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"Foote, Lee"
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Threshold Considerations and Wetland Reclamation in Alberta’s Mineable Oil Sands
Oil sand extraction in Alberta, Canada is a multibillion dollar industry operating over 143 km² of open pit mining and 4600 km² of other bitumen strata in northern boreal forests. Oil production contributes to Canada-wide GDP, creates socio-cultural problems, provides energy exports and employment, and carries environmental risks regarding long-term reclamation uncertainties. Of particular concern are the implications for wetlands and water supply management. Mining of oil sands is very attractive because proven reserves of known quality occur in an accessible, politically stable environment with existing infrastructure and an estimated 5.5 billion extractable barrels to be mined over the next five decades. Extraction occurs under a set of limiting factors or thresholds including: limited social tolerance at local to international levels for externalities of oil sand production; water demands > availability; limited natural gas supplies for oil processing leading to proposals for hydroelectric dams and nuclear reactors to be constructed; difficulties in reclaiming sufficient habitat area to replace those lost. Replacement of the 85 km² of peat-forming wetlands forecast to be destroyed appears unlikely. Over 840 billion liters of toxic fluid byproducts are currently held in 170 km² of open reservoirs without any known process to purify this water in meaningful time frames even as some of it leaches into adjacent lands and rivers. Costs for wetland reclamation are high with estimates of $4 to $13 billion, or about 6% of the net profits generated from mining those sites. This raises a social equity question of how much reclamation is appropriate. Time frames for economic, political, and ecological actions are not well aligned. Local people on or near mine sites have had to change their area use for decades and have been affected by industrial development. Examining mining effects to estimate thresholds of biophysical realities, time scales, economic allocations, and social tolerance helps to contextualize the needs for decision making and relevant policy formation as a way of constructively reconciling production with governing safeguards to the environment and citizens.
Journal Article
Hunting trophy import bans proposed by the UK may be ineffective and inequitable as conservation policies in multiple social‐ecological contexts
The UK government is considering legislation to prohibit the importation of hunting trophies. We examine documented social, ecological, and political outcomes of two previous such bans. We find that the UK government's proposal shares the shortcomings of existing bans that have (1) failed to address, or have even amplified, key threats to hunted species, (2) imposed costs on citizens of other countries, and (3) delegitimized the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). Trophy import bans are blunt policy instruments that can cause more problems than they solve.
Journal Article
From human invaders to problem bears: A media content analysis of grizzly bear conservation
Across their North American range, grizzly bears (Ursus arctos) occupy a special place in human imagination, as icons of nature's rugged and raw power, to representations of safety risks and economic costs of living with carnivores. Different bear representations can also be found across news media, from controversial and sensational descriptions of attacks, tragic events and conflicts, to scientific accounts of conservation research. News media certainly has the power to pique curiosity, spark debate, or elicit emotional responses through framing and repetition of content. In turn, news stories can influence how people might interpret and internalize information about grizzly bears. Using media content analysis, we examined newsprint stories on grizzly bears across their North American range between 2000 and 2016, to understand message framing and attention cycle, as well as attitudinal expression and representative anecdote conveyed to the readership. We found that human–bear conflict stories are over‐reported compared to other narratives, where a single incidence garners more attention than a story about new scientific findings. We also found articles that included hunting frames largely originated in Alberta, likely due to the threatened species listing and hunting moratorium. Attitudinal expressions included ecological, negative or neutral, and moral sentiments toward bears. The most common representative anecdote conveyed to the readership reflected the dire state faced by grizzly bears. The bear eco‐gossip expressed in the articles we reviewed, which included clear protagonists and antagonists and the occasional man‐bites‐bear surprise, appears to be the diet of manufactured information fed to the public. Results of our study can help scientists and conservationists understand how news media portrays grizzly bears to the public and how this might influence public sentiment toward their conservation, but also identifies the roles that scientists, conservationists and journalists together can play in crafting effective, factual and engaging news stories about bears.
Journal Article
Performance of wetland forbs transplanted into marshes amended with oil sands processed water
Companies mining oil sands in Alberta (Canada) face the challenge of reclaiming wetlands under water use restrictions. Wetland reclamation after mining will generate marshes characterized by elevated salinity and residual hydrocarbons. Oil sands wetlands are also impoverished in forbs, suggesting that their establishment may be constrained by water chemistry. We transplanted skullcap, mint, and smartweed plants into experimental trenches that simulated two possible reclamation scenarios: wetlands amended with on-site freshwater or with oil sands processed water (OSPW). The main scientific question was is OSPW a suitable water amendment as freshwater for reclaiming wetland forb habitat? As a surrogate of plant health, we studied plant ecophysiology (gas exchange, leaf fluorescence), leaf chemistry, and plant growth. Results showed that there were no differences in skullcap mineral contents under either treatment; however, mint and smartweed plants subjected to OSPW had a significantly higher Na content than those under freshwater. Smartweed dark-adapted leaf fluorescence showed a reduced photochemistry in OSPW relative to plants in freshwater. Mint leaves exhibited lower stomatal conductance in OSPW than in freshwater, a condition that negatively affected transpiration and carboxylation. Skullcap plants grown in OSPW had lower net CO
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assimilation rates than those in freshwater but did not show any other ecophysiological difference between treatments. Mint plants experienced growth reductions (i.e., shoot height) in OSPW. Our results show, for the first time in the literature, that plants photosynthetic capacity was negatively affected by OSPW. Conditions in OSPW proved to be suitable for establishment as transplanted forbs showed 100 % survival after the first growing season. However, impaired physiological functions in plants subjected to OSPW indicated that OSPW amendment created a less hospitable habitat for wetland forbs than freshwater.
