Environmentalists petition feds to protect mountain caribou from extinction

B.C. environmentalists want Ottawa to take measures to protect mountain caribou, which they consider to be in imminent danger of extinction.

The University of Victoria Environmental Law Centre and the Valhalla Wilderness Society have presented a petition to federal Environment Minister Catherine McKenna claiming that all 10 of B.C.’s most southerly mountain caribou populations are at risk.

They’re seeking federal cabinet approval of an emergency order under the Species at Risk Act that would put in place strategies to conserve the populations.

“Our position is that the minister is compelled by law to issue this emergency order,” said Calvin Sandborn, legal director of the Environmental Law Centre.

“The order would halt British Columbia approvals of old-growth logging in critical caribou habitat. And it would order B.C. to regulate snowmobiling in critical caribou habitat.”

Sandborn said that of the 10 populations of caribou, five of them are at extinction or near extinction and the other five have declined dramatically in recent years.

The petition says that a provincial strategy to recover the caribou has failed because the government has refused to curb most logging of the caribous’ old-growth forest habitat and has also neglected to implement snowmobile bans recommended by its biologists.

The caribou at this time of year are migrating from the high country to low elevation forests but in many areas the animals are not finding the mature forests they need for food and to escape wolves, states the petition.

Environmental groups had to take the government to court in 2014 to get an order to establish a strategy for recovery, but since then critical caribou habitats have not been identified and no new logging restrictions have been implemented, said Sandborn.

He said that because there are two new governments in power — the Liberal government in Ottawa and the NDP government in B.C. — who have made environmental commitments, there is hope that there will be a positive response.

“We do know the officials in both governments are highly aware of this. They realize this is one of the most critical wildlife issues in Canada.”