EcoMap: Explore the species & habitats of B.C.

Learn about the ecology of B.C. with our EcoMap

First, pick which region you want to explore

British Columbia has nine ecoprovinces, each with special ecological features that make them unique. While these regions are distinct, they're all interconnected through the air, water and animals that move from place to place. For example, the Fraser River crosses several ecoprovinces and black bears can be found throughout B.C.!

This EcoMap will help you learn about the amazing plants and animals who live alongside us in each ecoprovince. You can read about each species' appearance, life cycle, habitat, the threats they're facing and other interesting information. Click on the ecoprovince you want to start exploring or search for the species you're interested in below.

Species of BC

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Animal

Bird

Mammal

Gastropod

Fish

Amphibian

Crustacean

Plant

Angiosperms (Flowering Plants)

Mosses & Liverworts

Ferns

Gymnosperms (Conifers)

Grasses

Algae & Seaweed

Drosera (carnivorous plants)

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Sub-Boreal Interior

Coast and Mountains

Boreal Plains

Taiga Plains

Southern Interior Mountains

Georgia Depression

Central Interior

Southern Interior

Northern Boreal Mountains

Alpine Larch

The alpine larch, also called the subalpine larch, stands 12-15 metres tall. These trees are found throughout the Cascade and Rocky mountains.

American Kestrel

The American kestrel is the smallest falcon in North America and weighs only 3 or 4 ounces.

American White Pelican

American white pelicans are some of the largest birds in North America. They hunt together, driving small schools of fish into each other’s bill pouches.

Arbutus

Also known as the Pacific madrone, the Arbutus has distinctive reddish-brown bark, thick waxy and a beautiful twisted trunk that can grow to 30 metres tall.

Arctic tern

Arctic terns are unique birds with gifts of persistence and resourcefulness. These birds must fly great distances, and in doing so they have a diet with a variety of sea life.

Arctic Willow

Alpine willow is commonly found in northern B.C., the Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Alaska. It is adapted to grow in open, dry areas.

Bald Eagle

Bald eagles are found all over B.C. and the U.S. The largest populations in North America live in B.C. and Alaska.

Balsam poplar

These trees often grow on the eastern slopes of hillsides. They thrive in moist soils near rivers or floodplains, but they can also grow in rocky soils.

Balsamroot

Balsamroot is a relative of the sunflower. Its leaves are coarse and arrow-shaped, and a single plant can have many yellow flowers.

Banana Slug

Banana slugs are important decomposers in our coastal rainforest. They are nocturnal feeders, eating decaying animals, mushrooms, and plants.

Beaver

The beaver possesses many gifts! They are adept at swimming, building, and tree chomping.

Big Sagebrush

Big sagebrush can be thought of as a protector plant for many understory community members.

Bighorn Sheep

The bighorn sheep are important primary consumers in the food chain. They are vegetarians, eating grasses, bushes and leaves.

Black and White Warbler

These iconic Canadian birds are also called the ‘black and white creeper’ because they creep along tree trunks looking for tasty insects.

Black Bear

Black bears and Pacific salmon play an important part in maintaining our forest ecosystems.

Black Cottonwood

Black cottonwood gets its name from their fluffy white seeds, which look like cotton. These seeds can be seen floating through the air in late spring.

Black Huckleberry

Black Huckleberry is an important food in many First Nations communities. These berries can be eaten fresh, cooked, or dried into cakes.

Black Spruce

The black spruce can live for up to 250 years! Their cones which appear in clusters, are recorded to stay on the tree for 20 to 30 years at a time.

Blue Camas

The blue camas is a perennial herb. The beautiful flowers range from hues of blue and purple, but there are also some with white flowers.

Bocaccio Rockfish

Bocaccio rockfish are important consumers. These fish eat smaller fish such as anchovies, mackerel, squid and other rockfish.

Bonaparte's Gull

These gulls nest in large numbers and produce two to three eggs at a time. These gulls are gifted with agility.

Boreal Chickadee

Boreal chickadees are an important indicator species of boreal ecosystems!

