Community Forests International, a non-profit based in Sackville, has launched a fundraising campaign to purchase and restore 2,500 acres of forests in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

The Wabanaki Forest, also called the Acadian Forest, historically spans the Maritime provinces, the Gaspé Peninsula and parts of New England.

It includes a mix of northern adapted species, such as spruce, poplar larch and birch, along with southern adapted species including oak, pine, maple and hemlock. But this unique forest is endangered, according to CFI.

A media release announcing the Forgotten Forests campaign says that "scientists have affirmed what Indigenous communities already knew — that most of the Wabanaki forest has been drastically altered."

"The small remnants of this forest that remain intact today are often on hilltops and in hard-to-access ravines, where forest clearing could not easily reach."

For more on this story, CHMA spoke to Craig Tupper, CFI's forest program manager.

Tupper and his colleagues have been searching for remnants of the Wabanaki Forest — usually found in corners of larger properties — lining up sales agreements with landowners.

The group also plans to purchase and restore areas that have already been harvested, "actively managing younger forests back to their full ecological potential to augment their ability to sequester carbon and adapt to climate change."

CHMA's David Gordon Koch asked Tupper about efforts to locate those remnants of the Wabanaki forest: