Location:

Venues for the Lillooet Conference activities will be in several different locations. Registrants need to choose their own accommodations separately. See below for details.

The Lillooet Naturalists look forward to hosting the BCFO at Lillooet, June 5-7, 2026.

We are honored to be holding these events on the unceded territory of the northern St’at’imc.    Kukwstum’ulhkalap  (Thank you from all of us to all of you)

Getting to the Conference

Driving:  Vancouver to Lillooet via HWY 99 is 270 kms; Merritt to Lillooet via HWY 8,1 and 12 is 165 kms (all three highways suffered significant damage during our atmospheric rivers of 2021); Kamloops to Lillooet via HWY 1, 97 and 99 is 170 kms.

Flying: Fly to Kamloops and then follow driving directions.

Registration

You must be a paid-up BCFO Member for 2026 to register for the Conference: join or renew HERE.

AGM & Conference Registration & Payment page is HERE (to log-in, you will need to use your Member password, which you received by email when you joined or renewed) Registration will close May 22. No refunds after this date.

Full conference registration: $195/person.
Social Only $75.00 : includes Friday evening meet & greet, and Saturday dinner & keynote speaker. Does not include field trips, lunches, afternoon presentations or AGM meeting.
Young Birders (under 19 years of age) $90.00: includes Friday evening meet & greet, Saturday & Sunday breakfasts & lunches, Saturday evening dinner & keynote speaker, plus all field trips and talks.

Pre-Conference Extension Trip: Merritt/Logan Lake/Cache Creek June 2-5: Details HERE.

Conference Accommodation:

Hotels recommended are the DeOro, 639 Main Street, (250)256-2355, the Reynolds, 1237 Main St. (250)256-4202 and the Retasket Lodge and RV Park at 1264 Bouvette Road (250)256-2090. Note: The Retasket is on the T’it’q’et reserve and is managed by the band. This is where the hall is where we are holding events on Saturday and Sunday. They also rent lovely cabins at Seton Lake , which would be good for a small group to share (4 beds in two bedrooms and a loft). 

Other hotels are the Hotel Victoria, 667 Main St. (250)256-4112, 4 Pines, 108 8th Ave (250)256-4247 and the Mile 0, 616 Main Street (250)256-7511. 

There is free camping at the BC Hydro campsite on the way to Seton Lake off Highway 99 (5 minutes from town) as well as paid camping and RV at the Cayoosh Creek campground at the entrance to town at the confluence of the Seton and Fraser rivers. 

Friday, June 5

Registration, reception, and Saturday Field Trip Signup (and optional signup for breakfast from DeOro) : 5:00 PM until 7:00 PM at the Lillooet Brewing Company, 104 Main Street, proprietor Sacha Bordas. Pick up your conference registration package and socialize with fellow birders.

Light refreshments will be provided by the Lillooet Naturalists and visitors are encouraged to try the local award-winning beers. Beer, sodas, wine and light meals (pizzas and hamburgers) are available at cost. The brewery is graciously letting us use their patio, where birds can be seen and the scenery enjoyed. 

Sign the conference waiver form (preview the content of the Waiver in advance HERE ) review the BCFO Code of Ethics and make your field trip selections for Saturday morning.

Saturday June 6

Breakfast: Those that wish to book early breakfasts at the De’Oro (one of the recommended hotels) will have to order ahead on Friday eve for Saturday morning breakfast and the same on Saturday for Sunday breakfast. This can be done at the reception and dinner the evenings before. Otherwise, Tim Horton’s Drive-Through is the only early morning breakfast option – open at 5:30AM. 

