British Columbia British Columbia British Columbia (BC; ) is the westernmost province of Canada, located between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. With an estimated population of 4.817 million , it is Canada's third-most populous province. The first British settlement in the area was Fort Victoria, established in 1843, which gave rise to the City of Victoria, at first the capital of the separate Colony of Vancouver Island. Subsequently, on the mainland, the Colony of British Columbia (1858–1866) was founded by Richard Clement Moody and the Royal Engineers, Columbia Detachment, in response to the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush. Moody was Chief
Geography of British Columbia British Columbia Ministry of Forests and Range subdivides the province's ecoregions into a system of biogeoclimatic zones: In botany, nearly all of British Columbia is part of the Rocky Mountain Floristic Province. Founded as several colonies as part of the British Empire, the political geography is complicated by the fact that during colonization no treaties or conquests of First Nations (the indigenous people) occurred outside of a few small areas of the province. The resulting legal and political system is based upon the British, and later Canadian state that evolved from it. At present much of the province is subject