Matthew Marcone
Alberta Wilderness Association, Ontario Nature and The David Suzuki Foundation have released new maps that they say identify critical caribou habitat destruction “hot spots” in Alberta, Ontario and Quebec.
These groups are calling on respective provincial governments to meet with Indigenous and stakeholder groups to develop range plans for protecting critical caribou habitat, which is a federal requirement under Canada’s Species At-Risk Act.
“No province or territory has fully met the timeline established in the Recovery Strategy for the development of range plans, due on October 5, 2017,” said AWA conservation specialist Carolyn Campbell. “Our Chinchaga range maps strikingly illustrate the lack of progress to save Alberta’s iconic caribou populations. We need Alberta to produce collaborative range plans that include protected areas, restored areas and smaller, clustered areas of disturbance, so that caribou can recover and communities can thrive.”
“Range level planning” was identified as the best method of implementing practical protection measures under the 2012 Federal Recovery Strategy and 2016 Federal Range Planning Guidelines, which on a working landscape aims to benefit local caribou recovery while limiting the socioeconomic impact on communities and industry.
In the first step in meeting federal requirements, the Alberta Government hired independent mediator Eric Denhoff, who in May 2016 released a report, “Setting Alberta on the Path to Caribou Recovery.”
In the report, Denhoff recommended permanently protecting 1.8 million hectares of land in northwestern Alberta by converting large sections of Chinchaga Wildland Park, Yates, Bitscho, Red Earth and Caribou Mountains into provincial parks.
Denhoff falsely claimed that local stakeholders had been consulted in his report and currently works as Minister of Environment and Parks Shannon Phillips’ Deputy Minister, which has been well-documented by The Echo-Pioneer over the past year.
Among the most common regional concerns surrounding the province’s proposed strategy include its effectiveness and potentially negative socioeconomic impact.
The Northwest Species At-Risk Committee – made up of Mackenzie County, Town of High Level, Town of Rainbow Lake, County of Northern Lights, Clear Hill County and Town of Manning – developed a report in September highlighting ways to protect caribou while minimizing socioeconomic impact.
It was criticized by AWA and CPAWS for not having a special component, which they consider a key part of helping to recover Alberta’s caribou population. They have stated that by protecting 65 per cent of Alberta’s critical caribou habitat, it will give the species a 60 per cent chance of recovery; a fact that has been contested by NWSARC.
Included in the newly released maps is a profile on the Chinchaga range, which was assessed as having 76 per cent habitat disturbance in 2011.
“It has one of the lowest estimated calf survival rates in Alberta,” said Campbell. “Since the 2012 federal caribou Recovery Strategy, the Alberta government auctioned 1000 km2 of new energy leases in this range before halting lease sales in August 2015. One Wildland Park covers 5 per cent of this caribou range; otherwise there are no limits to industrial disturbance. In June 2016, the Alberta government promised to extend the existing Wildland Park by 3500 km2 into an adjacent area that has no industrial forestry, to increase protected areas to 24 per cent of this range; however, there have been few follow-up actions to date.”
The virtual maps can be seen online at http://caribou4ever.ca/nr-backgrounder/.