"Adventure Tourism Information About Places Ya'Gotta Go To!"
Author's Note: I am embarrassed to tell you that this article is a little unfinished. That is to say, it essentially reads like a first draft. It has become bigger than expected, therefore, some more time is needed to give it the due attention that it deserves. Sooner or later I will polish it up. Having said that, it is basically intact: I think that you will find it enjoyable and extremely informative.
"It is almost as though in him we can see how great is our loss of contact with ourselves." (The Sacred Paw, the Bear in Nature, Myth and Literature, by Paul Shepard and Barry Sanders)
Biologist John Stellfox had this to say about the Swan Hills in 1958: "it is a natural museum for zoologists, botanists and geologists".
About three hours by car, northwest of Edmonton, lays a disjunctive outlier of the Rocky Mountain Foothills known as the Swan Hills. Here we find a curious and decimated population of grizzly bears; a distinct population that is likely to perish.
Not fifty years ago, the Swan Hills region was still more or less ecologically pristine and harbored a thoroughly high density of grizzly bears. (Probably the highest in the province.) It would be difficult to find a more intriguing and diverse northern landscape. In fact, as you will see, it appears to be a near perfect habitat for grizzly bears, which is easily illustrated by the fact that many of these animals often grew to an unusually large size. Over and over again we see examples of this: the place is legendary for its huge grizzlies! But, today, industrial "development" has left it sadly depleted. Massive wealth is accumulated while little or nothing returned - these days, a familiar story. Adding to this tepid soup, the Swan Hills has a terrible mascot, a renowned and embarrassing toxic waste treatment facility.
Stories of this magnitude deserve recognition. It speaks loudly regarding the very definition of "progress". Bringing awareness to the Swan Hills is to uncover vast quantities of uncomfortable and thought provoking side issues. Topping the list is government (mostly provincial in this case) accountability along with their many satellite associates. Difficult questions arise that deserve reasonable answers.
It has been stated many times that the grizzly bear is the true monarch of the West, yet their extensive, former domain is essentially gone. Likewise, throughout the globe brown bears have been squeezed mercilessly into small, fragmented "islands" of existence. With regard to Alberta's "public" land, the old story is fast being repeated. We are often falsely led to believe that grizzly bears are regaining some of their former status. They are not. The Swan Hills and its grizzlies are but part of this sad mire. Their fate appears to be sealed.
These unfortunate animals might represent one of the most ignored and under-researched populations of grizzlies anywhere on earth. For reasons that I will discuss later, they are not even regarded as a distinct population. And because of some semi-unusual characteristics, they might offer some interesting and unique insight into our knowledge of bears.
So where is the concern? Of course there is virtually none because it would bring formal and official recognition to their plight. To coin a term from an old report, the Swan Hills is better off forgotten.
To achieve some level of objectivity, I will delve reasonably deep into the subject. It is evident that data pertaining to the Swan Hills is very scarce indeed - in itself a very telling fact. Every scant morsel it seems has to be patiently extracted virtually from thin air. What can be found is often hearsay, anecdotal or incestuously connected to the weighty anvil of corporate, industrial interests. So it is a difficult journey. Seeking substance, I often had no choice but to grope and slog through a variety of dry scientific reports. I am awkward, uncomfortable and out of place in this domain. It would be irresponsible not to mention that I could make mistakes, misinterpret something and so on. Still, having said that, I feel confident with the overall assessment. As if screaming out to be heard, the story easily tells itself. Anyway, this article is a vehicle to create some much-needed discussion, that is all. Oddly, if the Swan Hills grizzly information pool is thin, the opposite is true for brown bears in general. Somebody once said that there are more experts than there are bears. No kidding!
As the title of this article suggests, a fair amount of humor has been inserted. I want to keep it casual, unpretentious and somewhat intimate. This also helps draw attention to the fact that I am not a expert and definately not pretending to be so - just a concerned citizen is all.
You can already see that I use two terms: grizzly bear and brown bear. They are basically interchangeable. Brown bear is correct I suppose. Grizzly, although still used often, is a slightly outdated North American expression; yet it sounds intriguing to my ears and has a certain romantic quality. Grizzly works well in relation to the Swan Hills bears too because they have been, to a certain extent, already relegated to the realm of folklore.
It has been divided into three sections. Parts one and two seek to answer these three questions:
Part three mainly deals with the grizzly bears.
Basically, it is written like a book, but if you wish to simply browse about - go for it.
