In part one of his series on caribou, biologist and wildlife photographer Mark Bradley discussed barren-ground caribou. Part two will focus on woodland caribou, the same ones found in Jasper National Park.

Wolves, Elk and Caribou in Jasper National Park

The area that is now Jasper National Park has a long history of human interference in elk, wolf and caribou populations—likely starting with the introduction of firearms in the mid-1700s, and really picking up when the railroad reached Calgary, in 1883. Little is known about Jasper wildlife populations in these early years, but by the beginning of the 20th century, almost all of Alberta’s elk had been shot off. Wolves were also at very low numbers due to trapping and poisoning, but also because the elk were so scarce.

When the park was formed in 1907, the wolf killing continued, and in 1920 the park superintendent of the day imported some U.S. elk as a tourist attraction. These elk multiplied rapidly because of the lack of predators, and the caribou may have as well (though caribou records are scanty from this era). High elk densities prevailed until the 1970s when wolves were finally reaching higher numbers (wolf culling had stopped in 1959). 

Remember, the woodland caribou strategy is to stay away from other prey animals, and therefore their predators. In the years with no wolves, staying away from the elk wasn’t really an issue, but when the wolves made their comeback it became a huge issue.

The increasing elk populations meant that both elk and caribou started a steady decline which lasted until about 2014, and now both elk and caribou are more or less stable at low numbers. However, the caribou are at very low numbers. By 2014, because they’d eaten most of their food sources (but perhaps also from vehicle strikes), wolves had declined as well. 

So now we find ourselves in a low-density elk and caribou situation, and because of the low wolf numbers, a low-predation situation as well.

Low predation ought to be good for our slowly reproducing caribou; the problem is, there are now so few caribou left that there are just not enough breeding females remaining. Scientists call this the quasi-extinction threshold where the species in question isn’t actually extinct, but there are not enough breeding animals left to stage a comeback. Parks Canada’s plan to set things right is to rear caribou in captivity and release them into the park—this will get those caribou numbers up above that quasi-extinction threshold so they can make a go of it on their own. 

Wolves, Deer, and Caribou Outside of Jasper

But what’s the woodland caribou situation outside of Jasper in Alberta and B.C.? They have been the victim of human interference in the predator/prey system there as well, but in a different way. On provincial lands, deer (collectively: deer, elk, moose) and wolves are not at low densities, they are at high densities. The reason for that is that both the logging and the oil and gas industries cut down trees. When you cut down trees, you’re essentially growing deer food—the deciduous bushes and grasses that come up in fresh clear-cuts. And when deer increase, wolves increase right along with them… and those now-numerous wolves will also eat caribou.

The province’s solution to this problem has been to kill wolves in caribou habitat. The idea is that this will buy time so that those little bushes can grow back up into the tall trees of caribou habitat. Now, as much as it pains me to admit it, killing wolves actually can increase caribou numbers—but you have to kill a lot of them, and over a huge area, and you can never stop. Unlike caribou, wolves breed fast—they can have five or six pups per year when times are good, so if you stop the wolf killing, they come back in a hurry. And, because there are now a lot more deer, you end up with even more wolves.

Another issue is the fact that while this wolf killing has been going on, the provinces have not actually stopped cutting trees in critical caribou habitat. If you’re going to kill wolves to allow caribou habitat to regrow into mature forests, then it makes little sense to keep cutting the trees.

Of course there is a big reason that the tree-cutting continues: it makes some people a lot of money, and foregoing all that revenue is not at all appealing to governments and industry. But it all depends on how you do the accounting. An argument made by forestry scientist Samantha Maher (and others) is that conservation can be considered an investment by pricing forest as a natural asset. In other words, forgoing tree harvesting can be considered a capital gain, leading to an increase in future wealth. Just how much habitat to save for caribou, and how much to cut for today’s revenue is not an easy problem to solve, but if we don’t nudge the scales towards caribou, then their days are numbered.

Probably the most common question one hears about the plans for Jasper’s caribou captive rearing plan is: “Do you think it will work?” I do think it will work, because of our current low wolf density. And unlike areas outside of the park, our habitat is intact—we just need to correct the legacy of our past practises. 

Classification counts in Jasper

In Jasper, caribou classification surveys are now done from helicopters, not snowmobiles. Unlike surveys on the treeless tundra, in the mountains you cannot just drive your snowmobile for hundreds of kilometers in any direction. Here, we fly routes in the alpine and look for fresh tracks, which of course eventually lead to caribou. Modern camera gear enables us to record sex and age quickly as we fly past the caribou (we do the counting up later, from a computer screen). As you might imagine, these Jasper surveys are a lot faster than those arctic surveys I used to do—and far less demanding than snowmobiling for hundreds of kilometers in sub-zero weather. Following tracks from a chopper, however, often involves a lot of tricky flying and tight circling. Which leads us to a survey issue quite different from the “too many caribou on a hill” problem, all those years ago. 

We were in the middle of a classification survey, on a beautiful, sunny day. It was a couple of days after a fresh snowfall, which is ideal because it makes it easy to spot the freshest tracks. We’d had a great day so far, with lots of tracks to follow and several caribou groups to classify. Layla Neufeld was navigating up front. I was in the right rear seat and we had a volunteer sitting in the left seat. We were weaving and circling over the treeline, hot on the trail of a fresh set of tracks.

Just then the volunteer said loudly: “I’ve got six!”

“Awesome” I said, “what do you think they are: bulls, cows… what?” 

She shook her head… “No…” she said quietly. “I got sick…”

Ooooh… right… that’s not nearly as good… We landed for a well-deserved break, and as I mopped up in the back seat, it occurred to me that sometimes the old ways weren’t so bad after all!

Mark Bradley // info@thejasperlocal.com