Boreal Chorus Frog

Boreal chorus frogs live in moist grassy or forested areas near wetlands across North America.

Boreal Owl

Boreal owls are gifted with incredible hearing. The position of their ears allows them to locate their prey.

Brown Lemming

Brown lemmings love to live in the cold! They like to eat mostly arctic grasses and moss.

Bunchberry

Bunchberries flower in May and June, later in the Northern Mountains and frequently flower a second time in the fall.

California Quail

California quails are omnivores. These birds eat mostly plant seeds but will also eat fruit and insects.

Canada Goose

These geese are found across Canada and in parts of the US and Mexico at different times throughout the year.

Canada Jay

Canada jays are omnivores. They feed on the meat of small animals, fruit, insects, and seeds. They will frequent campsites with easy access to food.

Canada Lynx

These beings are gifted with excellent patience, hearing, and night vision to hunt prey.

Cattail

Cattails are an important part of wetland ecosystems! They provide food and shelter for many animals.

Cloudberry

Cloudberries are some of the most desirable, and yet elusive berries in the world. They grow in high altitudes, and cold, swampy, acidic environments.

Columbian Black Tailed Deer

Black-tailed deer are important grazers and primary consumers. They eat grass, leaves, twigs, and shrubs.

Common Green Sphagnum Moss

Sphagnum moss is a small but mighty community member. Mosses are some of the first organisms to grow back after disturbances, such as fires and floods.

Common Juniper

Juniper berries stay on the tree for at least two years, and are eaten by American robins and black-capped chickadees.

Cougar

Cougars are a keystone species which means they are vital in maintaining ecosystem balance.

Coyote

Coyotes are tactical beings, who are vital for their roles as scavengers. Coyotes keep areas clean by mostly feeding on rodents, rabbits, berries and carrion.

Crab

Crabs play an important role as decomposers in our ecosystem! They consume decaying biological (either plant or animal) matter.

Creamy Peavine

The creamy peavine reaches 0.3 to 1 metres in height and it is a climbing plant.

Crowberry

Crowberries spread sometimes by seed, but most commonly by underground roots.

Dall's Porpoise

Dall’s porpoises are found throughout the north Pacific Ocean, both in the open ocean and close to land where there is deep water.

Dall's Sheep

Dall’s Sheep are resilient, mostly non-migratory beings who withstand the throws of Yukon and Northwest winters.

Devil's Club

Despite its name, the Devil’s Club holds many gifts of healing. Its flowers appear in late spring to mid-summer.

Dog Lichen

Lichens can often be overlooked, but they contribute to ecosystem health like any other species!

Douglas Squirrel

Douglas squirrels and red squirrels are the only native squirrel species in British Columbia.

Douglas-fir

The Douglas-fir grows to 20-100 metres tall, but the tallest trees are only found on the B.C. coast.

Eared Grebe

Since these birds do not have good legs for walking on land and cannot fly long distances, they are gifted with an adept swimming ability.

Eelgrass

Eelgrass is actually a flowering plant, not an eel OR grass. Eel grass has dark green leaves that are 2-12 mm wide and up to 100 cm long!

Elk

Elk are herbivores. They eat shrubs and grasses such as bunchgrasses throughout the year.

Engelmann Spruce

These cold-tolerant trees can live up to 1000 years old! They start to produce cones after 20 years.

Fireweed

Fireweed grows up to three metres tall. It has clusters of pink four-petaled flowers and long, green leaves growing out of a single tall stem.

Garry Oak

The Garry oak is a slow-growing tree. The leaves of the oak turn dull yellow or brown in fall and produce small acorns.

Grand Fir

Grand firs are gifted givers; these trees provide not only shelter, but also food and medicine.

Gray Wolf

Gray wolves can be found in Alaska, Canada, and a few small pockets in the northern US Rockies.

Great Basin Spadefoot Toad

The Great Basin spadefoot toad is important to maintain balance in pond aquatic systems.

Great Blue Heron

These birds are expert fishers, graced with the gifts of patience and balance. It’s said that if you see one you’re more likely to have a good fishing day.

