August 2005 • Vol.13, No.4 Vol.13, August 2005 • AWA Beaver Pond in Lakeland area – (C. Olson) CAUTIOUS OPTIMISM FOR CONSERVATION OF LAKELAND / 4 RECREATION CHALLENGES IN BIGHORN WILDLAND / 14 CARPET-BOMBING ALBERTA’S FRAGILE RANGELANDS / 17 MOUNTAIN PINE BEETLE EPIDEMIC IN WILLMORE / 25 Editorial Board: THOUGHT’S ON ALBERTA’S 27 Shirley Bray, Ph.D. C ONTENTS SECOND “FLOOD OF THE CENTURY” August 2005 • VOL.13, NO. 4 IN TEN YEARS Andy Marshall Joyce Hildebrand Out Front FEATURE ARTIST Printing by: “NEXT YEAR COUNTRY:” ARL EIST RTIST ECAPTURES Colour printing and process is 4 28 K G : A R CAUTIOUS OPTIMISM SURFACES FOR OUTDOOR EXPERIENCES IN sponsored by Topline Printing CONSERVATION OF BOREAL LAKELAND PAINTINGS, DRAWINGS 9 DAWN DICKINSON: ETTERS O HE DITOR CONSERVATIONIST RELISHES UPS L T T E AND DOWNS OF ADVOCACY ROLE 29 A PERSONAL TRIBUTE TO IM UTLER VER EVEALING Graphic Design: 10 J B : E R ANDY RUSSELL OUR LOVE AFFAIR WITH NATURE Ball Creative ASSOCIATION NEWS Wild Lands Advocate is pub- ALBERTA WILDERNESS WATCH lished bimonthly, 6 times a 29 ANDY RUSSELL: MEMORIAL year, by Alberta Wilderness GIFT ACKNOWLEDGEMENT 12 WHY WE NEED WILD Association. The opinions PLAINS BISON expressed by the authors STAFF PROFILE: DAVID SAMSON 30 in this publication are not BIGHORN WILDLAND CONTINUES TO 14 STAFF PROFILE: JORDAN PETTY necessarily those of AWA. FACE RECREATION CHALLENGES 30 The editors reserve the right STAFF PROFILE: SEAN NICHOLS ARPET OMBING LBERTA S 30 to edit, reject or withdraw 17 C -B A ’ FRAGILE RANGELANDS articles and letters submitted. 31 LOCHEARN SCHOOL STUDENTS SUPPORT AWA TRUST FUND 18 CBM HORSE HAS LEFT THE BARN, Please direct questions NOW GOVERNMENT WANTS and comments to: LEAVE YOUR LEGACY FOR PUBLIC INPUT 32 WILD ALBERTA Shirley Bray Phone: (403) 270-2736 NEW TRAITS FOUND IN HUNGARIAN 23 Fax: (403) 270-2743 PARTRIDGE EVENTS [email protected] 24 WILDFIRE SNAKE PIT 31 OPEN HOUSE PROGRAM – MOUNTAIN PINE BEETLE EPIDEMIC SUMMER DAY HIKES 25 IN WILLMORE EXACERBATED BY ILD EST ALA DECADES OF FIRE SUPPRESSION 31 AWA W W G AN E OLVE ROUGHT IN ALBERTA WILDERNESS 26 C W S D 31 SOUTHERN ALBERTA BY THROWING AND WILDLIFE ANNUAL LECTURE MONEY AT IT? AND AWARDS AWA respects the privacy of members. Lists are not Box 6398, Station D, sold or traded in any manner. AWA is a federally Calgary, Alberta T2P 2E1 registered charity and functions through member and donor support. Tax-deductible donations Ph: (403) 283-2025 may be made to AWA at Box 6398 Station D, Calgary, AB T2P 2E1. Ph:(403)283-2025 Toll-free 1-866-313-0713 Fax:(403) 270-2743 E-mail: awa @shaw.ca www.albertawilderness.ca www.albertawilderness.ca e-mail: [email protected] © Karl Geist SUPPORT ALBERTA “EXPLORING WILD ALBERTA 2005 WILDERNESS BECOME A LIFETIME AWA MEMBER $25 SINGLE $30 FAMILY SUBSCRIBE TO WILD LANDS ADVOCATE $30 S. Bray SUPPORTER Z. Deak WILDERNESS CIRCLE $2500+ PHILANTHROPIST $1000 SUSTAINER $500 ASSOCIATE $100 SUPPORTER $50 OTHER $ MONTHLY DONOR PROGRAMME A ferruginous hawk nest in a cottonwood tree along the Milk River in the Twin River Heritage rangeland I would like to donate $___________ monthly. Here is my credit card number OR my voided cheque for bank withdrawal. I understand that monthly donations are R. Phillips processed on the 1st of the month An eagle perches (min of $5 month). on a rock in Island Lake in the Birch Mountains PAYMENT INFORMATION CHEQUE VISA M/C AMOUNT $ CARD # A bee meets a spider in the Porcupine Hills EXPIRY DATE: NAME: C. Olson ADDRESS: CITY/PROV: POSTAL CODE: PHONE (HM): PHONE (WK): A hawk in the Great Sand Hills, Saskatchewan E-MAIL: SIGNATURE: S. Bray Send payments to: Wind anemones near one of the many sloughs that Alberta Wilderness Association formed in the Twin River Heritage Rangeland this year P.O. Box 6398, Station D Calgary AB, T2P 2E1 or donate online @ www.albertawilderness.ca “NEXT YEAR COUNTRY:” CAUTIOUS OPTIMISM SURFACES FOR CONSERVATION OF BOREAL LAKELAND By Ian Urquhart When I moved to Alberta in appreciate because it highlights the hectares, was the province’s largest. 1987 it was not long before I realized longstanding roadblocks/obstacles In announcing the birth of I was living in “Next Year Country.” that have frustrated efforts to push our Lakeland, the province bragged that My adopted province, according to conservation objectives forward. But, these areas represented a 22 percent one group of writers, was “running while these roadblocks largely have addition to the lands managed by on empty.” Oil prices had tanked imprisoned us, there have been several Alberta Recreation and Parks. By and King Wheat, with export prices subtle changes in the economic and providing representation to seven of at their lowest level since the Great political environment over the past the ten natural history themes in the Depression, looked more like a pauper decade that have the potential to help Central Mixedwood subregion of than