(August 17, 2016)  By Hilary Cooke (via Huffington Post)2016 marked the 100-year anniversary of the Migratory Bird Treaty – a historic agreement that protected birds from indiscriminate slaughter for food and fashion markets. Dr. Hilary Cooke reflects on the legacy of this the treaty, the role WCS played in its inception, and the future of bird conservation in North America.Click here to read more. 

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(July 29, 2016)   Climate change is already taking hold across Canada, particularly in northern regions like Yukon and northern Ontario. As one of our most pressing environmental challenges, WCS Canada is working to find solutions to climate change across the country. As part of this work, our field scientists recently published two papers in Global Ecology and Conservation.With the retreat of glaciers and melting of permafrost changing the face of northern tundra, it is not surprising that this in tu...

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(July 23, 2016) Laws devoted to the protection and recovery of species at risk are meant to provide added protection measures after regular management approaches have been insufficient to stave off extinction risk. Examples of such laws in Canada include the federal Species At Risk Act (2002) and the Ontario Endangered Species Act (2007).The need for such statutes becomes obvious when we consider the ever-growing list of species at risk in Canada – mirroring global trends of biodiversity loss. Once a...

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(July 15, 2016) May 16 marks the launch of the 16th Annual North American Caribou Workshop and for the first time in two decades this year the workshop is in Ontario. Taking place in Thunder Bay, the workshop is the foremost conference of its kind, addressing caribou biology, research and management. This year’s workshop theme is Connections: exploring the link between people, disciplines and ecosystems to further caribou conservation and management. More than 250 people from science, academia, indig...

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(May 13, 2016) On March 31, the United States Geological Survey and Fish and Wildlife Service announced that White Nose Syndrome (WNS) had been confirmed in a little brown bat in Washington State – the first instance of the deadly disease in western North America. Biologists in western Canada and US have been working diligently since the first mass mortalities were discovered in the east in 2007 to prevent or at minimum slow the spread of this disease into western North America, in hopes that this woul...

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(April 01, 2016) New Bat Habitat Discovered in Western Alberta BatCaver, an ongoing WCS Canada program, has recently discovered two new bat hibernacula —places where bats hibernate during winter months—in the Alberta foothills. Bats hibernate underground for a large portion of each year, and these newly discovered locations help shed light on the mystery of where many species of bats go each winter. A total of 103 bats were counted within these hibernacula, including members of two species that ...

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(December 01, 2015) A new Report warns of  the potential for major negative impacts on fish and fish habitat caused by large hydroelectric dams, like that currently under evaluation through the Next Generation Hydro initiative. The Report, which focuses on north-western Canada, notes that substantial destruction of fish habitats caused by such a dam, along with additional threats and effects will be either very expensive or impossible to mitigate.  “Potential Impacts and Risks of Proposed Next ...

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(July 09, 2015) Even though Ontario's mining sector has been in a downturn for the past two years, mining is still big business. Ontario’s mining sector directly employs 26,000 people and supports 41,000 more jobs within the mining service and supply industries. The sector made $11B in 2014 and invested $1.3B back into the province.   Mining has recently moved into Ontario's Far North. This remote region contains globally significant ecosystems and is home to many species at risk, including caribou, ...

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(December 19, 2012) Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) Canada today announces a three-year grant from The W. Garfield Weston Foundation to help fund our continued conservation efforts in two of Canada’s most pristine,yet imminently threatened, northern regions — Ontario’s Far North and Northern British Columbia/Southern Yukon.  These funds will help extend our work into Canada’s Western Arctic, partnering with WCS’s Beringia program. 

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(June 10, 2009) WCS Canada’s conservation science and collaboration with other environmental organizations and First Nations leads to this tremendous expansion of Nahanni National Park Reserve. Now nearly the size of Vancouver Island, these new boundaries will allow for wide-ranging wildlife, such as grizzlies and caribou to roam freely. View in Full.

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