Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Canada Alberta's Grizzlies a declining population?

Some are asking, if time is running out for Alberta's dwindling grizzly population.

Alberta's Environment Minister mulls reinstating spring hunt even as gov't report recommends bears be listed as threatened species.

After eight years of research, studies and consultations over the status of the province's grizzly bear population, Alberta appears to be back where it began.

Alberta's Endangered Species Conservation Committee is poised to reiterate its recommendation to the provincial government that grizzlies be listed as a threatened species.

It made the recommendation in 2002 based on estimates there were fewer than 1,000 grizzlies in the province. When the committee meets Friday, it will have a hard number -- 691 grizzlies.

After the province spent $2 million and five years to count the bears with state of the art DNA-based methods, it now appears that despite hunter claims to the contrary, the committee's concerns were justified. The international measure for listing a species as "threatened" is 1,000 mature adults. The latest Alberta status report suggests there are fewer than 360 mature adult grizzly bears.

Critics see this as zero hour for Alberta's grizzlies. Given the delay, they say it's a good thing the grizzlies weren't in immediate peril, but the government better act now by closing roads in core grizzly habitat and taking measures to protect bears.

The critics -- a wide array of environmental and conservation groups -- say the only positive action the government has taken through a succession of four cabinet ministers is the suspension of the annual spring grizzly bear hunt in 2006.

But new Sustainable Resource Development Minister Mel Knight has revealed even that is not carved in stone.

"A harvest opportunity is part and parcel of good wildlife management," Knight said in an interview. "I am not going to stand here and prejudge anything that could happen in the future. Let's take the scientific facts and the evidence that's there and apply some rationale and reasoning and make a decision and decide whether or not a harvest is an appropriate thing to do."

Knight, MLA for Grande Prairie -- Smoky, concedes there's already a lobby for the resumption of a limited hunt in northwestern Alberta next year in the relatively undisturbed Grande Cache area. The most recent data suggests the area is home to as many as 18 bears per thousand square kilometres.

"There are areas in the province where the grizzlies are quite thin on the ground and areas where they are more plentiful," Knight says. "There are places where people are going to say: 'Why don't you allow some harvest in a certain area?'

"The other side of the coin is a number of groups inside and outside of Alberta and internationally have taken up the cause of the grizzly bear. It is an icon to people and there's pressure from that side to absolutely resist any sort of harvest."

Knight suggested it may come down to a safety issue. The Grande Cache area had 66 grizzly bear occurrences last year, ranging from grizzly sightings to attacks on livestock.

"First and foremost, the protection of people and the safety of individuals in Alberta is part of this whole issue," he says.

Hunters say the latest study supports their contention that a limited hunt can be sustained.

"We're looking to get our hunt back," says Alberta Fish and Game Association president Quentin Bochar. "I think now that the numbers are out, it's time the government comes out with a responsible management plan that includes hunting in it. There was never a justifiable or scientific reason for suspending the hunt."

Brian Bildson, of the Willmore Wilderness Foundation, says hunting has a limited impact on grizzly bear mortality and is an effective tool for managing problem bears.

But the report, titled the Status of the Grizzly Bear (Ursus arctos) in Alberta, says any additional human-caused grizzly mortality in areas of the province, other than the Grande Cache unit, "may be unsustainable." It warns, too, that the industry-driven pressures on grizzlies in the rest of the province will eventually reach the Grande Cache area.

Overall, the tone of the report by Marco Festa-Bianchet is cautionary. "Given the large numbers of uncertainties involved, the precautionary approach is to conclude that currently the population is likely slowly declining and may not sustain any additional human-caused mortality," it states.

University of Alberta biology professor Mark Boyce, who has studied grizzlies in Yellowstone and Alberta, says he believes that biologically, a limited hunt could be sustained, but it will be "a political hot potato."

"It's certainly possible. It's not a biological question; it's really a political one. I am glad I don't have to make the decision. The minister will catch flak no matter which way he goes."

Carl Morrison of the Sierra Club of Canada warns that resuming the hunt would be a huge blight on the province's reputation -- as if it needed another one.

"All the evidence points to the fact that we're dealing with a threatened species in Alberta," he says. "I can't imagine this looking too good for Alberta's international image if we were to open a hunt on a threatened species during the International Year of Biodiversity."

It is best, in my opinion, to err, if there is one to be made, on the side of the grizzlies. Development in Alberta is only going to increase, that in itself will decrease bear populations. 691 bears doesn't leave much room for mistakes:

Grizzly bears need a great deal of space to provide for their habitat needs. In order to access seasonally abundant and widely dispersed foods, grizzly bears must travel great distances. Grizzly bears that live in less productive habitat require much larger areas to feed in. The home range of grizzly bears in the eastern slopes of the Central Rockies Ecosystem is quite large, from about 500 sq. km for females to 1000 sq. km for males. Home range size in this region indicates that food sources are widely dispersed throughout the landscape rather than concentrated in local areas.

