(Photo: Jim Lamont)

To the northwest of Vancouver Island, long past the giant cedars and rainforests and on the precipice of the continental shelf, lies one of the most remote and vulnerable places in Canada.

Hard to find on any map, it’s actually one of the most densely populated places on the B.C. coast — if you happen to be a seabird.

Triangle Island, which is 45 kilometres from the northern tip of Vancouver Island and named for its roughly geometric shape, is home to about two million birds that fly in every spring and summer to breed.

It’s also one of the most sensitive ecosystems in North America, and a place where any kind of human presence is tightly controlled. The number of people allowed to visit in any given year is usually fewer than a dozen.

A visit to the island requires a rarely issued permit from B.C.’s environment ministry, not to mention a whole lot of cooperation from Mother Nature to get there.

“The weather out there can be pretty horrendous, especially in the spring,” said veteran seabird biologist Mark Hipfner, one of the very few people who have been allowed to frequently visit the island over the last two decades. (CBC journalists were not permitted to visit Triangle Island for the purpose of this story, so the researchers and volunteers agreed to share their images.)

Hipfner said the protection of this roughly one-square-kilometre island is critical to the survival of the world’s seabirds, but it also serves another mission — as the proverbial canary in the coal mine for climate change.

Nine crew members visited the island this year, including grad students and staff from a number of Canadian universities. (Triangle Island Seabird Research) Nine crew members visited the island this year, including grad students and staff from a number of Canadian universities. (Triangle Island Seabird Research)

Hipfner's team is on Triangle largely to study how a changing climate and ocean is affecting the birds’ ability to find food, reproduce and survive.

“The effects are pretty profound,” said Hipfner.