Time running out for Alberta's dwindling grizzlies
Minister mulls reinstating spring hunt even as gov't report recommends bears be listed as threatened species
By Darcy Henton, Edmonton JournalMarch 8, 2010
After eight years of research, studies and consultations over the status of the province's grizzly bear population, Alberta appears to be back where it began.
Alberta's Endangered Species Conservation Committee is poised to reiterate its recommendation to the provincial government that grizzlies be listed as a threatened species.
It made the recommendation in 2002 based on estimates there were fewer than 1,000 grizzlies in the province. When the committee meets Friday, it will have a hard number -- 691 grizzlies.
After the province spent $2 million and five years to count the bears with state of the art DNA-based methods, it now appears that despite hunter claims to the contrary, the committee's concerns were justified. The international measure for listing a species as "threatened" is 1,000 mature adults. The latest Alberta status report suggests there are fewer than 360 mature adult grizzly bears.
Critics see this as zero hour for Alberta's grizzlies. Given the delay, they say it's a good thing the grizzlies weren't in immediate peril, but the government better act now by closing roads in core grizzly habitat and taking measures to protect bears.
The critics -- a wide array of environmental and conservation groups -- say the only positive action the government has taken through a succession of four cabinet ministers is the suspension of the annual spring grizzly bear hunt in 2006.
But new Sustainable Resource Development Minister Mel Knight has revealed even that is not carved in stone.
"A harvest opportunity is part and parcel of good wildlife management," Knight said in an interview. "I am not going to stand here and prejudge anything that could happen in the future. Let's take the scientific facts and the evidence that's there and apply some rationale and reasoning and make a decision and decide whether or not a harvest is an appropriate thing to do."
Knight, MLA for Grande Prairie -- Smoky, concedes there's already a lobby for the resumption of a limited hunt in northwestern Alberta next year in the relatively undisturbed Grande Cache area. The most recent data suggests the area is home to as many as 18 bears per thousand square kilometres.
"There are areas in the province where the grizzlies are quite thin on the ground and areas where they are more plentiful," Knight says. "There are places where people are going to say: 'Why don't you allow some harvest in a certain area?'
"The other side of the coin is a number of groups inside and outside of Alberta and internationally have taken up the cause of the grizzly bear. It is an icon to people and there's pressure from that side to absolutely resist any sort of harvest."
Knight suggested it may come down to a safety issue. The Grande Cache area had 66 grizzly bear occurrences last year, ranging from grizzly sightings to attacks on livestock.
"First and foremost, the protection of people and the safety of individuals in Alberta is part of this whole issue," he says.
Hunters say the latest study supports their contention that a limited hunt can be sustained.
"We're looking to get our hunt back," says Alberta Fish and Game Association president Quentin Bochar. "I think now that the numbers are out, it's time the government comes out with a responsible management plan that includes hunting in it. There was never a justifiable or scientific reason for suspending the hunt."
Brian Bildson, of the Willmore Wilderness Foundation, says hunting has a limited impact on grizzly bear mortality and is an effective tool for managing problem bears.
But the report, titled the Status of the Grizzly Bear (Ursus arctos) in Alberta, says any additional human-caused grizzly mortality in areas of the province, other than the Grande Cache unit, "may be unsustainable." It warns, too, that the industry-driven pressures on grizzlies in the rest of the province will eventually reach the Grande Cache area.
Overall, the tone of the report by Marco Festa-Bianchet is cautionary. "Given the large numbers of uncertainties involved, the precautionary approach is to conclude that currently the population is likely slowly declining and may not sustain any additional human-caused mortality," it states.
University of Alberta biology professor Mark Boyce, who has studied grizzlies in Yellowstone and Alberta, says he believes that biologically, a limited hunt could be sustained, but it will be "a political hot potato."
"It's certainly possible. It's not a biological question; it's really a political one. I am glad I don't have to make the decision. The minister will catch flak no matter which way he goes."
Carl Morrison of the Sierra Club of Canada warns that resuming the hunt would be a huge blight on the province's reputation -- as if it needed another one.
"All the evidence points to the fact that we're dealing with a threatened species in Alberta," he says. "I can't imagine this looking too good for Alberta's international image if we were to open a hunt on a threatened species during the International Year of Biodiversity."