Conference Field Trips: 6 AM sharp departures from the parking area across from the Post Office on Main Street , beside KC Health (adjacent to Hotel DeOro, Mile 0 Motel, Hotel Victoria) return ~11:30
  Trip #1 = Seton Lake and area, leader Ken Wright
  Trip #2 = Texas Creek Road west side of Fraser south – Odin Scholz and Geoff Playfair
  Trip #3 = Fountain (Xaxli’p) valley – Ian Routley 
  Trip #4 = Pavilion (Ts’kw’aylaxw) – Kelly Lake road – Christine Galliazzo

Lunch: noon to 1:00 PM at the T’it’q’et reserve at the P’egp’ig’lha Community Centre, 59 Retasket Drive. All Saturday & Sunday indoor activities are at this venue.(no alcohol will be served at T’it’q’et)

Kukwpi7 Chief Sidney Scotchman, T’it’q’et -Chief Sid will provide a welcome.

Afternoon Speakers: 1:00 – 3:00 PM “Papt Ku Gwenis” – Liam Ragan, Aiva Noringseth and Morris Prosser; followed by updates on Birds Canada work in BC and internationally, David Bradley, Birds Canada

Annual General Meeting: 3:00 PM. Signup sheets for Sunday morning field trips will be available immediately following the AGM.

Social Break / find your own happy hour (no alcohol will be served at T’it’q’et) / rest and relax).
Dinner: 6 PM at the P’egp’ig’lha Community Centre

Steve Cannings Award Presentation: 7 PM

Keynote Speaker: 7:15 PM Ken Wright – Birding by Kayak on BC’s central coast, Highlights of the mid-summer avi-fauna, 2023-2025. 

Sunday, June 7

Breakfast: same as Saturday, on your own

Field Trips: same as Saturday, 6 AM sharp departures from the parking area across from the Post Office on Main Street, beside KC Health

Lunch: same as Saturday, noon to 1:00 PM at the P’egp’ig’lha Community Centre

Tally-up of Species on Summary Charts

Farewell

Field Trips

1. Seton lake and area – Ken Wright

A short drive from town. A mix of driving on paved roads and walking along level ground. You will visit Ponderosa pine and Interior Douglas Fir habitat, and two spawning channels.  Possible species include Canyon wren (a year round resident), Rock wren, Harlequin duck (breeding in this area), a mix of coastal and interior warblers, Western tanager, American dipper, Chukar, Warbling and Cassin’s vireo, Gray catbird,  White-throated swift and more.

2. Texas Creek Road west side of Fraser south – Odin Scholz and Geoff Playfair

Texas creek road follows the western side of the Fraser south to Lytton.  It offers a variety of habitats, with both coastal type of forest alongside dry Ponderosa bunchgrass grassland.  The mix of birds can include both coastal and grassland species including Western meadowlark, Lincoln’s, Vesper, Savannah and Song sparrows, along with Lazuli Bunting, Red-naped sapsucker and possibly Black swift. This will be mostly roadside birding with some unique views of the Fraser River, walking mostly on level trails and driving on paved roads for the most part, but where there are dirt roads, they can be traveled with a low clearance two wheel drive. 

3. Fountain (Xaxli’p) valley – Ian Routley 

Fountain valley is about 500 meters higher than Lillooet.  Mostly roadside birding on paved road with short walks along mostly level ground. We will visit three small lakes in the upper valley.  A mixture of Interior Douglas Fir and Aspen supports a different avifauna than nearby Lillooet. Common goldeneye, Ring-necked duck, Lesser scaup, Green-winged teal, Ruddy duck and other waterfowl breed in the area. Red-naped sapsucker and Red-breasted sapsucker can both be seen and hybridize here. Both Dusky and Hammond’s flycatcher can be seen and heard along the roadside. Olive-sided is also a possibility.  

4. Pavilion (Ts’kw’aylaxw) – Kelly Lake road – Christine Galliazzo

This route follows one of our Bluebird nest box trail routes.  It follows Hwy.99 north to Pavilion (Ts’kw’aylaxw) and then follows a steep dirt road to the plateau above (which is then gentle flat dirt road).  A two wheel drive is fine, although you may have to negotiate rocks on the road on the way up the steep part. It is higher elevation Aspen and Interior Douglas Fir (IDF) forest and open grasslands. This is a working ranch with a public road through private property. A wide variety of birds may be seen including Mountain bluebird, Clay-coloured sparrow, Lincoln’s sparrow, Western meadowlark, Wilson’s snipe and Sandhill cranes.  If accessible, several small ponds can have breeding Barrow’s goldeneye, Green-winged teal, Blue-winged teal, Ring-necked duck and other waterfowl. 

