Cross-country skiers in Jasper are praying for snow right now, but when it does fall they may have the chance to enjoy some new trails in the Park.

Parks Canada is in the process of reviewing other areas that could potentially be trackset for cross-country skiers this winter, in response to the elimination of machine-set tracks in the Maligne Valley and the Bald Hills area as part of the caribou recovery strategy.

The writing of the environmental assessment was completed last Friday and is now being reviewed, according to Steve Blake, resource conservation manager for Jasper National Park. Some of the areas under review are near the Decoigne warden station, the first few kilometres of the Pyramid Road, the Geraldine Lakes fire road, the Marmot Meadows area near Whistler’s campground and Sunwapta Falls.

“It’s important to remember that we’ll do the best we can but if it doesn’t snow we can’t enhance the skiing experience,” Blake said, adding that some of the pros-

pective areas have had promising snow levels in the past.

In response to concerns over trail quality from local skiers, Parks has doubled its fleet of tracksetting equipment from one machine to two. This will allow the trails to be prepared quickly after fresh snow.

“When we get these good valley-bottom snowfalls we’ll be able to trackset in a timely manner,” Blake said. “We have the manpower and equipment to get that done.”

While local enthusiasts might be aware of the limitations this winter in the Maligne Valley, skiers coming from out of town may not. The annual cross-country trails brochure has not been produced this year, Blake said, pending the approval of new trails. It will include full information about the lack of machine-set tracks at Maligne Lake and the reasons behind the change.

The Jasper Environmental Association is not overly concerned with the plan to create new ski trails in other areas.

“Decoigne is a fairly good area, there aren’t too many problems,” said Jill Seaton of the JEA. At the same time, Seaton said that parts of the Pyramid fire road pass through a wildlife corridor and the Sunwapta and Geraldine areas are part of historic caribou ranges.

“Caribou have been known to return to their historic ranges if conditions are poor in the alpine,” she said. “Parks will have to be careful there.”

Mark Howe, the Jasper manager of the Association for Mountain Parks Protection and Enjoyment (AMPPE) said that his organization is encouraging Parks to “stay the course” on caribou recovery.

“Our priority is making sure that Parks does track-set in other areas,” he said. There has been pressure on Parks from users and conservationists to alter the terms of the caribou recovery plan, he said.

“There has been pressure to rescind the dog restriction in the alpine areas on the one hand and pressure to close the Maligne Road in the winter,” he said. “I don’t think what we’ve seen warrants that.”

The lack of road closures and more stringent human-use restrictions are key elements of the concerns expressed by the Sierra Club of Canada and other national environmental organizations in their review of the recovery plan.

Blake defended the measures taken by referring to the process by which the caribou recovery team made their recommendations. Formed in 2003, the team was made up of local “experts” who did not sit on the committee as representatives of specific organizations. The team considered the ecological and socio-economic effects of all proposed measures and delivered a suite of recommendations based on consensus, Blake said.

“We have a high degree of faith in the merits of the process - this wasn’t Parks Canada perscribing measures,” he said. “Only through involving our stakeholders and Canadians in general can we hope to have success.”

Parks may not be willing to close the Maligne Road, but they have a responsibility to do more to ensure that people obey the posted 60 km/h speed limit, according to JEA’s Jill Seaton.

“It is bad and I don’t care what Parks says about it,” she said. “People just whip up there.”

The road is very narrow, making digital radar signs similar to the ones being used on the Icefields Parkway impractical, she added. With the RCMP already overstretched and responsible for both the 93 and 16 highways, Seaton doesn’t blame the police.

“I don’t know what to do about it, but there’s going to have to be something done about it.”

Speed on the road is affecting more than just the caribou population, as Seaton recounted having to pull a dead porcupine off the asphalt early one morning.

Enforcement in general is a crucial element to ensuring the success of the recovery plan, Seaton said.

“They are going to have to make an effort to enforce these restrictions,” she said. 

A total of seven warnings were issued this summer to hikers who had brought their dogs into restricted areas, Blake said at the Parks planning forum Monday morning and wardens will continue to enforce the dog ban.

Beyond patrolling, Parks is currently in the process of reviewing the video from two trail cameras mounted in Cavell Meadows and on the Wilcox Pass trail this summer. The latter trail is not closed to dogs, but Parks wanted to monitor it as a means of determining the amount of dog traffic on a popular alpine trail.

“Using Wilcox Pass as a benchmark will allow us to see how much of a concern this is to us,” he said.

The decision to limit dog traffic in caribou areas drew a passionate response from some Park users, including a series of posters and stickers reading “Wolves Kill Caribou… not hikers or pets” that encouraged people to prevent Parks Canada from “rewriting common sense.” Blake sees this response as a positive indicator.

“To us, it means that people care about this issue,” he said. “I don’t think caribou has been a topic of conversation in the coffee shops in the past.”

Visitors to Jasper have had a very positive reaction to the recovery restrictions, he added. An informal survey of people stopping by the Park information centre recorded about 70 per cent support.

The experimental phase of the final recommendation from the plan will begin this winter. Parks will set tracks of flagging tape, known as fladry, in wolf movement corridors in order to test their effectiveness.

The flagging tape is commonly used by gardeners and farmers to protect certain areas. The illusion of movement created by the tape is off-putting to animals.

Experiments will be centred around the three-valley confluence area and in the Athabasca Valley, Blake said.

“The sites aren’t chosen for their relationship to caribou specifically, but because they are known wolf movement corridors.” Fladry will be set up along the power line behind Whistler’s campground, for instance.

“If there are good results, we’ll see where we could incorporate it in caribou areas.”

Jill Seaton sees no harm in testing the fladry approach, but is sceptical about its chances of success.

“By all means, try it,” she said. “It seems to be rather a minor thing and I don’t see it working in a wilderness area.”

Whether or not fladry is successful, the various elements of the recovery plan are in place until 2007, when the program will be reviewed. Blake admits that it will be difficult to measure the effect of specific measures.

“If individual items are to be measured, it’s hard to see a direct impact on caribou population,” he said. “It is the synergy of these elements that we are hoping will work.” 

Population figures for the South Jasper woodland caribou herd have been dropping precipitously for a number of years. Numbers in the Brazeau and Tonquin regions seem to be stabilizing, but the Maligne population is still falling rapidly.

As part of the fall population count that Parks did this year, the number of collared animals was doubled from nine to 18. This will hopefully provide researchers with the ability to make more accurate population estimates. The count this year suggested a likely population of 147 caribou in the South Jasper herd, but the minimum could be as low as 97. 

Of the 18 radio collars, seven are equipped with a GPS locator, allowing Parks to track the movement of certain caribou groups.

“We need to have the best data we can to assess not only what’s happening to the numbers but why things are happening,” Blake said.