers (endangered), Nuttall’s Cottontail, black bears, and mule deer.

It is difficult to find low-land habitats unaffected by development, but three-quarters of the Park Rill Floodplain remains in a relatively natural state, allowing it to support six sensitive ecosystems: sagebrush steppe, open coniferous woodland, seasonally flooded fields, wet meadow, sparsely vegetated rocky outcrops and, importantly, grasslands.

The diversity of species and habitats protected by this project exemplifies the importance of the native grasslands within the South Okanagan. The Nature Trust of BC has a sterling track record for protecting, managing and restoring these and other critical habitat types in BC. For that reason, the Habitat Conservation Trust Foundation is a proud funding partner of the Nature Trust and of our shared goals of conserving fish, wildlife and their habitats through the protection and conservation of BC’s natural landscapes.

- Dan Buffett, CEO of the Habitat Conservation Trust Foundation

Conservationists plan to restore the natural floodplain and mitigate the risk of catastrophic wildfires through prescribed burns and the thinning of trees.

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