Biodiversity conservation: the devil is in the details

Canada recently hosted the 15th Conference of the Parties on the conservation of biological diversity; hereafter, referred to as COP15. Having spent my entire career, both in and out of elected office, dealing with the use, management, and conservation of Canada’s biological and natural resources, COP15 set an extremely high bar but, alas, has little chance of making real progress. Having said that, many of the right subjects were addressed. Sustainable use of biological resources was acknowledged, as was the primary role of local communities in the decision-making process. As a Member of Parliament, I represented a vast western Manitoba rural constituency dotted with small towns and villages, hundreds of farms and ranches with diversified crop and livestock production, a number of First Nation communities, with thousands of hunters and anglers, plus a wide variety of natural habitats supporting a diversity of plant, fish, and wildlife species, some that fell in the “threatened” or “endangered” category. COP15’s acknowledgement of the role of local communities especially applies to the constituency I had the privilege to represent. The documents that emerged from COP15 were long on goals and objectives, but woefully short on details. Goals are the easy part, but when it comes to legislation or treaties, precision is critical if there is to be any hope of progress. Let me explain. Just as an aside, unique Latin names are given to every species on Earth. Latin, being a dead language, does not change and is thus ideal for naming species. This may seem trivial, but using the Latin name injects much needed precision into biodiversity debates. For example, Canada’s most valuable fish, the ubiquitous walleye (Sander vitreus), has at least 21 common names depending where you are in North America. Insisting on the use of the Latin name prevents confusion. More on this later. COP15 stressed the importance of conserving wild species, which is well and good, but what constitutes a species is still not settled. The original definition was that if two individuals could breed then they are the same species. But hybridization is common in nature whereby two closely related species can cross breed. Mallard duck (Anas platyrhynchos) and black duck (A. rubripes) hybrids are fairly common yet both are considered separate species. Plus new breakthroughs in genetic analyses are quite simply throwing the concept of “species” on its head. There are now “races,” “subspecies,” and the aforementioned hybrids. For example, the common rainbow trout was considered a true trout with the scientific name of Salmo gairdneri. Recent genetic analysis has shown that the rainbow trout is not a trout at all, but a member of the Pacific salmon group with the new scientific name of Oncorhynchus mykiss reflecting the new scientific conclusion that the rainbow trout now belongs with the genus Oncorhynchus which is the genus of all Pacific salmon. This may seem like a trivial academic exercise, but under strict endangered species legislation, the re-classification of a species, or subspecies, might threaten the economy of a resource-dependent community if a “new” and re-classified species in that region is now considered endangered. The Algonquin wolf in Ontario is a salient example. And as reported in a 2016 article in the Smithsonian Magazine: “The Canadian government has spent more than 10 years deliberating over whether Algonquin wolves are a unique species. In a key decision on June 14, they decided they were and listed them as “threatened,” which makes it illegal to hunt them. But last month, new genetic research in the journal Science Advances asserted just the opposite. That study suggests that between 50 and 70 per cent of the eastern wolf’s genome derives from gray wolves, while the rest comes from coyotes. If the new study is correct, then the “Algonquin wolf” does not exist; it is simply a hybrid.” The original designation for the Algonquin wolf as “threatened” affected trapping and agriculture as coyote control, vital for livestock production, was temporarily suspended. To be blunt; the Algonquin wolf is an “invented” species. Another “invented” species is the Nooksac dace, a small forage fish in coastal British Columbia. I had never heard of the Nooksac dace until I checked the scientific name which is Rhinichthys cataractae. This is the scientific name of the long nose dace, which is abundant across most of Canada; a fact that was conveniently ignored by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. Naming the Nooksac dace as endangered set a train of actions in motion including mitigating measures, impact assessments, and community impacts. All for a “new” species that was “invented” by government officials and is in no way threatened, with the Nooksac dace being a population of long nose dace at the edge of its range. COP15 recommended the conservation of species, but the first question should be; “which species?” “Well, all of them,” you might say. Really? Canada’s flora and fauna can be divided into two categories; indigenous species (e.g. black bears (Ursus americanus), Canada geese (Branta canadensis), walleye (Sander virtreus) etc.) and invasive/introduced species (e.g. ring-necked pheasants (Phasianus colchicus), wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo), zebra mussels (Dreissena polymorpha), round goby (Neogobius melanostomus), and most agricultural weeds and crops. Introduced species are those that are deliberately moved or expanded from one area in Canada where they were native, to another region where they are not. A prime example are the thriving Great Lakes’ recreational fisheries based on Pacific salmon (Oncorhynchus spp) that were introduced to compensate for the drastic overfishing of native species. Some indigenous species had their ranges deliberately expanded simply because of their value to people, such as the very adaptable smallmouth bass (Micropterous dolomieu) for angling, or new wild rice (Zizania sp) plantings, to create rural development opportunities in Western Canada. On the other hand, the generalist indigenous predator, and very adaptable raccoon (Procyon lotor), significantly expanded its range in Canada, following land use changes such as agricultural development and suburbanization. Some “new” species are referred to as “invasive” species considering the threats they pose to existing ecological communities. While smallmouth bass and wild rice introductions have largely been benign; such is not the case for aquatic species like the zebra mussel and sea lamprey (Petromyzon marines). Sea lamprey invaded the Great Lakes and New England due to the construction of the Erie and Welland Canals. Sea lampreys decimated indigenous fish populations as they expanded into new habitats. These critical questions must be addressed before we can proceed with meaningful biodiversity legislation or policies. Robert D. Sopuck is the former Conservative Member of Parliament for Dauphin-Swan River-Neepawa, Man. The Hill Times

Biodiversity conservation: the devil is in the details

The documents that emerged from COP15 were long on goals and objectives, but woefully short on details. Goals are the easy part but when it comes to legislation or treaties, precision is critical if there is to be any hope of progress. Let me explain.

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Biodiversity conservation: the devil is in the details

The documents that emerged from COP15 were long on goals and objectives, but woefully short on details. Goals are the easy part but when it comes to legislation or treaties, precision is critical if there is to be any hope of progress. Let me explain.

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