by Tamara Hynd – Nelson Star
A wolf cull planned by the government in the South Selkirks aims to save endangered caribou. In a government press release it states that the Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations “is taking immediate action to save caribou herds under threat from wolf predation in two separate and targeted actions: one in the South Selkirk Mountains and the other in the South Peace.”
The South Selkirk area of the wolf cull is high lighted yellow and is bounded roughly by Ymir, Salmo, Kootenay Lake and Creston.
According to the government the local herd is at high risk of local extinction with only 18 caribou left. Research indicates that the population has declined from 46 caribou in 2009 to 27 in 2012, and to 18 as of March 2014, with evidence pointing to wolves being the leading cause of mortality.
Ministry staff will aim to remove up to 24 wolves by shooting them from a helicopter before snow melt.
The South Selkirk is a trans-boundary herd, and caribou move freely between BC, Washington and Idaho. Officials from those three areas, along with First Nations, the US Forest Service and the US Fish and Wildlife Service have been working together on a research project and have collared six of the remaining 18 caribou to help investigate the cause of decline. Wolves have killed two of the remaining caribou (11 per cent of the herd) in the past 10 months.
West Kootenay Eco-Society executive director David Reid in Nelson said the caribou situation is “really challenging.”
“As much as we abhor the cull of any animal, the reality is the intrusion of people into their habitats means if we don’t do something, the very small and delicate caribou population will likely not survive.”
He went on to say with the increase in recreation to the high elevations of the alpine is leaving skidoo tracks, which has been a point of access making it easier for wolves.
“The high alpine is typically a refuge for the caribou which are designed to walk in high snow. Wolves can’t walk in deep snow but they’ve figured out how to walk in the snowmobile tracks. It’s part of the problem.”
“If nothing is done, it’s very likely the caribou will not survive. It’s a very difficult situation, heli-hunting.”
The government statement went on to say that hunting and trapping of wolves have not effectively reduced populations and may even split up packs and increase predation rates on caribou.
“Habitat recovery continues to be an important part of caribou recovery, but cannot address the critical needs of these herds in the short term.”
The government said the operational plans for both the Selkirks and South Peace have been independently peer-reviewed.
On April 17, 2014, the Provincial Grey Wolf Management Plan was finalized and publicly released.
“There are no plans to implement a general aerial wolf cull, and in fact, the Two Zone Strategy noted in the Wolf Management Plan would not support a general cull.”
The government said that with the wolf population ranging between 5,000 and 11,600, they consider the wolf population to be “plentiful” and “the grey wolf is not a species of concern.
“The risk of removing the number of wolves recommended is very low, whereas the risk to pertinent caribou populations of doing nothing is very high.”
A Mountain Caribou recovery implementation program was endorsed by the provincial government in October 2007. This included strategies such as protecting 2.2 million hectares from logging and road building, transplanting caribou subpopulations, managing recreation to reduce human disturbance and to reduce predator densities where predation is preventing MC recovery.
For the South Selkirk herd, a significant portion of core caribou habitat has been closed to snowmobile use and almost all core caribou habitat has been protected from logging and road building. In July 2008, the Nature Conservancy of Canada purchased 550 square kilometres of land in the region specifically for conservation purposes.
To learn more about mountain caribou and recovery actions, visit:www.env.gov.bc.ca/wld/speciesconservation/mc/
More information will be provided by the Ministry on Friday regarding the commencement of the cull.