Federal decision sets one-year deadline for management plan

Peary caribou will be considered an endangered species under Canada's Species At Risk Act following a recent decision by the federal environment minister.

The decision means that, within a year, a management plan will need to be developed to ensure that Peary caribou, which are smaller than barrenground caribou and inhabit the islands of the High Arctic, do not decline in number further.

Population estimates conducted during the 1970s pegged Peary caribou numbers at 50,000. Current counts suggest about 8,000 exist today, although Inuit hunters have disputed these numbers as incomplete.

The Government of Nunavut has tried for several years to develop a management plan for Peary caribou, but hunters from Resolute Bay and Grise Fiord have so far rejected the plan, which they say sets total allowable harvests for some Peary caribou populations that are too low for hunters.

Resolute's hunters also point to how they have voluntarily limited the hunt for Peary caribou for years.

From 1986 to 1996, the Resolute Hunters and Trappers Association imposed a voluntary ban on hunting Peary caribou at the southern end of Ellesmere Island.

And in 1994, the Resolute HTA received international recognition for their Peary caribou population management system from the Wildlife Society, a group of biologists and wildlife management experts. They remain the only Canadian, and aboriginal, group to receive the designation.

Nunavut biologists have defended the proposed hunting limits, saying their population figures are "liberal."

Unlike most species believed to be endangered, the decline in Peary caribou populations isn't being blamed on overhunting or habitat encroachment.

Instead, global warming is the culprit, federal researchers suggest.

Unusually warm weather in recent years has led to an increase in freezing rain, which coats the tundra with a layer of ice. Unable to break through this surface to eat the vegetation beneath, large numbers of Peary caribou have starved.

John Baird, the federal environment minister, rejected the recommendations of the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board in a May 4 letter.

The board wanted four subpopulations of Peary caribou to each be treated differently. The board agrees Peary caribou on Somerset and Prince of Wales islands should be considered endangered, but says the caribou on Queen Elizabeth Islands should receive a lesser designation, as a species of special concern.

The board also wanted the Boothia Peninsula population to receive no designation until more information is gathered by federal biologists on the health of the herds.

Baird also made decisions for several other species. Dolphin and Union caribou are now a species of special concern, contrary to the board's recommendation to consider them not at risk.

And Porsild's Bryum, a rare species of bright-green moss only found in several locations in Canada, including Ellesmere Island, is considered threatened. The board wanted the moss to be considered a species of special concern.