'It’s game over': Last 'Grey Ghost' caribou herd down to 3

[A_Britishcolumbian]

the folks of the okanagan didn't seem to care about the caribou, and now from what i can see they are gone.
lets hope these folks can change the course for their local herd.

A small First Nation in northern British Columbia is calling on the federal and provincial governments to save endangered woodland caribou by taking drastic steps, including protecting key habitat, killing wolves and creating safe penning areas for calving.

Fearing the local extinction of a population that has fallen 80 per cent in 20 years, the West Moberly band has produced an action plan designed to rebuild the Klinse-Za herd to a size that can sustain hunting.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/bri ... picks=true

[Rwede]

Unfortunately, the government has had its hands tied by public opinion and has been reluctant to use science-based methods to help caribou herds recover.

The short and skinny of it, as mentioned in the article, is that if we're going to rebuild the caribou population, we're going to have to do wolf control, and that includes aerial gunning and the use of 1080. We would end up with both wolves and caribou under this plan. Public hysteria over wolf control means we'll end up with wolves and no caribou. Until we remove that public hysteria, game managers basically are powerless to do the right thing.

I'd like to show caribou and wolves to my grandkids. I don't think I'll be able to show them caribou, unless we move forward with predator control now, before the caribou are extirpated.

[A_Britishcolumbian]

before i got my first place in the okanagan, early 90's, i had followed the reports of a diminished herd on the eastside between kel and pen. i traveled the old roads back and forth between the two over many years and seasons but never identified a single track, heard a single story of caribou in the area. i believe the last documented count was in the 70's and it showed 40 or less animals. i find it so disturbing that no one ever talks about them, no one seems to recognize their disappearance.

[Rwede]

A-BC, do you belong to a fish & game club? Lots of talk and action about what can be done for caribou around their tables.

[A_Britishcolumbian]

no fish and game. avid fisher though, i hunt with a camera. i am a farmer.

[Rwede]

You may want to get involved with your local fish and game club. You don't have to be a hunter to be part of those conservation organizations, many fishers and even some non-fisher/hunters join up to help out.

They get all the information about wildlife populations and are the first ones invited to help with habitat restoration initiatives. Would be a good chance to make a difference and maybe help lobby for some action on restoring caribou populations in the Kettle, Grandby, and Shuswap areas.

[Thinktank]

So out in the middle of nowhere, caribou are going extinct and we can't save them,
but here in penticton, dozens of deer wander around causing $thousands of dollars damage
to orchardists, and it's against the law to harm one of them.

What would happen if someone would kill a deer? Jail? $10,000 fine? What? Life in prison?

[Fancy]

Hadn't heard of caribou in the Okanagan until now.
http://www.env.gov.bc.ca/wld/documents/techpub/b100.pdf

[Rwede]

So out in the middle of nowhere, caribou are going extinct and we can't save them,
but here in penticton, dozens of deer wander around causing $thousands of dollars damage
to orchardists, and it's against the law to harm one of them.

What would happen if someone would kill a deer? Jail? $10,000 fine? What? Life in prison?

Lots of seasons for people to be able to legally harvest a deer. Landowners suffering crop damage can invite licensed hunters in to shoot a deer within the seasons/regulations.

Fancy, thanks for the link. My dad told me about one of his buddies who legally shot a caribou along the Shuswap River back in the 1940s or early 1950s. They are really good eating until late September when the bulls start to rut.

[A_Britishcolumbian]

are newspapers more important than caribou?

Elected officials in the northern foothills are concerned about new restrictions the provincial government has placed on forestry to preserve caribou, including Hinton's mayor.

Mayor Ian Duncan with 13 other mayors and reeves (for counties and municipal districts), including from Edson, Jasper and Yellowhead County, signed a June 20 letter sent to Minister Diana McQueen of Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development. The letter predicts "significant negative social, financial and economic impact on our communities," as a consequence of the ESRD's restriction to exclude harvesting from 35 per cent of the Alberta Newsprint Company's forest management agreement area — for "an indefinite period."
West Fraser Timber, which owns the Hinton pulp mill, also owns half of Alberta Newsprint, said Mayor Duncan.

Discussions are needed to clarify the government's expectations from forestry companies for caribou range planning and what is meant by the restrictions for "an indefinite period" of time, said Hinton's mayor.
The ESRD's public affairs officer for forestry, Duncan MacDonnell, said the province is making efforts to comply with the federal government's recovery strategy for woodland caribou, published late last year. Alberta's herds are listed as "threatened" under Canada's Species At Risk Act.
Alberta Newsprint's FMA affects two of Alberta's herds: the Little Smoky and the A La Peche herds, which are estimated to contain 78 and 135 animals, respectively. The Little Smoky is named after the eponymous river that flows through the forest management area.
MacDonnell said the 35 per cent of land set aside for caribou habitat should not affect Alberta Newsprint's annual harvest because it can be substituted with other harvestable land in the area.

http://www.hintonparklander.com/2013/07 ... ou-habitat

[A_Britishcolumbian]

and apparently this herd is doomed...

A hunting quota for caribou in Coral Harbour, Nunavut, has been extended for another year.

Last year at this time, the hunt from the Southampton Island caribou herd was restricted to 1,000 animals.

It was the first restricted caribou harvest for Inuit in Nunavut.

An amendment to the Wildlife Act, published today, extends that restriction until June 30, 2014.

The amendment states that Nunavut's Environment Minister "is of the opinion that urgent and unusual circumstances continue to exist" in the herd, which makes the quota necessary.

That includes a "precipitous decline" in the population to fewer than 7,000 animals, from more than 30,000 in 1997.

Without a quota, the amendment says, the herd is likely to disappear in three to five years.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/sto ... ribou.html

[rookie314]

You need to go up in the winter and watch the snowmobiles chase them!

[A_Britishcolumbian]

you hit it on the head rookie312, that is indeed genocide.

it is in the winter that the caribou are most vulnerable, the limited lichen in combination with snow and cold makes any extra physical exertion often fatal to the animals, and even if not can cause females to lose their unborn calves.

so, it is not just the 'government' and industry killing these beautiful creatures, but malicious, ignorant individuals as well.

[Gone_Fishin]

You need to go up in the winter and watch the snowmobiles chase them!

You need to report anyone doing that, as it's illegal. Failure to report is condoning the activity.

[LTD]

*try again without the colorful language and personal attacks*/ferri