The Conservation Alliance

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Sierra Club BC

Website
http://www.sierraclub.bc.ca/
Contact Name
Laura Milne
Contact Email
laura@antispamsierraclub.bc.ca
Location
Victoria, BC
Past Grants
2012 · $35,000
2010 · $35,000
2009 · $35,000
Grand Total
$105,000

Sierra Club BC is a non-profit environmental organization whose mission is to protect and conserve British Columbia’s wilderness, species and ecosystems, within the urgent context of global warming impacts. We advocate the responsible use of B.C.’s natural resources while promoting a modern, equitable economy that sustains our planet in every way.

One of our greatest strengths, rooted in our more than 40 year history, is our ability to engage and mobilize people in constructive action to protect ecosystems and wild spaces. At the heart of our organization are more than 10,000 supporters from diverse communities across the province.

Sierra Club BC works with different levels of government and First Nations to provide science-based conservation viewpoints and advice on policy decisions that affect a range of environmental issues

Conservation Alliance helps fund our Flathead River Valley campaign, which seeks permanent protection for this globally-significant wilderness in the southeast corner of B.C. The Flathead adjoins Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park, a World Heritage Site and two UNESCO Biosphere Reserves.

In February 2010, following a prolonged campaign by Sierra Club BC, Wildsight and other groups, the B.C. government announced a ban on mining and oil and gas development in the Flathead. While we welcome the ban as an important first step, it has not been legislated and could be overturned by a future provincial government. In the absence of permanent protection, the Flathead, compared to Africa's Serengeti for its richness of species, remains under threat from logging, grizzly trophy hunting, new road access and quarrying.  

We aim to secure permanent protection by establishing a National Park in the south eastern one-third of the Flathead River Valley, thus filling in the long-recognized missing piece of the Waterton-Glacier World Heritage Site. We also aim to establish a Wildlife Management Area in the rest of the valley and adjoining habitat in order to protect a vital wildlife corridor stretching from Glacier to Canada's Rocky Mountain parks.

The Flathead has the highest density of grizzly bears in the interior of North America, and the highest density and diversity of carnivores on the continent. Water in the Flathead River is so pure that scientists use it as a benchmark by which to measure water quality in rivers around the world.

The mining ban followed a petition by Sierra Club BC and 10 other US and Canadian conservation groups, which asked the World Heritage Committee to declare Waterton-Glacier a World Heritage Site in Danger due to a proposed Flathead mountain-top removal coal mine and other mining proposals. In June 2009 the committee voted unanimously to send a delegation to investigate. Click here to read the full mission report. Learn more at www.sierraclub.bc.ca.

We share our Conservation Alliance funds with two other organizations involved in the Flathead campaign: Wildsight and Headwaters Montana.

Project Update

Grizzlies, big-horned sheep, wolverines and bull trout don't need Nexus cards to cross the border regularly between Montana and B.C. In mid-March, three leading international scientists spoke in Whitefish, Montana about the importance of permanently protecting B.C.'s Flathead for these at-risk species, and many other trans-border critters.

The scientists gave presentations at a public event organized by Flathead Wild, a coalition of Canadian and American organizations, including Sierra Club BC, that strives to protect a globally-significant wildlife corridor. B.C.'s unprotected Flathead River Valley is a critical link in the corridor, which stretches up the spine of the Rockies from Whitefish to Banff.

"Species that once thrived elsewhere--and are no longer found there because of human activity--have a refuge here," explained Dr. John Weaver, a carnivore conservation biologist who has spent many years studying the transboundary Flathead.

Weaver described how scientists track elk which winter on the U.S. side of the Flathead then migrate up the continental divide into B.C. to give birth to their calves. Cross-border wolf packs and mountain goats are also studied, along with the elusive and fierce wolverine. "Almost all of this trans-border Flathead country is just outstanding habitat for wolverines," said Weaver.

"We scientists are haunted by the ecological complexity we see out there in the natural world. We're also humbled by it. In wonder of that complexity we can celebrate and honour the trans-border Flathead."

Read about the event in the Missoulian.

Dr. Michael Proctor, lead researcher for the Transborder Grizzly Bear Project, described how he and colleagues collect grizzly bear hair samples to study the transboundary movements of this at-risk species. Instead of attaching unwieldy radio transmitter collars, they put fish and blood in a jar for a year and use it as bait to collect hair strands, which provide a "DNA fingerprint."

"It's really revolutionized bear biology. These bears don't even know they're being studied and we've learned quite a few things about them."

One thing Proctor and other scientists have learned is that grizzly populations become isolated when animals are separated by highways and human settlement. When bear populations are separated by human development over time, by as little as 120 kilometres, they stop breeding with each other. "The big, tough grizzly bear is really the wimpiest one out there because it's so hard to move him across the landscape," said Proctor.

Fragmented populations result in greatly reduced gene pools. When grizzlies have safe passage through the landscape and can co-mingle, their gene pools are far more diverse, said Proctor. "In fragmented places across highways we've basically found that bears are having no sex. And then we found places that were like a university campus. There's a lot of activity!"

One such place is B.C.'s Flathead River Valley, where grizzlies easily move back and forth between B.C. and the adjacent Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park in Montana and Alberta.

In November 2011, following an intense campaign by Sierra Club BC and other conservation groups, the B.C. government legislated a ban on mining and energy development in the Flathead. The legislated ban is a very welcome first step, but it does not permanently protect this globally-significant wildlife area. Notably, the Outdoor Recreation Council’s 2010 and 2011 endangered river lists placed the Flathead “On Watch,” pointing to the absence of permanent protection.

Dr. Richard Hauer, a University of Montana limnology professor, talked about how rivers extend under the ground to cover entire valley bottom floors, or riparian bottomlands.

The vast majority--90 percent--of native fish species in the trans-border Flathead rely on riparian bottomlands, many for spawning. These floodplains support 235 bird species, half of which nest in the riparian area. An astounding 300 caddis flies, mayflies and stoneflies also thrive in the Flathead, which Hauer referred to as  “truly one of the most bio-diverse places on the planet,” he said.

Today, the Flathead is threatened by plans for industrial logging, new road access, and trophy hunting of grizzlies and other animals that are given sanctuary only steps away in Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park. Waterton-Glacier is part of the same "Crown of the Continent" ecosystem that includes B.C.’s Flathead River Valley. The United Nations considered this intact ecosystem to be of such outstanding value to humanity that it has designated Waterton-Glacier a World Heritage and two UNESCO Biosphere Reserves. Learn more about Flathead issues.

Take action to permanently protect B.C.'s Flathead River Valley, with a National Park in the southeastern one-third and a Wildlife Management Area in the rest of the valley and adjoining habitat.