Grizzly Bear

Grizzly bears are omnivores, and they feed on salmon, carrion, trout, small rodents, insects, berries, leaves and roots.

Gull

Why do seagulls fly over the sea? Because if they flew over the bay they’d be bagels (bay-gulls)!

Henderson's Shooting Star

Shooting stars are a major plant in the Garry oak meadows of southern Vancouver Island. The plant flowers in the spring and early summer.

Hermit Thrush

Hermit thrushes are omnivores and help to balance the populations of insects, amphibians, lizards and plants.

Highbush Cranberry

Despite the name, highbush cranberry is not a cranberry at all! These are actually part of the honeysuckle family

Hoary Marmot

Hoary marmots live at high elevations, near the tree line on rocky slopes and alpine meadows. They are found throughout the mountainous areas of B.C.

Horsetail

Horsetails can be found almost everywhere around the world except Australia and New Zealand.

Hybrid White Spruce

The hybrid white spruce is a mixture of white spruce and Engelmann spruce. It grows up to 40 metres tall and has large branches and a narrow top.

Keen's long-eared bat

Keen’s long-eared bat are found from southeast Alaska to the Olympic Peninsula, but most of them live on Haida Gwaii.

Kelp

Kelp is a type of marine algae, which are aquatic plants. They are common in oceanic waters around B.C.

Kinnikinnick

Kinnikinnick is a small, trailing, evergreen shrub with dark green leaves. Its bright red berries look like miniature apples and have a large hard seed.

Knight's Plume Moss

In Knight’s plume, there is a brown capsule that grows out of the branches to release these spores.

Labrador tea

Found in low to mid elevations, they grow in peatlands and boggy areas. Labrador tea is able to grow in soil that is acidic and low in nutrients.

Leafy Aster

These plants provide nectar for native bees, moths, and most importantly, the migratory monarch butterfly.

Least Chipmunk

Chipmunks fill their stretchy cheek pouches with the food they coChipmunks fill their stretchy cheek pouches with the food they collect. They'll store it in their nests or in small holes they have dug in the ground.llect and store it in their nests or in small holes they have dug in the ground.

Least Weasel

The least weasel eats primarily mice, voles, and insects, but some birds' eggs and frogs make up its diet.

Leatherback Turtle

Leatherback turtles are the largest of all turtles! These reptiles can grow up to seven feet long and weigh over 2,000 pounds!

LeConte's Sparrow

These sparrows have a mottled brown back with a white belly and crown stripe, an orange-yellow eye stripe and collar.

Lesser Yellowlegs

They are alert birds that defend their territory and keep their eyes out for trespassers, dipping their heads up and down while watching them.

Little brown myotis

Little brown myotis live in a wide range of habitats, from northern and coastal forests to grasslands and pine forests.

Lodgepole Pine

Lodgepole pine has serotinous cones, which means they rely on fire to open. Cones open when heat is present, and the seeds are then spread on the open ground.

Long-Billed Curlew

Curlews love to use their long bills to dig deep into coastal mud for worms, insects, and tasty crustaceans. When threatened by predators, males flock together to fight off the potential threat.

Marbled Murrelet

The marbled murrelet was a mystery to conservationists for quite some time. It seemed like no one could figure out where they nested!

Marten

Martens are mainly threatened by habitat and food loss (especially because of logging), disease, and in the past, over-trapping for their fur.

Meadow Vole

Meadow voles are often called field mice, but they actually have shorter tails and ears than mice.

Moose

Moose are herbivores, and eat twigs, shrubs, bark and tender plants. As a grazing animal, moose can change the landscape to increase heterogenized vegetation.

Moss campion

Moss campion is found in slightly moist areas in mountains, on rocks or cliffs and in open cold areas.

Mountain chickadee

Mountain chickadees look very similar to other chickadees. Their body is about the size of a tennis ball with a white belly, greyish wings and have a black cap on their head.

Mountain Goat

Mountain goats are a critical species for alpine and high-altitude ecosystems. Mountain goats have the incredible ability to stand on an area the size of a Canadian quarter.

