We have significant concerns…

We have significant concerns with the manner in which the LSCS consultation has been framed. The foundation of MNRF’s approach should be a focus on promoting caribou recovery through the protection and restoration of caribou habitat, but it is not. The fact that the government is having to resort to stop gap measures, such as those described in the discussion paper, to ensure the survival of the caribou population, is a clear sign of serious mismanagement and the failure to maintain sufficient habitat on the LSCR mainland. These stop gap measures should be seen in this context – while temporarily supporting caribou survival, they are not a sustainable, long-term solution.

MNRF must prioritize its legal responsibility to promote recovery:

The MNRF oversees the implementation of the Endangered Species Act, the purpose of which includes protecting species that are at risk and their habitats and promoting the recovery of species that are at risk. Thus, the MNRF is legally obligated to promote recovery. The current consultation should be based on reaching out to stakeholders, local citizens and Indigenous peoples to determine how recovery should be achieved, not whether it should be achieved.

Further, the MNRF is obligated to uphold its commitments made to caribou recovery in the “response statement” created pursuant to s 11(8) of the ESA, which, in the case of caribou, are contained in the MNRF document titled “Ontario’s Woodland Caribou Conservation Plan” (CCP). The MNRF has an obligation to ensure that the actions referred to in the CCP are implemented to the extent that the Minister believes they are feasible and within her responsibilities (s 11(9) of the ESA).
In the CCP, the MNRF states that “The Lake Superior coastal population will be managed for population security and persistence. The focus will be to protect and manage habitat and encourage connectivity to caribou populations in the north.”
It also states:

"Ontario will develop a management strategy for discontinuous range management to enhance connectivity between the northern continuous range and the southern coastal Lake Superior populations. This connectivity will improve the prospects for persistence of the coastal population. Discontinuous range will not be managed broadly for caribou habitat to support self-sustaining populations. Instead it will be managed with a focus on specific landscapes that may support temporary caribou occupancy or movement between the continuous range and Lake Superior."

This is consistent with the clear science regarding what boreal caribou need to recover: sufficient unfragmented habitat and habitat connectivity.

Boreal caribou are also listed under the federal Species at Risk Act. The federal recovery strategy for boreal caribou emphasizes the need for habitat management, which includes provinces:

"Undertak[ing] coordinated actions to reclaim boreal caribou habitat through restoration efforts (e.g. restore industrial landscape features such as roads, old seismic lines, pipelines, cut-lines, temporary roads, cleared areas; reconnect fragmented ranges)."

The federal recovery strategy also recommends that:

"Disturbed areas may need to be improved or restored to support population and distribution objectives within each boreal caribou range. Maintaining connectivity within and between habitat patches and ranges will be particularly important for boreal caribou."

Thus all of the management options listed in the consultation, options a –e, which include limiting habitat disturbance and fragmentation from new linear features, rehabilitating disturbed habitat, restricting the type, location or timing of activities, enhancing forest management direction to support caribou habitat needs, and amending/enhancing Crown land use policy for select land use are management directions that the MNRF should be not only promoting but implementing, as they will advance connectivity and caribou recovery as per the MNRF’s responsibility. Given this responsibility, why is MNRF seeking public input on an option to “do nothing”, including potentially seeking public support to abdicate its responsibility for habitat restoration (page 14)?

MNRF must set appropriate population/recovery targets:

The federal boreal caribou recovery strategy, which includes the Lake Superior herds, states that: “Recovery of all boreal caribou local populations across Canada is technically and biologically feasible.”

Draft policy from the federal government on setting population targets requires that:

"In general population and distribution objectives will be set based on the best biologically and technically achievable scenario, provided it does not exceed historical norms."

Thus, as it is technically and biologically feasible, the default conservation objective for these populations should be to achieve long-term occupancy of caribou in the LSCR and establish connectivity between the coastal population and the northern continuous distribution.

MNRF must ensure that LSCR caribou numbers do not go below the minimum viable population size and it must move beyond stop gap measures:

Options f-k in the consultation document do not address the root causes of caribou decline: the lack of sufficient habitat and the lack of habitat connectivity required to advance caribou recovery. Unless the MNRF accepts its responsibility to promote effective habitat management recommendations to recover caribou populations currently living on the coast of Lake Superior, the province will find itself focused on stop gap measures in perpetuity, or until the Lake Superior caribou are gone.

Management measures, such a translocations, predator control or penning, are considered extreme and controversial approaches that have unknown long-term impacts on caribou individuals and populations. When and if these measures are actually considered, they should be considered case by case based on the advice of local First Nations and caribou biologists to determine the potential efficacy, and must be undertaken in conjunction with efforts to protect and reconnect critical habitat and ensure long-term persistence.

Conclusion

We are alarmed by what now appears to be the collapse of the Lake Superior Coast Range. MNRF has a responsibility to achieve long-term occupancy of the LSCR and establish connectivity through the Discontinuous Distribution to the northern continuous distribution. Anything less would be contrary to one of the main purposes of the Endangered Species Act, which is “to protect species that are at risk and their habitats, and to promote the recovery of species that are at risk” and to the MNRF’s mandate to steward biodiversity on behalf of the public.