Not only do grizzly bears need large areas to live in, they need space with limited human access. Secure habitat where human activity is minimal allows grizzly bears to be 100% effective in their use of the landscape. Human activities and developments can make even the most productive habitat less attractive to a bear. As a result, grizzly bears will either live in these areas under stressful conditions or they will avoid them entirely. Overall, human developments and activities make habitat less effective in supporting the needs of bears.

In areas where grizzly bears may frequently encounter humans, they need tree and shrub cover that allows them to escape human detection and avoid close encounters. The alternative to avoiding humans is to become habituated and tolerant of their presence. Unfortunately, proximity to humans tends to increase the chance that a bear will be killed by humans. Bears also use the cover provided by closed-canopy forests to take refuge from the heat and to bed down for periods of the day.

I agree with you totally.

B.C. and Alberta are very different places.

B.C.'s latest estimate is 17,000 Grizzly Bear population - that gives a bit more leeway when it comes to the allowable harvest - that's for sure.

Need to shoot a bear? British Columbia has approximately 165,000 black bears, up from an estimated 80,000 in 1870.

Definately air on the side of caustion. I was raised in southern Alberta and the last few bears were gettin throttled by ranchers and small coutry lot homesteads.
They are truely a fantasic animal.........we need them to survive in Alberta. Stop hunting may not be enough.

I wonder if Banff, Jasper and waterton Lakes populations were excluded.

Kananaskis country has it's fair share, too. I've seen a couple of different grizzlies in that area just in the last 5 years. There's gotta be a decent number for me to see 2 in such a short time frame.

Yes, the National Parks were excluded from the study. Having said that, the bears don't recognize the park boundary nor do they recognize the AB/BC or AB/MT borders.

I feel we need to continue to figure out the population of Griz here in AB and in areas such as Grand Cache and north where the population is solid and stable, reinstate the hunt. In other regions, the population must be properly assessed and a good recovery/management plan initiated based on good science and that is region specific.

I personally know both Brian Bildson and Mark Boyce. They are very knowledgable and passionate outdoorsmen/conservationists. The Willmore Wilderness is an incredible provincial and national treasure. It is truly a wild area with opportunity for hunters, fishermen, trappers, hikers, birdwatchers etc....and it is home to Grizzly bears. Accessing it can be difficult which has helped to keep it wild but it is also pristine due to the efforts of folks like Brian.

Mark is a world renowned wildlife researcher who has been over seeing a number of his grad students studying large predators in several parts of Alberta. I sat on the advisory board for a cougar study that one of Marks students was doing in my area. These are good folks who are doing their studies in a very unbiased manner. We have some of the best researchers in the world right here.

The study that came up with 691 grizzly bears did not count bears in the National Parks, north of Peace RIver or the Swan Hills, if my memory is right. Therefore, the number is seriously flawed.

Whether or not a hunt is viable, I'm not sure.

According to this report, or at least through my quick perusal, it seems that the Alberta Government did try to make an estimate of the population throughout the province.

http://www.srd.alberta.ca/BioDivers...Status-GrizzlyBear-inAlberta-Feb2010.pdf

I don't thinkAlberta is very good grizzly range in the first place compared to say the Yellowstone drainage.

Just start planting (or dropping by air) cold weather mast crops, maybe oaks and beechnuts from either northern Ontario, Manitoba or Siberian, at the headwater streams on the east slopes of the Rockies.

Mast crops invariably make for more bears, bigger bears, and if planted far enough away from people keeps the bears out of trouble.

There are plenty of grizzlies in Alberta. Just go into the foothills or mountains and fire one shot. They are the top of the food chain and they are not hunted. They know that a shot means a dinner bell. Most elk hunters will be chased off a kill eventually. A few hunters get killed every year because of this.
It seems to be in everyone's interest to understate the grizzly population here. It's a hot issue much like the Yellowstone wolves. They are a disneyesque wilderness icon that many couch experts have passionate opinions on. The paid "experts" yell fire to protect their little fiefdoms. Trust me, grizzlies are not rare by any means. I live 20 minutes out of Calgary and I see a few every year within a mile or 2 of my house.

'Splain something to me, Jburner, exactly what mast crops would grow north of Lake Superior?

Why isn't Alberta good grizzly range? This province is very much part of their home range. The bears were once very abundant here. We even had grizzlies across the prairies here.

The bears are there, likely more than we know but without a solid count of them we won't know. The bears problems here are related to human incursion into their home ranges, mainly industry incursion. The backcountry has been opened up by roads which are in some cases easily traversed by cars. We need proper controls, not politically motivated ones over access. I don't have the answers but we need to discuss options. I am not anti industry nor anti access, but, we need to find a good balance all around if we want to build and preserve the bears population and be able to hunt them. Yes, I would like to hunt a grizzly bear here in Alberta.

Planting non-native/invasive plants is not the answer. Alberta has enough issues with invasive species without adding to the problems. There are plenty of native food sources out there for a healthy population of bears. ASRD has a program that involves flying road killed wildlife into the backcountry for the bears. This normally happens in areas where there have been bear/livestock depredation issues. It works to a certain degree.

