The "Recovery Implementation Plan for Threatened Woodland Caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) in the Hart and Cariboo Mountains Recovery Area, British Columbia" was completed and forwarded to government August 2005, and is currently awaiting decision. (View pdf file-6Mb).
The recommendations of the Recovery Action Plan were used by the provincial Mountain Caribou Science Team to develop the Provincial Mountain Caribou Recovery Plan.
That plan is currently being implemented, including additional habitat protection, implementing snowmobile restrictions, and managing the predator-prey system.
Details of the plan and the current status of recovery actions can be found at www.env.gov.bc.ca/sarco/mc/updates.html.
That plan is currently being implemented, including additional habitat protection, implementing snowmobile restrictions, and managing the predator-prey system.
Details of the plan and the current status of recovery actions can be found at www.env.gov.bc.ca/sarco/mc/updates.html.
Executive Summary:
The purpose of this document is to identify the steps that are most likely to lead to full recovery of threatened mountain caribou herds within the Hart and Cariboo Mountains. Full recovery is defined as:
“Maintaining a self-sustaining population of mountain caribou distributed throughout the recovery area in perpetuity.”
The major threat to mountain caribou is increased predation that appears to be related to habitat changes that increase the number and distribution of early seral ungulates and their associated predators in caribou habitat. It is also necessary to ensure that the caribou have adequate supplies of arboreal lichens, their primary winter food source. There is concern that disturbance and displacement of caribou from core winter range by snowmobiling and helicopter skiing may also be detrimental to these animals, and hinder recovery.
Key recovery actions include:
i) Prohibit forest harvesting and all road building within core caribou habitat, except in exceptional cases that are discussed in the report;ii) Manage the forested land adjacent to core caribou habitat so that it will sustain natural levels of early seral ungulates and predators;iii) Restore the forested lands adjacent to core caribou habitat to a natural age class distribution that will sustain natural levels of early seral ungulates and predators;iv) Liberalise hunting to reduce early seral ungulate populations to levels that would occur in a natural forest age class distribution until habitat conditions recover;v) Reduce wolves and cougars in areas where caribou herds are critically endangered until the habitat has recovered;vi) Snowmobiling should be prohibited within most core caribou habitat, with the exception of special zones that have been identified within the report;vii) Helicopter skiing should be prohibited within some key portions of core caribou habitat, and operators should adopt practices that minimise disturbance in other areas of core caribou habitat.
Although there is consensus that full implementation of these recovery actions provides the best chance of achieving the objective, there remain significant concerns among some members that the objective is not biologically or socially feasible.
These concerns include:
i) The recent increase in early seral ungulates and their associated predators within mountain caribou range may be largely a natural process or the result of human-induced climate change at the global scale. If so, habitat management will be inadequate to maintain mountain caribou without the use of ongoing predator-prey management. Some believe that we should not interfere with natural processes even if caribou continue to decline and become extirpated, whereas others believe we should use ongoing predator-prey management to maintain caribou.ii) The habitat management actions would have a major impact on the forest industry and some believe we should implement a combination of habitat management and ongoing predator-prey management that will maintain caribou while reducing the socio-economic impacts.iii) Given that predation is the primary threat to mountain caribou, some believe that the restrictions on snowmobiling and helicopter skiing are unnecessarily severe. Others believe that based on a precautionary approach, all helicopter skiing and snowmobiling within core caribou habitat should be prohibited.
