Recipients,
The latest news from the Creston Valley is the numbers of Grizzly Bears frequenting the Creston Flats. Many ranchers are seeing as many as 20 Grizzlies in their corn, oats, and barley crops at one time. Additionally, other farmers report counting ten or eleven Grizzly bears on their properties at once. Some bears have stayed up most of the winter where food is available. It seems as through multiplying Grizzly bears is a planned event, evidenced by the present government shutting down the G-Bear season completely in beautiful British Columbia. Over the past 20 or more years, the estimated G-Bear population has been at 15,000.
With springtime just around the corner, our elk, bighorn sheep, moose and deer populations, that are still alive, will be producing calves, lambs, and fawns, the favorite fodder of large carnivores, like Grizzlies, black bears, wolves, cougars and coyotes.
Dr. Vince Crichton tells of a trail camera set up by a coyote den. Footage on this camera from 29 days shows the two adult coyotes bringing back 19 mule deer fawns to their den for the cubs.
Dr. Charles Kay tells of an Alaska Grizzly bear with a camera attached to a radio collar, killing 44 moose calves in 29 days.
As we see predator numbers increase, and ungulate populations drastically decline in the Kootenays, it is imperative that our big game managers take steps to counteract the demise of our Big Horn sheep, which would be the next to go. Additionally, following the Big Horn sheep include are our Shiras moose, elk, Mule deer and Whitetail deer. We have already lost our Woodland Caribou and do not need to more ungulates to this list.
Simply locking up large areas of land doesn't work; Kootenay national Park is testimony to that. Closing off access roads is not the solution as it turns the untraveled areas into predator pits. We have had enough of this inane practice of restricting back road use.
Predator management is the obvious solution and access to our Crown lands is required to do so. Presently, the Ministry of Everything is set on closing our back country down via road closures, using access restrictions like AMA's, VAC's and WMA's; thus, affecting all people who use this back country. Once big game populations fall below certain critical levels, [so called predator pit] wolf predation alone is capable of maintaining the critical slide to extirpation of any given ungulate species.
Starting in 1978, biologists in Northeastern began to test the effectiveness of wolf control as a means of increasing Caribou in the Horseranch and level mountain areas, moose and mountain sheep in the Kechika Valley, and mountain sheep, elk, moose and caribou in the Muskwa valley. They monitored ungulate populations in which up to 80% of the wolves were removed and other areas where none were removed. The results of such predator control were dramatic. The recruitment of Caribou calves, where wolves were removed, increased exponentially. In the Kechika, moose calf survival increased tenfold and mountain sheep lambs twofold. In the Muskwa, moose responded to wolf control with four times as many calves per 100 cows, elk with three times as many calves per 100 cows and mountain sheep with twice as many lambs and three times as many yearlings. Similar results were found on Vancouver Island's Nimpkish Valley, where an overpopulation of wolves were killing all of the back tailed deer.
Most older biologists, who were once opposed to predator control, are now espousing the benefits, as we see our Kootenay ungulate populations plummet. Predator/prey relationships need to be kept in balance. Our elk, deer, sheep and moose need our help now.
Call the Minister of FLNRO, Honorable Catrine Conroy's Castlegar office and seek her support for predator management and insist on opening roads, not closing them.
Sincerely,
Carmen C. Purdy
President KWHF
Director Emeritus; The Nature Trust of BC
Past President; BC Wildlife Federation
Past Chair; BC Conservation Foundation
Founding director; The Habitat Conservation Fund.