Field Trip Leaders

Ian Routley is a founding member of the Lillooet Naturalist Society with a lifetime interest in the natural world. Ian has been birding in the Lillooet area since he moved to Lillooet to work in the late 1980’s. He was the Regional Coordinator for the Lillooet area during the Breeding Bird Atlas of BC.

Ken Wright is a founding member of the Lillooet Naturalist Society. He lived and birded in Lillooet for over 20 years, during which he started our Christmas Bird Counts and local bird checklist, before his international birding and guiding career. Ken has been fascinated by birds for as long as he can remember. He began by banding Harlequin Ducks in the Salish Sea, and his studies followed them from their coastal wintering grounds to breeding in riverine systems around Lillooet. He has also worked on the migration and breeding biology of the Yellow-billed Loon across its North American Arctic range and co-authored several related journal articles.

Odin Scholtz BSc. EP is a long-term Lillooet Naturalist Society member. He works as an environmental professional, managing ecological restoration projects as the senior biologist at Splitrock Environmental – a local First Nation business. Odin has a passion for studying native plants and ecosystem ecology. Over the past decade he has broadened his field to include the avian realm. He looks forward to spending time with the BCFO group.

Christine Galliazzo is a recently retired forester. Retirement allows her to spend more time on being the BC Bluebird Society president, Lillooet Naturalist Society vice-president and on monitoring and maintaining our local bluebird nest box trails.

Nick Froese works with the Xwísten Lands Department and has been involved in a variety of fish and wildlife projects in the Bridge River Valley for the past four years. Before moving to Lillooet, he worked on several ornithological research projects, with fieldwork ranging from Haida Gwaii to Peru. He enjoys a range of outdoor activities in the Lillooet area and is always keeping an eye out for birds and other wildlife.

Geoff Playfair has a love of nature in all forms and was with the Whistler Naturalists before moving to Lillooet and joining the Lillooet Naturalist Society. He is their current president. With a background in emergency response and mitigation, he also heads up the local Search and Rescue group. You are in safe hands on an outing with Geoff.

Presentations and Speakers

1) Ken Wright, Keynote Speaker – Birding by Kayak on BC’s Central Coast: 2023-2025

Ken has been fascinated about birds for as long as he can remember. That passion led to opportunities working on bird ecological research. He started out banding Harlequin Ducks in the Salish Sea and following them from their coastal wintering grounds to breeding riverine systems around Lillooet. He has also worked on the migration and breeding biology of the rare, Yellow-billed Loon across its North American Arctic range, and he co-authored several related journal articles. Ken enjoys international travel and often works on expedition cruise ships venturing to the Antarctic, Greenland, Iceland and other places. Ken’s passion for birds even led to the skies, where he obtained a glider license. One of his favourite ways to bird is exploring the intricate British Columbia coast by sea kayak and documenting these journeys on eBird and iNaturalist.

I have always relished the notion of exploring under-birded parts of our province. In 2023, my partner and I decided to do a ten-day kayak trip on the outer coast near Bella Bella in late July. I thoroughly documented the bird fauna using the eBird app. I was quite surprised by the relatively high species diversity (71) encountered. We had so much fun exploring the plethora of islands, channels, lagoons and pristine temperate rainforest that we decided to return for the next two years. As such, we documented 92 species over the three years. There were many highlights and surprises including unprecedented numbers of Marbled Murrelets (>200 individuals/yr) an obligate old-growth forest breeding alcid. We saw numerous shorebirds (19 species), mainly attributable to the timing of our trips coinciding with peak migration periods. Of particular note, were relatively high numbers of Wandering Tattlers (average 25 individuals/yr), a rocky shoreline migrant that mostly goes undetected on our coast. In contrast, Black Oystercatchers were surprisingly scarce, especially considering the extent of rocky intertidal habitats we managed to survey. Red-throated Loons were common and widespread, indicating a robust breeding population. We even detected the uncommon Western Screech-Owl at two of our campsites. These journeys have helped contribute to the understanding of the mid-summer avi-fauna of this spectacular part of our coast and highlight the rewards of exploring remote and under-birded areas of our province. I look forward to sharing these adventures at the BCFO AGM in Lillooet.

