Bird numbers plummet in Canada Energy, infrastructure blamed for greater sage-grouse demise since 1988
Organizations concerned about the future of the greater sage-grouse are stepping up their pressure on Ottawa to save the endangered species.
Ecojustice filed a lawsuit against the federal environment minister in February to force Peter Kent to recommend emergency protection for the birds. A provision in the Species At Risk Act provides for this action.
With no word by May 17, the organization planned to ask the court to intervene.
Melissa Gorrie, a lawyer for the not-for-profit organization, said the government will not even say whether Kent has made a decision on the request, let alone what the decision is.
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She said officials cite cabinet confidentiality.
“This is a ministerial decision,” she said. “It’s a statutory duty he’s re-quired to comply with.”
About 90 percent of the Canadian population of sage-grouse, known for the males’ elaborate courtship dance, died off between 1988 and 2006.
Energy and infrastructure development have destroyed critical habitat the birds need to survive.
The species was listed as endangered in 1998 but population continues to decline.
This year’s count is still underway, but in 2011 there were only 13 males in Alberta and 35 in Saskatchewan’s Grasslands National Park, which is considered the only viable population in Canada.
The lawsuit filed on behalf of the Alberta Wilderness Association, the Wilderness Committee, Nature Saskatchewan and Grassland Naturalists seeks to prevent extinction.
Mark Boyce, a sage-grouse expert from the University of Alberta, said the federal government has developed a recovery plan but never implemented anything on the ground.
He said the legislation allows Ottawa to push the provinces to do something if they fail to provide adequate conservation measures for critical habitat.
“The provincial government in Alberta clearly has not done anything to protect critical habitat for sage-grouse, so therefore the federal government ought to be mandating that it happen or actually intervene according to the Species at Risk Act,” Boyce said.
However, he doesn’t expect that to happen.
Meanwhile, he said the efforts that Montana and Alberta officials have taken to move birds from the state to the province aren’t likely to work. About 40 birds were recently captured and relocated.
The real issue is habitat, Boyce said, and the habitat to ensure the bird’s survival doesn’t exist.
“Bringing some up from Montana to die doesn’t really make a lot of sense to me,” he said.
“There has to be habitat for them in the first place, and it’s the loss of habitat that’s resulted in the loss of the birds.”
The sage-grouse might survive for a few months, he said, but the effect of the move will only be temporary.
The birds might have stood a chance if an effort had been made to increase habitat by removing oil wells and planting sage brush, he added.
“Montana doesn’t have that many birds to be able to spare them for such a fruitless effort.”
