“To those devoid of imagination a blank place on the map is a useless waste; to others, the most valuable part.” Aldo Leopold. Somewhere in Jasper. Alberta, Canada.
Twilight over the Athabasca Glacier. The glacier is currently receding at a rate of about 5 metres (16 ft) per year and has receded more than 1.5 km (0.93 mi) and lost over half of its volume in the past 125 years.Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada
Mountain Caribou lock antlers in a mock fight. Sadly I found out that two of these amazing animals were shot dead a few weeks after I took this shot from the same small herd in Northern BC. The situation has been described as dire for the Central Mountain Caribou population by the Federal Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC). Numbers of Central Mountain Caribou across Alberta and B.C declined by 60 per cent between 2004 and 2014 to just over 500 mature individuals in 11 herds. Its so sad that we are not that far from a future of having no Mountain Caribou anywhere in the rocky mountains. The mountain caribou have evolved to deal with deep snow-packs and a complex life high in the mountains and are physically quite different from their northern arctic cousins and European reindeer who roam the vast frozen plains. Makes you wonder how you can control poaching in places like Africa if you can’t even stop shooting of endangered animals in a highly educated first world country like Canada.
