A new Parks Canada report has shown that over the past two decades nearly 23 black bears have been killed annually in the Rocky Mountain national parks.
The report indicates all of the mountain national parks, including Glacier, Revelstoke and Waterton Lakes, saw a total of 477 black bear mortalities between 1990-2009.
Jasper National Park Superintendent Greg Fenton said recently the report, the first of its kind in the mountain parks, represents a base line of black bear mortality trends for Parks Canada and the public.
“That’s all it really is, you can’t come up with good solid cause and effect relationships, but it does provide some trend data to allow us to focus in on what might be working or what might not be working generally in reducing the mortality factors in different parks for different causal factors, highways, railway or the different categories in the report,” Fenton said.
“This will set the stage for more frequent reporting on black bear mortalities in the parks.”
According to the report, Black Bear Mortalities in the Mountain National Parks: 1990-2009, a 20-year summary report, prepared by Barbara Bertch, a Parks Canada ecosystem GIS technician, and mountain national parks carnivore specialist Mike Gibeau, those mortalities were caused by a number of factors that fall into human-caused, natural and unknown deaths.
Among the human-caused deaths the highways and railways in the mountain parks resulted in the largest number of mortalities.
Highways led to 53 per cent of the deaths, followed by the Canadian Pacific and Canadian National Railways, which accounted for 28 per cent.
Of the highway mortalities, the Trans-Canada Highway is the single largest source of deaths on roads in the mountain parks (37 per cent) followed by Highway 93 North and South (33 per cent).
Jim Pissot, representative for Defenders of Wildlife, said he welcomes the report and the information it provides, however, it is also a reminder of the effect humans have on wildlife, even in protected areas.
“It is really tragic that we are having this level of mortality within a national park. One would think these are places of conservation where bears can live to a ripe old age and die a natural death, but for these numbers of bears each year that doesn’t happen,” Pissot said.
However, he added the report is essential as it focuses on black bears, which are often overlooked in consideration of grizzly bears.
“Black bears have long been the poor cousin to grizzlies in the mountain parks and grizzlies have a slower reproduction rate. There are reasons to focus on grizzlies as a priority, but I believe this report finally puts black bears on the map where they deserve to be,” Pissot said.
The report demonstrates Jasper National Park, with 209 black bear deaths, has the greatest number compared to Banff (90), Glacier (56), Yoho (47), Kootenay (37), Waterton Lakes (31) and Revelstoke (7).
Fenton said Jasper has the largest mortality for black bears simply because it is the largest national park with the largest amount of viable black bear habitat.
He added that a rough estimate used in the park, but not on population studies, sits at 70-90 bears.
Banff, on the other hand, has an estimated population of 40 black bears, according to Parks Canada.
However, Fenton said the number of bears killed in Jasper National Park have been declining over the past 20 years, in part due to management actions such as decreased speed zones and better handling of garbage.
“We haven’t done any specific studies to quantify cause-effect, but it appears actions like that have assisted and led to a downward trend and we’ll certainly continue to monitor those kinds of things, and if there are additional management actions that we need to take we’ll do that,” he said.
The numbers appear to follow similar trends in the other national parks, especially in Banff, following the fencing of the Trans-Canada Highway and increased cooperation with Canadian National and Canadian Pacific Railways.
“We’ll continue to work with CN and CP as partners on those kinds of programs with the hopes of reducing the numbers of mortalities associated with railways,” he said.
While Fenton said the average of 22.5 black bears killed per year is not insignificant, he said that amount does not appear to be having a significant effect on the overall population of black bears in the Rocky Mountains.
“In part, because they have a much higher reproduction rate than grizzly bears and they are more resilient. There are more cubs and females mature sooner in life compared to grizzly bears and they seem to be less sensitive to interaction with humans than grizzly bears.
“We feel the populations in all of the parks are certainly not in any threat of significant decline below a threshold where they couldn’t rebound. With the reproduction rates, and the feeling that the populations are healthy compared to grizzlies, it hasn’t led us to do any detailed population studies as we have for grizzlies, where there is greater concern for them,” he said.
Even though Fenton said it appears black bears may not be in danger overall, the report sets the stage for continued tracking, reporting and an identification of what management actions work and what doesn’t.
“It gives us a chance to look at the trends and what is working or not generally,” he said.
