The only way to ensure Alberta’s endangered species survive, specifically grizzly bears and woodland caribou, is to set aside and protect large tracts of interconnected wilderness, according to a new report.
The report, 2010 Review: The State of Canada’s Parks, released earlier this month by the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) points out that where Canada has large, protected landscapes, wildlife thrive.
“The main message, especially in Alberta, is that in areas where we have large intact sections of wilderness we have done a really good job of protecting biodiversity and in areas where we don’t have that, we haven’t done such a good job,” said Canmore-based Sarah Elmeligi, CPAWS’ senior conservation planner for southern Alberta.
Even though the federal government has established new national parks, such as the country’s first deep sea National Marine Conservation Area in Gwaii Haanas, the report says biodiversity in Canada is in trouble, in this the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity,
Over 500 species are facing extinction, with the primary cause being inadequate habitat protection.
The specific lessons learned, according to the review, are threefold.
The first is that wildlife does well in large undisturbed areas of habitat.
Secondly, where a species is in trouble in national and provincial parks, such as grizzly bears in Banff National Park, the reason is usually human-related, but the causes can often be fixed.
And finally, reintroducing extirpated species, such as with plans to examine bringing woodland caribou and plains bison back to Banff, can go a long way to help these species recover and improve a region’s biodiversity.
Banff’s five known woodland caribou were killed by an avalanche in 2009, but as part of the current Banff National Park Management Plan, Parks Canada has committed to study the feasibility of reintroducing a breeding population to the park.
The prognosis for woodland caribou in Banff, according to the review, is uncertain.
Elmeligi said CPAWS applauds Parks Canada’s commitment to investigate if it is feasible to reintroduce bison and caribou to Banff National Park.
“We applaud that Banff National Park wants to do a feasibility study to reintroduce caribou to the park and very excited about the reintroduction of bison to the park, but reintroducing a species is much more costly and risky than maintaining a species.
“So that is something we need to focus on.”
For grizzly bears in the Rocky Mountain parks – both provincial and national – their condition has been rated as fair with their prognosis as fair to poor.
Elmeligi said the reason for that prognosis is that protected natural spaces create the perception that wildlife are safe, but in the case of grizzly bears in the Rocky Mountain parks, that is not true.
Trains, which have killed six grizzlies in Banff National Park since 2007, remain the most significant hazard the bears face in this region, according to the report.
“If we had a healthy grizzly bear population and one or two grizzly bears were getting hit by a train it wouldn’t be a problem, but the reality is Alberta has now gone ahead and listed the population as threatened and the amount of deaths occurring on the CP Rail line through the national park is unacceptable,” Elmeligi said.
Elmeligi said reports such as the 2010 Review provide decision makers with a different perspective and remind Canadians to act and take a personal responsibility for ensuring parks remain viable.
“Canadians need to take this to the next level and they need to take it to their MLAs and we need to get hard answers of how they are securing our future in terms of protected areas,” she said.