Mountain Heather

This beautiful alpine shrub is in full bloom from July through August and does not produce berries after the flowers have wilted.

Mule Deer

Mule deer are primary consumers. They eat grass, foliage, twigs, and shrubs.

Muskrat

Muskrats often get mistaken for beavers, and are specially adapted to chewing on plants underwater.

Mussels

Mussels are a type of clam that have a long shell. Mussels live in the same place their entire lives (they are “sedentary”) and fix themselves in place by their byssal threads.

Nootka Lupine

The Nootka lupine is notable for the beautiful pink and white flowers that pop up in the summers of British Columbia.

Northern alligator lizard

Northern Alligator Lizards are brown or grey with some dark spots and stripes on their belly.

Northern Flying Squirrel

Northern flying squirrels act as nature’s gardeners in the forest. These animals help plants grow by dispersing fungi spores that help new mushrooms, like truffles, to grow.

Northern hawk owl

Northern hawk owls are a little smaller than crows and have long, rounded tails and striped bellies.

Northern Leopard Frog

The northern leopard frog plays an important role in transferring nutrients between aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems.

Northern Long-Eared Myotis

Northern long-eared myotis are mouse-eared bats with long, rounded ears. They have a distinct dull-brown coloured spot on their shoulder.

Northern Red-Backed Vole

The northern red-backed voles have many different foods they like, including nuts, seeds, fruits and leaves.

Northern Saw-Whet Owl

This owl is an important predator that is necessary in forest ecosystems to eat insects, small mammals, amphibians and songbirds.

Nuttall's Cottontail

Cottontails are herbivores and eat mostly grass and other green plants. They are nocturnal, most active at dawn and dusk.

Orca

Orcas are carnivores and top marine predators. Resident orcas eat salmon, octopus, and other cold-blooded sea creatures.

Oregon grape

Oregon grape is a tall evergreen plant with pairs of spiny leaves. It has bright yellow flowers and blue berries.

Osprey

Known as fish-hawks, these raptors can often be found gliding on their five-foot wingspan around coastal areas.

Pacific Bleeding Heart

The Pacific bleeding heart is a giving plant and has many relationships with other beings.

Pacific dogwood

Pacific dogwoods grow to 15 metres tall as a shrub or tree. They are covered with white flowers in spring.

Pacific Giant Salamander

The Pacific giant salamander is an indicator species, and thus is an important marker of ecosystem health.

Pacific Salmon

The pacific salmon plays a vital role in maintaining our ecosystem balance in British Columbia.

Pacific treefrog

Pacific treefrogs are usually about 5 centimetres long full grown. They can be green, bronze, grey, and all colours in between.

Pacific Willow

The Pacific willow is considered one of the tallest native willows, growing 1-9 metres tall. It has long, pointed leaves and shiny, reddish-brown branches.

Painted Turtle

Painted turtles are famous for their basking behaviour, sometimes piling on top of each other to warm up in the sun’s rays.

Paper Birch

Paper birch is a small to medium sized deciduous tree that grows 30 to 40 metres tall and has a trunk that grows up to 75 centimetres in diameter.

Peale's Peregrine Falcon

Falcons are carnivores gifted with the art of the hunt. They have exceptional eyesight, with sharp talons and beaks.

Pika

Small, brown, and fuzzy, pikas are a relative of the rabbit. They have short, round ears and short limbs.

Pine Siskin

Pine siskins are small birds that resemble a sparrow when perched and measure only 4.25 inches long.

Pinegrass

Pinegrass flowers in small green clumps, with seeds that are spread by wind, animals, birds, and animal’s fur. These seeds are eaten by birds!

Pink Fawn Lily

The pink fawn lily has flowers that hang downward, protecting the pistil and pollen from springtime rains.

Ponderosa Pine

This tree has a cone shaped top and grows 30 to 50 meters tall. Ponderosa pine has two or three needles in a bunch and yellow to red-brown bark.