Journal Article
The Relationship of Amphibian Abundance to Habitat Features Across Spatial Scales in the Boreal Plains
We examined the relationship between amphibian abundance and habitat features at 8 spatial scales in boreal Alberta, Canada. Twenty-three local pond variables and 15 landscape variables at 7 scales (50, 100, 200, 500, 1000, 2000, and 5000 m) were incorporated into a Principal Component Analysis (PCA) for each scale. We analyzed amphibian relative abundance against the PC axis scores using regression for each species and each scale. We found that each species' abundance was best described at different spatial scales. Wood frog (Lithobates sylvaticus) abundance was best predicted by local, pond-linked variables, boreal chorus frog (Pseudacris maculata) abundance by 1000-m-scale landscape variables, and western toad (Anaxyrus boreas) by the 100-m scale. We found significant positive relationships with amphibian relative abundance and dissolved oxygen, deciduous forest cover, mixed forest cover, and urban cover. Pond depth, conductivity, total dissolved solids, aquatic plant density, low-shrub cover, and conifer cover showed negative relationships with abundance. We also investigated relationships between landform type and amphibian relative abundance. All 3 species were most abundant on wetlands in the moraine landform. Our research highlights the importance of developing conservation plans based on knowledge of individual species' biology because amphibians do not all respond to the same spatial scale. Nomenclature: Crother et al., 2000; Frost et al., 2006.
Journal Article
Fisheries restoration potential for a large lake ecosystem
Increased population sizes of Double-crested Cormorants (Phalacrocorax auritus) and small-bodied (<15 cm total length) yellow perch (Perca flavescens) have occurred at Lac la Biche, Alberta, Canada, since fisheries collapsed the walleye (Sander vitreus) population. A walleye restoration program was introduced in 2005, but uncertainty around the ecosystem’s response to management made it difficult to evaluate program success. This study used 40 variations of Ecopath with Ecosim models representing ecosystem conditions over 200 years to test the potential for multiple attractors, i.e., possible ecosytem states, in a large lake ecosystem. Results suggest that alternate stable states, defined by walleye-dominated and cormorant-dominated equilibriums, existed in historical models (1800, 1900), whereas contemporary models (1965, 2005) had a single cormorant-dominated attractor. Alternate stable states were triggered by smaller perturbations in 1900 than in 1800, and model responses were more intense in 1900, suggesting a decline in system resilience between model periods. Total prey biomass consumed by walleye was up to four times greater than the biomass consumed by cormorants in historical models, but dropped to 10% of cormorant consumption in 2005 models. Differential size-selection pressures of cormorants and walleye on yellow perch provided strong feedback that stabilized each state. These results provide important theoretical support for alternate stable states as well as practical insights for restoration of large lake ecosystems affected by human induced overharvest of top-level fish predators.
Journal Article
Ecological determinants of avian distribution and abundance at Rankin Inlet, Nunavut in the Canadian Arctic
Large areas of the Arctic remain poorly surveyed, creating biological knowledge gaps as scientists and managers grapple with issues of increasing resource extraction and climate change. We modelled spatiotemporal patterns in abundance for avian species in the low Arctic ecosystem near the community of Rankin Inlet, Nunavut, from 2015 to 2017. We employed six habitat covariates, including terrain ruggedness and freshwater cover, and contrasted the influence of elevation with distance from coast, as well as the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI; a proxy for vegetative productivity) with the normalized difference water index (NDWI; a proxy for vegetation water content). Our results most clearly show the importance of low elevation, large amounts of freshwater and high vegetative productivity for Arctic birds at relatively local scales (<1 km2). Although NDVI more consistently appeared in competitive models of abundance, NDWI was particularly important in predicting abundance for shorebirds, ducks, Tundra Swans (Cygnus columbianus) and Lapland Longspurs (Calcarius lapponicus), demonstrating that it may be a more influential habitat covariate than NDVI for species that frequent habitats with wet vegetation. We also documented apparent shifts in habitat between early and late summer for geese, which were more strongly associated with freshwater later in the season, likely due to the presence of flightless juveniles and moulting adults at that time. Our study illustrates a relatively easy to implement survey methodology for avian species, provides baseline information for an Arctic study area that had not previously been surveyed intensively, and includes species that are underrepresented in previous literature.
Journal Article
Where is the avoidance in the implementation of wetland law and policy
Many jurisdictions in North America use a “mitigation sequence” to protect wetlands: First, avoid impacts; second, minimize unavoidable impacts; and third, compensate for irreducible impacts through the use of wetland restoration, enhancement, creation, or protection. Despite the continued reliance on this sequence in wetland decision-making, there is broad agreement among scholars, scientists, policymakers, regulators, and the regulated community that the first and most important step in the mitigation sequence, avoidance, is ignored more often than it is implemented. This paper draws on literature published between 1989 and 2010, as well as 33 semi-structured, key-informant interviews carried out in 2009 and 2010 with actors intimately involved with wetland policy in Alberta, Canada, to address key reasons why “avoidance” as a policy directive is seldom effective. Five key factors emerged from the literature, and were supported by interview data, as being central to the failure of decision-makers to prioritize wetland avoidance and minimization above compensation in the mitigation sequence: (1) a lack of agreement on what constitutes avoidance; (2) current approaches to land-use planning do not identify high-priority wetlands in advance of development; (3) wetlands are economically undervalued; (4) there is a “techno-arrogance” associated with wetland creation and restoration that results in increased wetland loss, and; (5) compensation requirements are inadequately enforced. Largely untested but proactive ways to re-institute avoidance as a workable option in wetland management include: watershed-based planning; comprehensive economic and social valuation of wetlands; and long-term citizen-based monitoring schemes.
Journal Article