Indigenous groups and residents block aerial herbicide spraying in Canada

Indigenous communities and grassroots residents across Canada have taken a definitive stand against the aerial application of chemical herbicides on forestlands, marking a mounting challenge to longstanding industrial forestry practices. As detailed in reporting from the Watershed Sentinel, decades of blanket chemical use — primarily involving glyphosate formulations designed to eliminate naturally regenerated trees and shrubs in favor of commercial tree farms — have provoked coordinated bans, protests, and direct occupations.

The practice of aerial spraying has long drawn fierce opposition from environmentalists who note that herbicides are lethal to frogs, lizards, and salamanders, while also wiping out medicinal plants and berry bushes relied upon by wildlife and Indigenous populations. According to the Watershed Sentinel, a critical turning point arrived in September 2024 when a tanker truck overturned on a Northern Ontario forest road, spilling 600 litres of GlySil, a glyphosate compound, into the soil. Deeply shocked by the accident, the Temagami First Nation (TFN) and the Teme-Augama Anishnabai community (TAA) responded by declaring a total ban on aerial herbicide spraying within their home territory.

We are gravely concerned about both the immediate and long-term impacts this spill and this practice have had and will continue to have on our region. This practice must stop, said TFN Chief Shelly Moore-Frappier.

TAA Annike Ogimaa (Second Chief) John Turner notes Ontario has outlawed GlySil on private lawns, parks, and schoolyards because it is “an unnecessary risk to human health, especially children’s health.”

Parallel resistance has unfolded in Atlantic Canada. Reporting from PNI Atlantic News highlights how community members in Nova Scotia stepped up to protect local land and water from impending aerial operations. Lenny Hornung, a concerned Thomas Road property owner who helped organize protest encampments in western Annapolis County on behalf of the group No Spray Bear River, stated that an apparent lack of environmental oversight is what made him say “enough is enough.” Encampments were established at critical locations, including the entrance to the approved spray site at Shell Camp Lake off Virginia Road, an area that included two approved spray sites and is part of the watershed associated with the drinking water supply for Cornwallis Park and the County of Annapolis Lake Cady Source Water Protection Plan, bordering Shell Camp Lake and containing wetlands, and at Thomas Road near Bear River First Nation, set up on Crown land bordering the approved spray site and directly above Thomas Brook Stillwaters, which flows into Sam Harris Lake and then Bear River.

Hornung said the parcel is very steep, and the product label for approved glyphosate-based herbicides warn against using them on steep terrain. Having observed local woods for decades since moving to the area in 1978, Hornung contrasted modern forestry methods with past provincial support for sustainable management and selective harvesting.

I’ve watched how these sustainable practices by individual landowners have given way to preferring vast clearcuts and aerial spraying, turning our biodiverse forests into highly combustible mono softwood crops where the small landowner cannot even economically compete, Hornung said, as cited by PNI Atlantic News.

Across Nova Scotia, grassroots volunteers from Don’t Spray Us!, No Spray Bear River, Stop Spraying and Clear-Cutting Mi’kma’ki, and Allen Hill Anti-spray Coalition have put themselves in harm’s way by camping in areas targeted for aerial spraying with banners warning pilots Humans Are Here. Savanna Callison of Allen Hill Anti-Spray Coalition attributes its “small victory” to the peaceful nature of the occupation and the “civil discussions” she and the group had with company representatives. The Bear River sites included a drinking watershed and an ecological reserve, and both were cancelled this year after campaigns of civil disobedience and letter-writing that targeted provincial decision-makers.

Meanwhile in British Columbia, TimberWest quietly scrapped almost all 2023 herbicide spraying across a large area of Kwakwaka’wakw territory on northern Vancouver Island, following public pressure from Indigenous leaders.

Is this the first step toward forests permanently free of toxic glyphosate?