This weekend, a small group of volunteers came out in a desperate bid to protect a scarce resource that once flourished in the Vancouver area: wild salmon.

There is only one wild salmon stream left in Vancouver, according to the Musqueam Eco-System Conservation Society (MECS) -- and they are doing everything possible to preserve it.

"We are removing the invasive species so the native species can thrive," event coordinator Christina Nahanee said.

"We clean up all the garbage, we keep it clean in the area and by planting more trees it provides protection for the salmon."

Salmon is important to Christina, as it is to her community. The creek runs through the Musqueam reserve, which is tucked away at the south end of Crown Street in Vancouver before entering into the Fraser River.

"It represents our past and our future," Nahanee said.

This Saturday was the second time Emily Carr teacher Rita Wong volunteered to help MECS in its efforts to preserve the stream.

"The ivy will grow back and it will choke the trees and the small indigenous plants," Wong said while pulling out the plant on a steep embankment beside the creek bed.

"It's pretty tenacious."

"I think it's so amazing that there is a wild salmon stream in Vancouver and that it survived at all is a bit of a miracle to me," she added.

In 2004, a broken water main at 41st and Marine Drive flooded the creek, putting the salmon run at risk. Spawning salmon were buried alive by mud and the chlorinated drinking water killed off much of the insect life that fish feed on.

In 2006, the City of Vancouver gave over $200,000 to fund Musqueam efforts to preserve the stream.

Nicolas Scapillati, executive director of MECS, says the restoration of Musqueam has been a success.

He says that the Musqueam efforts to preserve the salmon stream helped keep it from disappearing like the approximately 50 streams that used to bring hundreds of thousands of salmon into the area.

Before the restoration started the Musqueam were seeing less than ten salmon return each season. With continual improvement to the river bed, they are seeing between 20 and 40 Salmon come back each year and could see more in the future.