I have had them come in the shot a number of times. We often hunt in the Hinton area. A couple of years ago I was walking back down an old, closed logging road when I found very fresh griz tracks covering my tracks from my climb up. Needless to say I was a bit more alert to my surroundings as I was grouse hunting with a 20g!

A year ago while hunting west of Rocky Mountain House, I noted 5 distinctly different grizzly bears within a few miles of each other along the North Sask River. Sow with cubs and two large boars.

Jburner,

Some of your posts are very interesting and some are just plain puzzling. This is one of the puzzlers--maybe a joke?

Grizzlies eat an incredible variety of stuff, including some nuts, but planting eastern Canadian nut trees in the Rockies is one of the nuttier ideas I have ever heard. In fact the biggest, most peaceful grizzlies are from the coastal areas where they eat a lot of fish. It would make more sense (which wouldn't be much) to plant salmon in the east-slope Alberta trout streams.

Dear Mule Deer,

Because of the glaciers Canada is a very sterile country. Most of the top soil and evidence for previous fauna and flora was carried south into the USA.

The human race has made the world a better place for itself by moving flora around - potatoes and tomatoes are from South America, pineapples are from French Guiana, mangoes trees from India, oranges from God knows where etc etc.

Mast forests such as beechnuts and oaks do make the world a better place for bears just like potatoes make the world a better place for us.

That is why Manitoba and Pennsylvania black bears get larger and live in denser populations than Yellowstone grizzlies. Ursus arctos in Iran get huge on acorns.

If the soil at the headwaters of Rocky Mountain streams will support mast crops then plant them there. They draw bears for miles in the autumn and can be used at that time of the year to draw the bears away from people. The bears get bigger on mast and there are more of them.

All hunters have to do is get some northernmost acorns when driving through Manitoba, put them in a back pack and plant them when hunting the headwaters of Rocky Mountain streams or drop them from aircraft.

The trees on the prairies that have grown up since settlement is why there are whitetails in places like Saskatchewan now and no one has complained about that. There were no white-tails there in Samuel Hearne's day.

Just use a little creative planting to make the wildlife habitat better.

Remember nobody really knows exactly what animals and plants were in Canada 10,000 years ago and where they were located because the glaciers destroyed most of the evidence.

Dear Khamann,

Oaks grow in Manitoba further north that Lake Superior. I think the problem will be soil type. But there are many drumlins and eskers (gravel hills and mounds desposited by the glaciers) in far northern Ontario that might support oaks if they were introduced.

There are almost certainly varieties of northern oaks in Siberia that would grow quite far north. We plant potatoes from South America in Ontario. Why not oaks from Siberia?

The drumlins and eskers have already been mapped out on geological survey maps and so have the types of trees that are there now.

I have used MNRs tree maps to locate oaks and thus concentrations of black bears in autumn. They sometime congregate in very large numbers in small areas to feed on acorns and beechnuts. A friend once saw more than 30 in one day in oaks near Sudbury.

Dear Troutfly,

The density of grizzly bears in Canada's Rocky Mountain Parks has been documented and is very small compared to the density in Yellowstone. Its because the country is all rock and no soil and the climate is harder. The plant growing season is shorter.

Bear visibility is not an indication of the bear population. Hunted bears hide from people. Unhunted bears will climb into your dumpster.

The best Alberta grizzly range has been planted to wheat. Grizzlies did better on the plains, until we came along. And i'm still trying to find out where the buffalo went. This side of the rockies is harsh and unproductive and poorer bear range than the other side. It is not their choice range in Alberta, it is simply all there is left.

Jburner may be right about the habitat enhancement stuff. There's lots of mast in the Riding Mountains of Manitoba (i'd like to see Siberian Tigers there - and wild boar!) and it has the highest bear densities in North America (blacks.) The grizzlies were there too a couple hundred years ago, all over southern Manitoba, but they're long gone there - it's a simple equation: more of us = less of them. Same thing as is happening in Alberta today. Which is why they're on their way out in Alberta, too - it's turning into Southern Ontario the 2nd. Playground for Big Boys with Big Toys.

But these habitat enhancement things will not happen. America is collapsing and in a few years will be in sovereign default. We will follow. Pretty soon conserving anything other than ourselves will be off the radar. Which will be good for Alberta, to see it go into decline finally - as it is right now.



Spongebob - if you wanted your car fixed, would you take it to a plumber?

Hey Gulo,
Obviously I'm not a bear expert like you are. I'm just giving a boots on the ground report as someone who bumps into grizzlies all the time. My knowledge is based on observation. I have heard the stories and read the reports and it just sounds too much like typical government in action. I would believe the opinion of a hunter or a rancher over a biologist any day. I work in government and I know the mindset. The object of any govt department is not to fulfill it's stated mandate, although sometimes it does happen by accident. The real goal is to grow the kingdom, hire more and expand the budget. Any crisis in the wind will do. Do you really think the goal of Indian Affairs is to make a better life for our Native people? It would be a beautiful thing if it were true but it ain't. It's never in governments best interest for any "problem" that government sinks it's teeth into, to ever actually be solved.