Allow me to make a dedication, as there is a long lost person who is most worthy. During the Klondike gold rush - a little over a century ago - the Swan Hills, for a time, was used as an over land route to the Yukon. Miraculously, nobody perished during the Swan Hills (Chalmers Trail) leg of the journey save one five-year-old girl. She was the daughter of Mr. And Mrs. G.W. Larrabee. It is to this child that I make my dedication. Her family was attempting quick monetary rewards. Did it blind them to life's real riches? The irony and symbolism is too much. It eerily echoes the very tale of the Swan Hills.
"From the shores of Lesser Slave Lake, The Swan Hills appear like a mountain range to the south, rising 2500 feet from lake level" (Alberta Natural History, W.G. Hardy, 1967).
Because the topic is so interesting, I find myself occasionally talking to people about the place. These social interactions let me know that familiarity with this part of Alberta is rare. Like the ghostly old legends of the place, the Swan Hills do not even seem to exist sometimes.
Reach into the glove compartment and haul out the old road map of Alberta. Put your finger on Edmonton and proceed northwest until you hit Lesser Slave Lake. The great big "green" area to the south is the Swan Hills. (Adding insult to injury, maps often show the Swan Hills as a large green-colored zone.) It is nicely encircled with the Athabasca River winding through the south and east, Lesser Slave Lake to the north, and the Little Smokey River to the west - a fine package really.
As if to reach for help, the Swan Hills stretches out to the northeast in a sort of arm-like extension known as the Pelican Mountains. I have mentioned this place because of its subalpine connection to the Swan Hills and historically healthy grizzly populations. (Although, how many grizzlies remain in the Pelican Mountains is anybody's guess. I suggest the situation is grim.) This hilly appendage might occasionally be mentioned but the primary focus of this article is the large, semi-round area to the south of Lesser Slave Lake. And because natural systems do not end abruptly or succinctly the surrounding areas will also be mentioned from time to time. As you will see later, this actually proves to be something of an issue.
Before I begin with this little talk, a hint at an overview is in order. The Swan Hills represented a fairly pristine environment until the 1950's. This is when big-time resource extraction first greedily entered the scene. In the short span of about fifty years, the Swan Hills have been hacked up, altered and polluted with impunity.
The Alberta foothills present a unique and fascinating portion of the boreal forest. They can be more or less divided into a couple of ecological and geographic sub-regions: upper and lower foothills. Interestingly, as the Swan Hills stretches out into the middle of Alberta it is actually both "upper" and "lower".
Anomalous mountain ranges like the Swan Hills (and adjacent Pelican Mountains) are referred to as an "outlier". It is a good name since they are foothills and also outlying. This is the eastern edge of the foothills, a kind of incongruous, high-altitude-island. It is a compact mountain range, right smack-dab in the middle of Alberta. (One biologist informed me that this is a very important fact as far as grizzlies are concerned.) If you think this sounds intriguing you are right.
Here is a quote that I found on the Internet entitled, Alberta Naturally.
"The upper foothills subregion occurs on strongly rolling topography along the eastern edge of the Rocky Mountains from about the Bow River north to the Grande Cache area, with disjunct occurrences in the Swan Hills and Clear Hills. The subregion is generally between the lower foothills and subalpine subregions with an upper elevation limit of about 1500 hundred meters in the south to 1000 meters in the north. Bedrock outcrops of marine shales and non-marine sandstones are frequent. Morainal deposits are common over bedrock throughout much of the area, although colluvium and residuum occur on steeper terrain."
To punch you in the ribs with a jarring George Chuvalo-like blow, pay attention to this little smashing fact. According to the Conservation Biology Institute, "several designated areas [in the foothills forest ecoregion] receive at least moderate protection (GAP code 2) the actual land area being protected (19,052 ha, 47,044 ac) amount to less than two-tenths of 1% of the ecoregion."
Two-tenths of 1%! I damn near choked on my doughnut. Actually, most people put the figure at about 2% (Whew, I was worried there for a minute). This shocking figure alone is almost enough to transform the staunchest redneck into a tree hugging environmentalist.
While we're on the topic of wilderness exploitation lets pause for a moment and enter the ghastly underworld of Alberta politics. In 1998, ex-environment minister Ty Lund was quoted as saying, "It's all sustainable, as long as one sector doesn't undergo excessively rapid exploitation." If the Swan Hills could laugh... It is a preposterous and ridiculous statement; as if any "sector" has ever exercised restraint! "Sustainable" is everyone's favorite word yet it means practically nothing. A powerful tool for those who wish to abuse it. (Where there is power and control, there will be vague and bizarre language! The forestry business, in particular has practically re-invented its own perverted version of the English language.)
Glimpsing at a topographic map of Alberta, the Swan Hills unfolds like a beckoning bulls-eye right in the center of this wonderful province. It kind of spreads out in waves of diversity: sub-alpine gives way to lower foothills which blends into rich mixed woods and so on. The outer edges are typical of boreal forest central mixed woods and dry mixed woods.
