I just happened to catch the news the other night on TV and, after watching two unrelated stories, I was left wondering about both the nature of politics and, more precisely, the politics of nature.
According to one item, our provincial government has given the OK to shoot a number of barred owls in a “last-ditch” effort to protect a dwindling number of northern spotted owls.
While the exact number of northern spotted owls in our province may be uncertain, the fact is they are a species on the verge of extinction. According to some estimates, there are only 10 adult spotted owls remaining in the wilds of southwestern B.C.
The situation is so grave, in fact, that over the past five years the provincial Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations has already authorized the shooting of some 39 adult barred owls that have moved into spotted owl habitat, and relocated another 73 owls.
Thus far, the relocation or elimination of barred owls is being limited to a five-kilometre radius around areas where spotted owls have been confirmed, or in those areas being considered for the reintroduction of spotted owls from a captive breeding program. Either way, it is but a band-aid solution.
“This is what happens when you drive a species right to the edge of extinction and you don’t do the right thing… which is put aside the habitat it [the spotted owl] needs to recover,” says Gwen Barlee, policy director for the Wilderness Committee.
On the other hand, preliminary results from government studies do show that 13 new spotted owls (eight adult and five young) have been discovered within nine of the 17 sites where the barred owls have been removed.
It would seem that the long-term objective is to either protect and/or create sufficient suitable habitat for the spotted owl, and then introduce captive-bred birds which will hopefully either withstand or adapt to competition from the barred owls. The problem is that barred owls are more adaptable than spotted owls and can compete more successfully for both natural habitat and prey. The situation is exacerbated further by the fact that the barred owl will not only prey directly on spotted owls, they can also breed with the spotted owl to produce a hybrid species.
Barred and spotted owls are not the only species of wildlife that are at the whim of politicians these days.
The other news item I watched was about wild steelhead and other fish stocks in the Kokish River on northwest Vancouver Island.
For several years, federal scientists have worked to protect the fish in the Kokish River from the potential adverse effects of the Kwagis Hydroelectric Project, which is co-owned by Brookfield Renewable Power and the ‘Namgis First Nation. The news story suggested that concerns by scientists were “greatly watered down” by the time a final memo reached the desk of the fisheries minister. More than 1,000 pages of memos and emails obtained by the Wilderness Committee appear to substantiate this claim.
Again, on one hand you have information (the memos and emails) indicating one thing, and then the nature of politics takes over and a political green light is suddenly given to a project without all the facts coming out. The politics of nature or the nature of politics?
All I know for sure is that if I were a barred owl in the southern interior, a steelhead in the Kokish River or sockeye salmon in the Fraser, I would get mighty depressed watching the evening news. Luckily for politicians, wild creatures can’t vote. But we can, and as nature’s representatives, if we cannot affect the nature of politics, we can at least have some effect on the politics of nature.