2)  Afternoon talk June 6 – Liam Ragan, Aiva Noringseth, Morris Prosser 

Papt Ku Gwenis Project

Tsal’alh First Nation, BC Nature, and Lillooet Naturalist Society have partnered with the Papt Ku Gwenis project which supports research, recognition, and monitoring of a unique population of black kokanee salmon, known in St’át’imcets as Gwenis. Endemic to Anderson and Seton Lakes, west of Lillooet, and unique in their morphology and ecology, these landlocked salmon are important to St’át’imc communities and to numerous wildlife species, notably Bald Eagles which gather in the hundreds in the area during the mid- winter spawning. Despite their immense cultural and ecological significance, Gwenis are barely known outside of the local region. In a watershed long impacted by hydro, forestry, and railway, the Papt Ku Gwenis team is working to study Gwenis and their role in the valley ecosystem to inform conservation strategies and to turn back declines and ensure they thrive for all time to come. In addition to talking about the unique salmon, we will be discussing the monitoring work that’s occurred and efforts to quantify the hundreds of Bald Eagles which rely on Gwenis as a winter protein source and speculate on the impacts their relationship is having on valley ecology.

Liam Ragan is the Manager for Key Biodiversity Areas (KBA) in BC. He has worked in Tsal’alh since 2018, and with the Papt Ku Gwenis team since 2021. This project helps shine a light on this unique salmon, and its impact to local ecosystems, including through recognizing Anderson and Seton Lakes as a KBA.

Aiva Noringseth is a field coordinator for BC Key Biodiversity Areas. She is coordinating field monitoring for the Papt Ku Gwenis project at Seton and Anderson lakes working with Tsal’alh and BC Nature. A well-rounded naturalist, Aiva primarily works in bird conservation and projects elevating biodiversity in BC and beyond.

Morris Prosser Rep’rep’sken (Morris Prosser) is Tsal’alhmec. He grew up half his life in Tsal’alh and the other half in Stό:lō Territory in the Fraser Valley. Dedicated to his Community and Nation, Morris has served in various community positions. Most recently as Tsal’alh Trustee for the St’at’imc (PC) 2011 Trust, on the Board of Tsalalh Development Corporation, on a St’át’imc Nation business working group, and also served on the Board of St’at’imc Eco Resources. Morris’ experience is in Economic development, First Nations’ Title & Rights, and Policy. From a young age, it has been instilled in Morris to honour the words of his Ancestors in the 1911 Declaration of the Lillooet Tribe. Morris works for the Ministry of Water, Land, and Resource Stewardship as a Senior Wildlife Policy Advisor and is currently pursuing a Master of Science at the UBC Faculty of Forestry. Morris’ career has revolved around the weaving of Indigenous and non-Indigenous knowledge and decision-making systems.

3) Afternoon talk June 6 – David Bradley Ph.D. Birds Canada

David will present on two of his current projects including a Long-billed Curlew migration tracking study in the Kootenay Mountains and a Black Swift breeding study in southwestern BC. He will also present on the Conserva Aves project and the use of the Motus Wildlife Tracking System that protects habitat for migrant birds in the Neotropics

David Bradley Ph.D., Birds Canada, Conservation Scientist and Director, British Columbia. David has been interested in birds and their conservation for as long as he can remember. Prior to his current role, he completed a postdoc at Birds Canada’s head office in Ontario and the University of Guelph on migration and breeding phenology in Tree Swallows. He conducted his Ph.D. research in New Zealand on the ecology and conservation of an endangered endemic bird, the North Island Kokako. He has also been involved in behavioral studies of Neotropical birds in Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, and Colombia.