A guest piece this time from John & Mary
Theberge, biologist’s from Oliver
B.C.
John & Mary’s recent book, The Ptarmigans Dilemma expands on
grasslands issues in North America. We recommend the book and the opinions
contained in their letter below that first appeared in the Oliver Chronicle
September 11 2015. That book and Wolf
Country: Eleven Years Tracking the Algonquin Wolves are available at
amazon.ca
National Park – Reasons for Concern - The Position of 2 of the
Proposal’s Initiators
John and Mary Theberge
Oliver.
During the public
feasibility study, we put in years of effort to inform the public about its
high priority, ecological rationale, including staging a 2-day public science
forum to explain the meaning and values of a national park in this area.
But a problem arose. The BC government pushed Parks Canada into
the untenable position of abandoning its foremost principle of maintaining
ecological integrity. With cattle
grazing, the lands before and after national park establishment would look and
feel very little different.
National parks are
meant to preserve and protect nature in as unimpeded a way as possible, to be
places where we stand back, for ethical and moral reasons, and let nature have
its way.
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| pic from wildernesscommittee.org/gwen barlee |
Livestock grazing,
along with commercial logging and mining are prohibited, by Act, Policy and
Regulations. While any legal or
procedural changes to accommodate livestock grazing in a South Okanagan
national park undoubtedly would be restricted to this particular park, a dangerous
precedent would be set. History has
shown that once you entrench rights in any park, national or provincial, the
legal prospects of removing them are in doubt.
We have already made far more concessions to outside
commercial interests than has the U.S. National Park system.
For decades we have
championed national parks. As a
university teacher, John has helped train many of the Agency’s senior employees in
ecological park management, and chaired a national task force for the federal
Minister of the Environment on finding ways to complete the national park
system. The minister wanted to be able to make national parks without being
held to ransom by the provinces, as had happened so often before. Here, it has happened again.
As ecologists, we recognize that livestock
grazing, even managed as well as possible, is invariably extremely destructive
in the dry southern interior. These
lands never supported bison, which are roughly ecological equivalents to
cattle, and so are not adapted to the presence of a 1,200 pound grazing and
trampling herbivore. Delicate soils that
depend on cryptobiotic crusts for nitrogen, sensitive riparian habitats, and
the ubiquitous presence of seed sources of invasive plants, all make livestock
grazing and ecological integrity totally contradictory.
Parks Canada’s statement in 2011 that they would manage “continued livestock grazing in the park concept area
in a manner consistent with ecological objectives and park values” is scientifically absurd.
Now, however, the
game has changed with the province’s
recent press release of a proposed jurisdictional split into national park and
provincial park/conservancy lands, and its call for public comment by Oct.
12. Taking a big chunk out of the
national park proposal, BC would likely continue to despoil the lands it
manages, but it may withdraw the offending caveat on provincial crown lands it
hands over to Parks Canada. A real
national park, not a bastardized one, could happen. Similar to Grasslands National Park in Saskatchewan,
it would accumulate gradually, probably over decades, assembled only as
ranchers willingly decide to sell. But
no land included in a national park would remain cattle pasture. The Act, Policy and Regulations, and the
whole ideal of national parks, would stay intact.
Unhappily, we do
not know if that is in the cards. Far
too little information was provided in the province’s press release. If a real national park without grazing is in
the offing, we support it. If not, we
continue our objections and hope that people concerned with protecting and
restoring the wild beauty of an intact ecosystem, will object too.
With the current
ambiguity, and especially after the years of unresolved debate over appropriate
land uses, this request for public comment is almost insulting. Ideally, BC together with First Nations,
should make clear what land uses they foresee, and extend the period of public
comment. But related to a national park,
at a minimum, Parks Canada should exploit the opportunity, right now, to
determine if the province has backed away from the livestock grazing ransom,
and issue a press release reassuring Canadians that it will not entertain
commercial ranching in any lands that may become a national park.
John and Mary Theberge, Oliver
B.C.
This article and other background info on the park proposal can be found at www.boundaryalliance.org/nationalpark.pdf
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