(October 27, 2023) by Cheyenne MacDonald, BSc, L'nua'tikete'w/Indigenous Relations Associate, Wildlife Conservation Society Canada  Smiling Faces of WCS Staff Cheyenne Macdonald and Chrystal Mantyka-Pringle at the CMN Knowledge Sharing Summit. Reflecting on September’s Canadian Mountain Network’s (3rd annual) Braiding Knowledge Sharing Summit in Parksville, BC, I was in awe of the inspiring leadership and conservation initiatives which I was able to learn about while liste...

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(September 19, 2023) Written by Ocean Skye Phillips, Moose Cree Youth. Ocean Skye Phillips in the field. Photo: WCS Canada  My name is Ocean Phillips. I’m a 20-year-old Moose Cree youth, living in Kapuskasing Ontario. In 2019, I had a chance to join Wildlife Conservation Society Canada (WCSC) scientists and staff from the Moose Cree First Nation Resource Protection Unit (MCFN) to study lake sturgeon in the Moose River watershed in the far north of Ontario.    But then COVID happen...

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(August 03, 2023) Written by Clara Reid, Avian Field Intern, and Chris Coxson, Avian Field Technician, both with the Northern Boreal Mountains Program based in Whitehorse, Yukon.  Yellow Warbler, found in shrubby habitats in unmined areas and revegetated placer mines. Photo: Chris Coxson  The word “mining” brings certain images to mind: noisy and large machinery, piles of rocks and overturned trees, and stripped away vegetation. These may seem like hostile conditions for wildlif...

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(August 01, 2023) By Donald Reid and Hilary Cooke  For several years, Wildlife Conservation Society Canada scientists based in Yukon have been drawing attention to the ecological and climate impacts of the Yukon Government’s proposed expansion of using wood (aka biomass) to fuel boilers to heat large buildings in Whitehorse and other communities. In June 2023, we submitted the following Letter to Yukon News in response to Yukon economist’s Keith Halliday’s analysis of biomass impacts on ...

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(May 31, 2023) By Justina Ray Bighorn sheep in the Canadian Rockies. Photo by Richard Paksi (Canva Pro). Helping steer 196 countries to arrive at a consensus agreement for “halting and reversing biodiversity loss” was no small accomplishment for Canadian representatives at the Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) negotiations in Montreal this past December.  But now the even more challenging work of implementing the agreement has begun with the official launch on May 15th of Canada&...

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(May 01, 2023) By Hilary Cooke, Chrystal Mantyka-Pringle and Justina Ray Don Reid in the field trapping an Arctic lemming. Photo: WCS Canada. When Dr. Don Reid set up shop in Whitehorse, Yukon in 2004 as the founding member of what would grow to become WCS Canada’s Northern Boreal Mountains team, this versatile -- and well-versed -- scientist also brought an expert knowledge of the wildlife and wild places of one of Canada’s most globally important areas – the wild region spanning C...

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(March 20, 2023) By Morgan J. Martin,  WCS Canada postdoc at the University of Victoria in collaboration with the Wildlife Conservation Society Canada working on behavioral responses of bowhead whales to shipping noise. The pandemic kept me grounded for two years, the research conditions were challenging, but when I finally did make it to Igloolik in Nunavut, it was an experience I will never forget. When I started a three-year postdoctoral researcher position at WCS Canada in June 2020, I was su...

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(March 08, 2023) On a late summer afternoon in Whitehorse, Hilary Cooke was sorting through the mail not really looking for anything in particular, when she came across an interesting hand written letter. It isn’t too often that we receive hand written letters, and almost never coming from a community school. She opened it diligently, and inside to her surprise she found a hand written cheque addressed to the Wildlife Conservation Society Canada for $450 addressed by St. Elias Community School in Haines Ju...

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(October 03, 2022) by Lina Cordero, Conservation Communications Intern, Wildlife Conservation Society Canada Canada is a big place. There are tens of thousands of lakes in this country, including some of the largest in the world. It is home to forests with a combined area larger than India and has the world’s longest coastline at more than 200,000 kilometres, including along the Pacific, Atlantic and Arctic oceans. This much space means Canada is blessed with a huge abundance and richness of natu...

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(September 23, 2022) By Justina Ray, President and Senior Scientist at WCS Canada The federal government’s draft Critical Minerals Strategy is structured around colonial ‘new frontiers’ mindset that leads to a focus on expediting extraction instead of understanding the real consequences of opening up some of the world’s last remaining ecologically intact areas and carbon-rich stores to industrial development. Map from Canada’s critical minerals strategy: Discussion paper Ou...

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