Driftwood Canyon Provincial Park facts for kids

Driftwood Canyon Provincial Park is a special place in British Columbia, Canada. It's a provincial park that covers about 23 hectares (that's about 57 acres!). You can find it in the Bulkley River Valley, near a stream called Driftwood Creek. It's about 10 kilometers northeast of the town of Smithers.

You can easily get to the park from Highway 16 by taking Driftwood Road. The park was created in 1967. A kind person named Gordon Harvey (who lived from 1913 to 1976) donated the land. He wanted to protect the amazing fossil beds found there. These fossil beds were first discovered around the early 1900s. The land where the park is located is also part of the traditional territory of the Wet'suwet'en First Nation.

Exploring the Park

When you visit Driftwood Canyon Provincial Park, you'll find a car park right off the road. From there, you can see an information sign and a bridge that crosses Driftwood Creek. A short walking trail, called an interpretive trail, leads you to a cliff. This cliff shows layers of ancient rocks called shales. These rocks were formed in a lake that existed over 50 million years ago during a time called the Eocene period.

Mixed in with these shales are layers of volcanic ash. This ash came from volcanoes that were erupting in the area when the lake was still there. Inside these shale layers, you can find incredibly well-preserved fossils. These fossils include plants, animals, and insects that lived in this area more than 50 million years ago! There are other similar fossil sites in British Columbia, like the McAbee Fossil Beds and the Princeton Chert fossil beds.

Why This Park is Important

BC Parks helps manage Driftwood Canyon Provincial Park. They recognize several important things about the park:

• It has very important Eocene fossil beds. This is the most northern place in North America where you can find Eocene insect fossils. You can also find fossils of ancient salmon, trout, and suckers, including a fish called Eosalmo driftwoodensis.
• Scientists are still doing a lot of research here to learn more about the past.
• The park also protects a special type of forest found in the Bulkley Basin area.

Fossil Collecting Rules

In the past, people were allowed to collect a few fossils at Driftwood Canyon Park. Some guidebooks even listed it as a place for this activity. However, in recent years, BC Parks stopped public fossil collecting. This decision was made for a few important reasons:

• Safety: Rocks can fall from the shale cliff. This could be dangerous for visitors trying to collect fossils.
• Protecting Fossils: Removing fossils means losing these important pieces of history. It also goes against rules designed to protect parks.
• Protecting Nature: When people dig for fossils, soil and rocks can get loose. This can fall into Driftwood Creek and harm the places where fish lay their eggs.

New Trail and Signs

In 2010, the interpretive trail was improved. BC Parks worked with local groups like the Bulkley Valley Naturalists and the Smithers Rotary Club. Many organizations helped fund these improvements. A new bridge was built over Driftwood Creek. A new trail was made that is easy for wheelchairs to use. New signs were also put up.

These new signs teach visitors about the area's history. They explain the cultural practices of the Wet'suwet'en First Nation, including their traditional fishing methods. The signs also describe the sub-boreal spruce forest found in the park. Most importantly, they explain how significant the fossils are. At the end of the trail, where the public fossil site is, signs show what scientists have learned from the fossils. They also feature photos of some of the amazing fossils found there.

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  Bridge over Driftwood Creek at the start of the interpretive trail.

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  Interpretive sign on Driftwood Canyon trail.

Ancient Life: Palaeontology

Scientists have been studying fossils in British Columbia for a long time. Some of the earliest work was done by George Mercer Dawson and John William Dawson in the late 1800s. They were part of a survey of British Columbia.

Fossil fish from Driftwood Canyon were collected as early as the 1930s. These are now in the Canadian Museum of Nature. However, scientists only started seriously studying the fossils from Driftwood Canyon (also known as the Driftwood Creek beds) in the 1950s.

What Fossils Are Found Here?

The Driftwood Canyon fossil beds are famous for their many well-preserved insect and fish fossils.

• Fish: You can find fossils of ancient fish like Amia, Amyzon, and Eosalmo.
• Insects: The insect fossils are very diverse and clear. They include water striders, aphids, leaf hoppers, green lacewings, spittle bugs, march flies, scorpionflies, fungus gnats, snout beetles, and ichneumon wasps. A fossil green lacewing was even named Pseudochrysopa harveyi to honor Gordon Harvey, who helped create the park.
• Other Animals: Sometimes, fossil feathers are found. Rarely, tiny rodent bones are found inside fossilized fish droppings, called coprolites. Recently, fossil palm beetles were found. This tells us that palm trees grew in the area during the early Eocene period.

Ancient Plants

Plant fossils are not as common, but scientists have found up to 29 different types of plants.

• The most common plant fossils are leafy branches of the dawn redwood, Metasequoia.
• You can also find the floating fern Azolla primaeva, sometimes as whole mats of plants.
• Leaves from alder trees (Alnus) are also found.
• Needles and seeds from pines (Pinus), golden larch (Pseudolarix), and cedars (Chamaecyparis and/or Thuja) have been discovered.
• Fossils of redwood (Sequoia) and rare Ginkgo and sassafras (Sassafras hesperia) leaves have also been found.
• A fossil pine cone (Pinus driftwoodensis) was described in the 1980s.
• Rare flowers and seeds of flowering plants have been collected. These include Ulmus, Florissantia, and Dipteronia. Dipteronia is a type of tree related to maples that now grows in eastern Asia.

How Old Are the Fossils?

Scientists used a method called radiometric dating to find out the age of the rocks. They tested volcanic ash found in the lake shale beds. The results showed that the ash is about 51.77 million years old. This tells us how old the fossils are too!

Bird and Mammal Discoveries

Bird feathers are sometimes found in the shales. But even more exciting, two actual bird body fossils have been discovered!

• In 1968, Pat Petley found a bird fossil. It was later given to Thompson Rivers University (TRU) in 2000 and is now on display there.
• In 1970, German visitors Margret and Albrecht Klöckner found another complete bird fossil with feathers. After 38 years, it was brought back to British Columbia and given to the Royal British Columbia Museum. Both bird fossils were studied in 2019. They were identified as an ancient coliiform bird and a member of the Songziidae family.

In 2014, two fossil mammal jaws were found in the park. These were very important discoveries!

• One jaw belonged to an early relative of the tapir (called cf. Heptodon).
• The other jaw belonged to a relative of the hedgehog named Sivacola acares. This name means "small forest dweller."

These were the first times these types of Eocene mammals had been found in North America outside of Ellesmere Island in the Canadian Arctic or the states of Colorado and Wyoming.

Where to See Fossils

Small collections of fossils from Driftwood Canyon are kept in a few places:

• The Bulkley Valley Museum in Smithers.
• The BC Parks office in Smithers.
• The Royal British Columbia Museum in Victoria, BC.
• The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM).
• The Canadian Museum of Nature (CMN).
• The Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture in Seattle, Washington.
• Various university collections.

Many important fossils from Driftwood Canyon are also owned by private collectors.

Protecting Our Past

Stopping fossil collecting at Driftwood Canyon Provincial Park fits with British Columbia's new Fossil Management Framework]. This framework aims to:

• Make the rules for managing and using fossils clear.
• Control how other activities might affect fossils.
• Help take care of important fossil sites.
• Teach people about the framework and why fossils are important.
• Learn more about the types and amounts of fossils in British Columbia.
• Make sure everyone knows their rights and responsibilities regarding fossils.