Category: Wildlife

New job! Conservation Scientist with Y2Y

2/6/2017

I am thrilled to announce that I have begun a new position as Conservation Scientist with the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y). I will be based in Canmore, Alberta, with applied research throughout the Y2Y region.

My two years as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Victoria in Victoria, British Columbia have been terrific. I was fortunate to work with talented researchers and conservationists in the Marine Ethnoecology Lab (Natalie Ban & team) and Applied Conservation Science Lab (Chris Darimont & team), and their partners in the Great Bear Rainforest and Sea. They generously shared their knowledge, skills, and time with me – these experiences and collaborations will be invaluable on my path ahead. I will miss them all dearly.

Big wild places and wildlife have always been close to my heart. Stretching over 3200 km, the Yellowstone to Yukon region is one of the most intact mountain ecosystems in the world. For nearly 25 years, Y2Y has been a global leader in large-landscape conservation, working with diverse partners to connect and protect wild lands, waters, and biodiversity over 1.3 million sqkm. Critical to its success are commitments to collaboration and evidence-based work, values I care about deeply.

As Y2Y’s Conservation Scientist (and for the first year continuing my Liber Ero Fellowship), I will design, conduct, and communicate applied research to inform key issues across the Yellowstone to Yukon region. This includes strengthening existing partnerships – and forging new ones! – with academic, conservation, media, industry, and governance communities.

Y2Y has a bold mission: To connect and protect habitat from Yellowstone to Yukon so that people and nature can thrive. I am excited to engage with partners to achieve it.

More about Y2Y:

2015 annual report and 20th anniversary report
Interactive map of protected areas in the Yellowstone to Yukon region
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Remote cameras spy on wildife in the Great Bear Rainforest

11/9/2013

I got such a kick out of seeing wildlife through remote cameras, and these videos from coastal British Columbia are great. They were taken in the "Great Bear Rainforest" (aka BC's Central and North Coast), a huge stretch of temperate rainforest on Canada's west coast running from northern Vancouver Island to southeast Alaska. Wildlife are plentiful and people have lived there for millennia, but the region really sprang onto the world stage in the last decade or so. It's an amazing place - and it's where I hope to do postdoctoral research!

Remote cameras let scientists study wildlife from afar. Using these and other non-invasive methods of research, we can minimize the impact of research on animal behaviour. But Remote cameras aren't entirely without impact - they can inadvertently affect animals - so we need to be careful how, when, and where they are used.

Grizzly rubbing and scratching on a tree

Wolves fishing for salmon

Using a remote camera set up on a river in the Great Bear Rainforest, an environmental group has captured rare video footage of wolves fishing for salmon on British Columbia’s rugged Central Coast. Conservation group Pacific Wild is monitoring animal behaviour on the central coast and other remote parts of BC, including the Great Bear Rainforest.

Above text from Globe & Mail article

Together with the Wuikinuxv First Nation, scientists from the University of Victoria's Applied Conservation Science Lab are monitoring grizzly bears.

Hair is collected by wrapping barbed wire low around trees, with liquid bait poured nearby. Bears step over the wire to check out the smell and some hair is snagged on the wire. Scientists study DNA and "stable isotopes" in the hair. DNA helps them learn about the relatedness and size of the bear population, whilestable istopes reveal what the bears have been eating (even months before!).

See more videos or read about their research.

A rare glimpse of a cougar

The silent ghost of the rainforest is finally captured on a remote video camera. Though cougars are relatively common here, they are extremely difficult to see due to their nocturnal habits and elusive behaviour. We have recorded several individuals using remote cameras. We have seen their tracks right behind the lodge during winter. This video is black & white due to the low light during this dusk encounter with this female.

Above text from Great Bear Tours (click to see other videos, including otters playing in the snow and bears rubbing on trees and wallowing in mud!)

Support remote cameras!

If you liked those videos, consider supporting the Great Bear Rainforest Remote Camera project. Pacific Wild needs to raise $36,000 to install more cameras (including a night-vision camera that would show what animals fish for salmon at night, like cougars and wolverines!).

I enjoyed these videos so much, and I think the project gathers important data about the area - so I donated $40 to keep the project running.

Standup4Greatbear documentary

This last video isn't about remote cameras - it's about Norm Hann's stand-up paddleboard trip through the Great Bear Rainforest, following the route of the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipelines project. His goal was to highlight First Nations culture and traditional food harvest and the threat that an oil spill would have on local people, wildlife, and the environment. (Go to 32:00 to see my friend Chris Williamson's project making cedar stand-up paddleboards with students at the Bella Bella Community School - also covered by National Geographic!)