Alberta grizzly population “shockingly” low

The total breeding population of grizzlies in Alberta is less than half of what is needed for the species to maintain a genetically healthy population.

Those are the final results of a scientific study into the bear’s total population in the province and as a result, the government is expected to make a decision on its status this spring.

In 2002, the endangered species committee recommended the grizzly bear be listed as threatened and since then the province has tasked Gordon Stenhouse of the Foothills Research Institute, who has more than three decades of experience studying the animal, with establishing a baseline population. During a presentation earlier this month as part of the MD of Bighorn’s Living in the Natural Environment speaker’s series, Stenhouse detailed the final results of his research.

After five years of counting individual bears through DNA, a total population of 583 bears are thought to inhabit the province, although the research is but a snapshot into populations at one given time. Regardless, Stenhouse said 40 per cent of that population is known to be sub-adult, therefore his research has found Alberta has a breeding population of 363 grizzly bears. “Certainly that is fewer bears than we expected,” Stenhouse said. Population size is a key factor in the species’ survival. According to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, at least 1,000 mature animals are needed in order to keep a population of animals genetically healthy.

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