Beluga protection
Environmentalists want federal government to protect huge Hudson Bay beluga calving area
Environmentalists say the federal government should step in to protect an area of Hudson Bay that is the world’s largest calving area for beluga whales.
“The case for protection is just so strong,” said Chris Debicki of the group Oceans North, which just released a report on the southwestern shores of the bay, where more than 55,000 of the white whales gather every year.
“There’s nothing like this on the planet.”
Every year, tens of thousands of belugas migrate from their winter ranges to the mouths of the Seal, Nelson and Churchill rivers.
Scientists suggests the whales — one-quarter of all the belugas in the world — are drawn by the shallow, warm water that is ideal for calving.
The river estuaries also protect the calves from killer whales while providing abundant meals of fish and bottomdwelling shellfish.
The area is also rich with 170 species of migratory birds and one of the world’s most southerly populations of polar bears.
The wildlife is crucially important to Inuit communities, which have left a rich archeological record from centuries of occupation along the western shore of Hudson Bay.
It’s also becoming a significant tourism resource for Manitoba, which bills the area’s wildlife as one of its marquee draws.
Debicki said Ottawa should turn the region into a national marine conservation area.
Canada has two such areas — one in Georgian Bay in Lake Superior and one in the St. Lawrence River. Two others — one in a different part of Lake Superior and one in Gwaii Haanas off the British Columbia coast — are in advanced planning stages.
A fifth, on the eastern gate to the Northwest Passage, is also planned.
Oceans North has been urging Parks Canada to create a conservation area for the belugas since 2012 and the federal government announced its intention to do so in the 2017 budget.
“There’s nothing like this on the planet.” Chris Debicki of Oceans North