Porcupine

Porcupines play a crucial role in the establishment of forests and the development of ecosystems. Porcupines eat mostly the inner bark of trees, but sometimes tender leaves and stems.

Prairie Lupine

Although other lupines have been known to kill animals that eat the plant, this lupine is considered a good food source for cattle.

Prickly Pear Cactus

Prickly pears bloom in late spring and early summer. The flowers are large and yellow, and they turn into small, hard, pear-shaped fruits.

Prickly Rose

The prickly rose grows up to 1.5 metres tall and has stems covered in short, hard prickles. It has a large pink single flower with a strong sweet smell.

Queen's Cup

The Queen’s cup is an important species in B.C. It is a small plant, but its presence can help us learn a lot about the ecosystem.

Red Alder

The red alder grows to 24 metres tall and is often found in recently disturbed areas, especially along marshes, floodplains and stream banks.

Red Huckleberry

Red huckleberry is an important species to many beings in British Columbia. Red huckleberries are often found growing on rotting logs and stumps.

Red-Breasted Sapsucker

Sapsuckers drill holes in rows across trees. They get their name from the sap they drink, along with insects that are stuck in the sap.

Red-Osier Dogwood

Red-osier dogwood is a plant that protects and provides for its community.

Red-tailed hawk

Red-tailed hawks have many different colour patterns in both light and dark phases, but most adults have a red-coloured tail and a light belly with a dark band across it.

River Otter

River otters have a unique gift for communication! They communicate via speech, smell, touch and body language.

Rough-skinned newt

These newts are small, less than 10 centimetres long, and have a dark back and a yellow or orange belly.

Round-Leaved Sundew

This is a small insect-eating plant that has sticky red tentacles for capturing insects such as mosquitoes, midges and gnats.

Salal

Salal is an evergreen plant, so it keeps its beautiful green leaves all year round. It spreads by underground stems and roots.

Salmonberry

Salmonberries are one of the many berries which bears and birds eat. The young shoots of the salmonberry can be peeled and eaten raw or steamed.

Sandhill Crane

Sandhill cranes are one of the oldest living bird species in the world. Fossils of the sandhill crane date back over 10 million years!

Saskatoon berry

The Saskatoon berry plant varies in size from being a shrub of one metre tall to a small tree of five metres tall. The berries are purple to nearly black in colour.

Scrub Birch

Also known as bog birch, swamp birch and dwarf birch. Scrub birch is a shrub with resin-filled wart-like glands on its twigs.

Sharp-Tailed Grouse

This grouse species has an extravagant mating dance that is performed on mating grounds known as leks.

Sitka Spruce

Sitka spruce has papery seed cones and stiff, sharp needles. The conifer has thin and scaly, brown-purplish bark.

Skunk Cabbage

In many ways, skunk cabbage is an initial sign of spring as the heat created from the root system melts the surrounding snow.

Snow Bunting

Snow buntings are a kind of sparrow. They are an important part of the ecosystem and food chain.

Snowberry

The snowberry fruits ripen in the fall with two seeds. They spread out by their seeds and by underground stems.

Solitary Sandpiper

Solitary sandpipers eat from the shallow waters and muddy shores of marshes, finding frogs, spiders, crustaceans, and a variety of insects.

Soopolallie

Soopolallie is an incredibly important plant for bears! The berries of this shrub appear from late July to mid-August. These berries are a main part of a bear’s diet.

Spotted Bat

Spotted bats have a great gift of communication. In fact, they use their communication skills to see through echolocation.

Spotted Owl

The spotted owl is an indicator species for old-growth forests. This means it indicates the health of the ecosystem.

Spruce Grouse

Spruce grouse are unique in that they like to live in regenerating forests. They play an important part in the restoration of ecosystems after disturbance.

Subalpine Fir

Subalpine fir is an important tree for animal habitat in B.C.’s interior and high-elevation forests.

Sword Fern

Sword ferns reproduce by spores not by seeds; they need lots of moisture to spread the spores to sprout in a new spot.

Tailed Frog

They are one of the longest living frogs in the world! The adults don’t mate until they are seven or eight years old, and some tailed frogs can live for 20 years.

