Alberta trapper has nowhere to go

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Trapper Ken Cowles holds a lynx pelt along with a trap near his home in Mulhurst Bay Alberta, Friday December 21, 2012. Cowles's trap line is in on of the last remaining slivers of undisturbed caribou habitat along the Little Smokey River but in 2009 and 2010, Alberta Energy sold 61 oil and gas leases right in the heart of what was left of the prime range. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jason Franson

Ken Cowles thought he'd found a refuge.

The longtime northern Alberta trapper had been chased from one area to another as he tried to stay ahead of the logging and drilling that ruined his other traplines. The section along the Little Smoky River east of Grande Cache seemed perfect -- not pristine, but relatively untouched.

Timber companies had agreed to stay out. The federal and provincial governments had promised to preserve caribou habitat. And Cowles's new trapline was on the one sliver of the Little Smoky herd's range that remains in good shape.

Cowles, 63, figured he'd spend the rest of his trapping days working the surrounding lakes, creeks and forests.

Maybe not.

"When I bought this trapline, I thought, 'This is good. I'll be protected here,'" he said recently. "I got in here and exactly the same thing is happening, except it's worse."

Alberta has 15 caribou herds and all of them are threatened by industrial incursion into the old-growth forest they require to survive, a problem acknowledged by both the federal and Alberta governments.

As early as 2004, Alberta's caribou recovery plan said "targets should be used to describe the minimum habitat necessary for the survival and recovery of woodland caribou." Federal documents say caribou need to be able to use at least 65 per cent of their range.

If any area were a candidate for preservation, it would be Cowles's neck of the woods.

Environment Canada says caribou tend to stay at least 500 metres from roads, cutlines or well sites. That accounts for 95 per cent of the Little Smoky range, the worst disturbance rate for any herd in Canada.

The remaining five per cent, on which Cowles traps, is critical.

"It is within the core of the range and it is relatively undisturbed," said Dave Hervieux, caribou specialist with Alberta's Department of Environment and Sustainable Resource Development. "It is heavily used by the caribou that remain."

Environmentalists echo the sentiment that this habitat should be saved.

"It shouldn't be that hard to defer new (industrial) footprint," said Carolyn Campbell of the Alberta Wilderness Association.

Still, in 2009 and 2010, Alberta Energy sold 61 oil and gas leases in the two townships right in the heart of what was left of Little Smoky's prime range.

Despite policy and promises to preserve habitat, 84 per cent of that tiny remnant has now been sold off. The average price was about $380 a hectare -- about two-thirds the average price for oil and gas rights in 2010.

Roads have been punched through the bush. Cowles counts plans for at least 34 new wells on his trapline.

"I had one oil company tell me, 'We see (caribou) on the lease all the time. They like it there.'

"I said, 'They don't like it there. They used to feed there. They fed in that area for hundreds of years and they fed in the same places all the time. You guys go clear (the trees) and they'll go there to feed and they'll just stand there because they don't know why the feed isn't there.'"

Cowles has been offered buyouts, but he's not biting.

"They'll pay me off, but why do I want to get bought out? So I'll shut up?"

He has written to Alberta's environment and energy ministers and to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

"All you get is lip service," Cowles said. "I'm just kind of getting to my wit's end. It's just like banging your head against a wall."