royalty. But, at a time when it us engineer a jail break. the boreal the government crowed seemed that only bankruptcies and This potential rests in the that this “designation confirms the welfare case loads were on the rise, my challenges these changes pose to province’s commitment to protecting new neighbours smiled reassuringly “business as usual” in the boreal representative examples of our natural and told me not to despair; next year forest. But, if they challenge the heritage and to being a leader in was bound to be better. way business has been done in the protected areas.” Mike Cardinal, the local MLA at the time, was pleased the government was “preserving the integrity of the area.” R. Thomas R. Two months later Environment O Minister Ralph Klein raised UT F expectations even higher regarding the RONT conservation potential of Lakeland. With the Duke of Edinburgh, the International President of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), by his side Klein reportedly described Lakeland as Alberta’s “lifeline to an ecologically sustainable future.” It would be a model Special Place, presumably an WLA August 2005 • Vol.13, No.4 Vol.13, August 2005 • WLA area that would satisfy WWF Canada’s Endangered Spaces Campaign criteria. Peter Lee, Alberta’s spokesperson for WWF Canada during much of the Endangered Spaces Campaign in the 1990s, outlined these criteria Such an optimistic mindset, a boreal they also may challenge the “as legislatively established sites that legacy of Alberta’s agricultural past, way AWA should strategize about prohibit industrial activities such as is mandatory equipment for anyone and pursue conservation goals in logging, mining, development of who wants to become involved in any Primrose-Lakeland. hydroelectric dams and oil and gas of Alberta’s environmental campaigns drilling, and they must be large enough today. Working on AWA’s Primrose- Raised Expectations, Dashed to maintain ecological integrity.” It’s Lakeland campaign has so far taught Expectations easy to see why some members of the me as much. It would be impossible to It has been more than 13 years conservation community were willing 4 work on this issue if I didn’t believe the since the provincial government to suspend their skepticism and were future will deal more positively than announced the designation of Lakeland tempted to believe that Klein was the past has done with our concerns for Provincial Park and Provincial turning over a new, more ecologically this slice of our boreal forest. Recreation Area in January 1992. At sustainable page in Alberta. In this reflection on Lakeland 14,689 hectares the provincial park The more cynical, realistic to I look back and look ahead. became Alberta’s third largest; the some, among us likely felt we should Lakeland’s history is important to recreation area, encompassing 44,089 heed the suspicions Liberal MLA Grant Mitchell raised in the provincial Lakeland. Advertised in a government supports a park development, featuring legislature about Lakeland’s prospects video as “Nothing Less than Paradise,” wilderness type of experience, with in June 1991. Then Mitchell suggested Lakeland became, in the words of non-mechanized recreational focus and that all of the talk about creating a Tom Maccagno, Lac La Biche’s modest facility development.” protected area in Lakeland was just longstanding champion of Lakeland’s As AWA discovered last year this empty public relations. This talk was historical and natural legacies, “nothing pro-wilderness sentiment continues designed to convince “people that less than a scam.” to be held strongly among Albertans. they’re doing something right, but in Steve West planted the seeds of Two-thirds of the people polled by fact it’s meaningless beyond public this betrayal the very day he officially the University of Alberta on behalf of relations.” Its intent, in other words, designated the Park and Recreation AWA agreed (42% of them strongly) was just to soothe and manipulate a Area. Prior to this announcement, the that the provincial government should nervous or concerned public. government had retained Westworth resolve the conflict in Lakeland C. Olson O UT F RONT Mixedwood forest For Mitchell the idea, not the and Associates to assess the significant between wilderness values and logging/ reality, of a park in Lakeland was just natural features of the boreal forest in oil and gas development in favour No.4 Vol.13, August 2005 • WLA a sop to Albertans troubled by the the vicinity of Lakeland. of wilderness; only seven percent province’s decision to allocate most of They recommended that, to be disagreed with this position. Alberta’s boreal forest to multinational effective as a conservation initiative, The most dramatic betrayal timber companies. It was a promise a protected area in Lakeland needed of the public trust may rest in the he never expected the government to be 1124 sq.