By Maria Ionova
Rudolph — in all his plastic glory – could soon become the only reindeer seen in the province of Ontario. Environmental scientists worry that non-fictional reindeer – or woodland caribou – may become extinct if their plummeting population cant recover quickly enough.
Since the introduction of the Endangered Species Act in 2007, the woodland caribou population has been a hot topic among the environmental community.
Reindeer are threatened because they have virtually vanished in the northern region and are, at this stage, considered to be in great danger of disappearing altogether. Only dispersed herds remain in Northern Ontario.
The exact count of the current population is unknown aside from the definitive evidence that Ontario is experiencing a drastic decline in these numbers. According to research by Northwestern Ontario Boreal Forest Management, in 1965 the total caribou population was estimated to be approximately 13 000, but this estimate was “thought to be far below the carrying capacity of their current range.” More recent studies in 2008 suggest that the range of forest-dwelling woodland caribou has plunged by 40 to 50 per cent since the mid-1800s, as indicated by the Ontario Woodland Recovery Strategy.
So what factors have lead to such a drastic decline of these velvet-skinned creatures?
To answer this question, CPAWS Wildlands League, a public interest group, engaged in an empirical study in July 2009 and reached the conclusion that seven of nine caribou populations are declining as a direct result of industrial activities, such as wildfires and logging, which disturb their habitat.
The scientific evidence cited within Wildlands League was derived in large part from the report “Scientific Review for the Identification of Critical Habitat for Woodland Caribou, Boreal Population in Canada,” as presented by the federal Scientific Advisory Group in May 2008 to Environment Canada. This government-endorsed scientific review found that human imposition on caribou natural habitats proved to be one of the most prevalent contributing factors in population disintegration.
In response to such findings, the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) swiftly devised an action plan. In April 2009, the MNR released a draft of the Ontario Woodland Caribou Conservation Plan; a strategy outlining the steps they plan to take to rescue the threatened population.
Since releasing its first draft of the CCP, MNR has come under fire from various environmental groups, including Wildlands League, which are pressuring the government to outline the particular areas and specifically identify ongoing industrial projects that will be halted in order to preserve the caribous’ habitat.
“We’ve been really disappointed with the government’s response. It didn’t really get to the heart of the matter in terms of addressing the fact that human impacts are known to have a strong influence on woodland caribou. Our biggest complaint was it put conservation planning for caribou within the forest management context,” said Carly Armstrong, a campaigner for an activist group, Earthroots Northern Ontario.
But for James Schaefer, a caribou biologist and a professor at Trent University, the effect of industrialization on caribou populations has been evident for quite some time. He has been urging industries to act responsibly towards caribou habitats since the initiation of the Northwest Territories Mackenzie Gas Project, a 1220-kilometre natural gas pipeline system designed to connect with North American markets in 2006.
“There is no doubt that we are to blame for the continuing demise of woodland caribou,” he said in Sierra Club Press Release.
Proponents of the MGP have argued that once the project is completed, the caribou populace would return to normalcy. But Schaefer says that, in all likelihood, the loss of habitat is permanent or, at the very least, long-term since there are no case studies on record that depict caribou repopulating an area once vacated.
Don Russell, Yukon’s caribou biologist and a former employee for Canadian Wildlife Service, echoes Schaefer’s sentiment that recovery of Canadian caribou must evolve around the concept of access control in any given industrial area.
However, he said one of the major obstacles in considering any drastic recovery strategy is a delayed population response, a time interval of ten to twenty years which usually occurs between the implementation of an industrial project and the detection of its effects on the species. And he fears that this “lag time” of uncertainty may have catastrophic results for the caribou population if the wait is prolonged for too long.
Armstrong said the correlation between industrial activity and caribou population decline is clearly indicated through the scientific evidence provided up-to-date. She also acknowledges the fact that a strong correlation between a cause and an effect does not necessarily imply a given link.
She also recognized that this skepticism shouldn’t be grounds for the government to continue promoting industrial development, because it contradicts the logic of the precautionary principle – “a lack of full scientific certainty must not be used as a reason for postponing measures to avoid or minimize the threat of a species at risk in the Province,” as cited in the Endangered Species Act.
“They (the Ontario government) don’t seem to be operating at a range-level. They are not defining all caribou range as habitat they are trying to pick and choose what is called ‘caribou habitat,’ but actually, they (caribou) range through these large areas and impacts in any of those areas is going to affect caribou persistence on the landscape,” said Armstrong.
Stefanie Millon, the Communications Advisor for MNR, said the government developed a caribou “insurance policy,” which entails mandating future forestry companies to engage in caribou population and habitat assessment prior to development. But aside from this proposed effort, there weren’t any specific industrial projects suspended in an attempt to sustain the declining caribou population.
“CCP established a planning framework for caribou conservation within an adaptive management framework, rather than calling for the immediate cessation of any specific activity,” Millon said.
Armstrong said they’ve already lost the fight to protect the Ogoki region located in northwestern Ontario, one of the few intact caribou habitats, from logging and road-building initiatives. However, their attempt did not prove to be entirely futile since it culminated in the MNR outlining specific guidelines for road-building, which were seen to cause minimal damage to caribou habitat.
“We put a lot of pressure on the government in the form of petitions and informed letters, and that definitely had a strong impact,” she said.
She also added that individuals need to stay informed about the issue to facilitate change. Both Armstrong and Millon agree that an increased public awareness can lead to improved protection of caribou population.
“A lot of people do not necessarily know what a caribou is in terms of where they are or where they used to be. I think gaining that awareness about what the creature is and why it’s in trouble – is important,” said Armstrong.