Tall Bluebell

The tall bluebell is signified by its beautiful blue flowers, which are are pollinated by native bumblebees.

Tamarack

Tamarack is a conifer tree that loses its needles in the fall. It usually only grows as high as 15 meters and has three-sided needles in clusters of 12 to 20.

Thimbleberry

Thimbleberries contribute so much to the ecosystem throughout the year! Native bees love to eat the thimbleberry nectar hidden deep inside the flowers.

Three-Toed Woodpecker

True to their name, the woodpeckers peck at wood to get to the delicious insects that live under the bark of various trees.

Trembling Aspen

The trembling aspen is quick-growing but does not live for more than 50 years. These plants are gifted at fostering community.

Trumpeter Swan

The trumpeter swan is the heaviest living bird native to North America, and one of the largest flying birds on the planet!

Tundra Shrew

Tundra shrews are insectivores, meaning that they mainly eat insects. Like most shrews, they eat worms, insects, some grasses, and flowers.

Twinflower

Twinflower is a short trailing shrub, less than 10 centimetres tall, with long stems that run along the ground and send up shoots.

Vancouver Island Marmot

Vancouver Island marmots have chocolate-brown fur and a white chest, nose and feet patches.

Western hemlock

The western hemlock always has droopy new growth at the top of the tree with soft foliage and needles. A full-grown tree can be 30 to 50 metres tall.

Western Jumping Mouse

Western jumping mice hibernate during the winter and spend most of their days in the summer building up fat reserves for this dormant period.

Western Red-Cedar

The western red cedar has long been known as the “Tree of Life” for its abundant gifts and contributions to ecosystem health.

Western Sandpiper

These birds are important for shoreline and coastal ecosystems. They like to eat small aquatic animals, including worms, shellfish, and insects.

Western Screech Owl

The western screech owl is a unique being that lives in low-elevation, woodland areas adjacent to streams.

White Mountain Avens

White mountain avens are pioneer species; this means they are some of the first to grow in an area.

White Spruce

White spruce grow from a stunted bush up to a 40 metre tall tree, with smooth, shiny twigs and grey scaly bark.

White Tailed Deer

The deer will band together during the winter when food is scarce, as the snow may be high and feeding areas may be limited.

White-Tailed Ptarmigan

Ptarmigans change the colour of their feathers in winter and summer so they can blend in with their habitat and be protected from predators.

Whitebark Pine

Whitebark pine is one of the shorter pine trees in the mountains. Its round bushy treetop grows from many different twisted stems.

Wild Ginger

Wild ginger is an evergreen plant with thick roots and trailing stems with heart-shaped leaves on long stalks.

Wolf Willow (Silverberry)

Wolf-willow is one of the few plants that is able to fix its own nitrogen through a partnership with nitrogen-fixing bacteria.

Wolverine

Wolverines are in the weasel family, but are shaped more like a small bear. Wolverines are carnivores, usually scavenging rather than hunting.

Wood Frog

Wood frogs eat mostly worms, insects, snails, and other small creatures, but they have also been known to eat small frogs.

Woodland caribou

Woodland caribou are found in the Yukon, Northwest Territories and in central/northern B.C. with a pocket in the Central Interior’s Chilcotin.

Woods Rose

Woods rose has flowers that are bright pink and look very different from roses you can buy in a flower shop.

Yarrow

Yarrow is a generous plant and a team player. The flowers, leaves, and entire plant have edible and medicinal properties.

Yellow Pine Chipmunk

The yellow pine chipmunk eats mainly seeds and nuts and scampers up pine trees to retrieve the seeds available in their cones.

Yellow-Bellied Marmot

Marmots create rock burrows in the ground that they use to keep themselves cool during the day and to provide protection from predators.

Yellow-Cedar

Yellow cedar can live for hundreds of years! Young cedars will sprout out of damp rich earth and out of old, downed trees.

Did You Know?

B.C. is the most biodiverse province in Canada but doesn't have a provincial law to protect endangered species or their habitats. Let’s change that.

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