"The subalpine subregion consists of two portions: the lower subalpine, characterized by closed forests of lodgepole pine, Engelmann spruce and subalpine fir, and the upper subalpine, characterized by intermixed open and closed forests. Engelmann spruce-subalpine fir forests typically occur on higher, moister sites. Pure Engelmann spruce is characterized of high elevation stands. At lower elevations, spruce trees (often white spruce-Engelmann spruce hybrids) are more common, and burned areas are often covered by extensive lodgepole pine forests" (Rare Vascular Plants of Alberta, L. Kershaw, J. Gould, D. Johnson and J. Lancaster, 2001).
Marten Mountain is our next destination. It rises directly east of Lesser Slave Lake and constitutes the western edge of the aforementioned Pelican Mountains. Trees like balsam fir, white spruce and poplar grow exceptionally well here. On the summit there is (or maybe once was), lodgepole pine, devil's club, mosses, lichens and ferns. It is interesting to note that apparently on the upper reaches the ground never really dries out. Marten Mountain has extensive peat-land complexes "with floating fens and extensive horizontal fens" and is named after the pine marten. The Pelican Mountains rise up to between 760-1,020 meters. (Are there any floating fens left here? I'm affraid to find out.)
Anybody who has ever flapped their lips to discuss the Swan Hills usually described three basic things: rain, mud and muskeg. Great tales abound of washed-out bridges and torrential downpours. Many people have attempted to traverse this entangled northern jungle only to find grief and misery.
"The Swan Hills area is noted for rain, gumbo and grizzly bears" (Nature Guide to Alberta).
"The Swan Hills area is far wetter and cooler than most of Alberta's foothills approaching rain forest conditions on the western side of Goose Mountain" (Nature Guide to Alberta).
Because the Swan Hills reaches such a high altitude, it receives more rainfall than any other part of the province save the Rocky Mountains. In fact, outside the Rocky Mountains, it is the highest part of Alberta. High precipitation and long summer days present excellent growing conditions. Rivers and streams are in great profusion, either flowing north into Lesser Slave Lake or south into the Athabasca River. A number of small lakes are present too. (The Swan Hills Waste Treatment Centre sits on the highest point in the Swan Hills. It makes me wonder, was this the best choice of location for such an unsavory undertaking?)
"Few living today can recall the hardships of travelling winter trails over frozen rivers and lakes or crossing the hundreds of miles of muskeg and unbridged rivers and creeks between Athabasca Landing and Sawridge, on Lesser Slave Lake. The winters were long and cold, summers had hordes of mosquitoes and other blood-sucking insects, and although they were short the daylight hours were endless and the sunshine provided rapid growth of vegetation, both wild and cultivated" (Lesser Slave Lake, Lee Phillips, 1973).
Apparently, like Marten Mountain, the summit of Deer Mountain is (or was) one large muskeg. Just what is muskeg? I have a diminutive soft covered book entitled, Plants of the Western Boreal Forest and Aspen Parkland. It refers to muskeg as "a complex mosaic of boreal fens, bogs, swamps, pools and scrubby forest, increasingly common to the north."
Now we're getting somewhere. The vegetation might be divided into two broad categories: forest and muskeg. It has been estimated that 25% of the Swan Hills are blanketed with muskeg. Mind you, from what I can see, the whole place is seemingly carpeted with water and rubber boot sucking mud. Muskeg can also be termed peatlands. These swampy places are extremely important carbon sinks, and we need all the help we can get these days. (Okay, let me get this straight: not only are we buggering up the place but also interfering with the way the whole planet defends itself? Not to mention, Alberta is an over-achiever where global warming is concerned. Ouch!)
"Peatlands occupy a transitional point between upland and aquatic systems, playing a role in flood control and acting as natural filter systems, maintaining the health of the overall environment. Alberta contains 1.03 x 105 square km. of peatland, representing 16.3% of Alberta's landbase" (Devonian Botanical Gardens, 1996).
Moving right along, let's talk about fens - patterned fens. This is an interesting subject. In 1975, a study was produced, "The Vegetation and Chemical Properties of Patterned Fens in the Swan Hills" (Can. J. Bot.53: 2776-2795). It concentrated on the western portion of the Swan Hills, 55" N latitude and 116" W longitude and 1300 meters elevation. It examined three patterned fens with one being "intensively analyzed".
A fen is a mineral rich wetland with slow moving water... simple right? These peat-forming wetlands receive nutrients from sources other than rainfall. Fens have been described as looking like watery meadows with sedges, grass-like plants, reeds, shrubs, and a smattering of stunted trees. Patterned fens often have peaty ridges (sounds like the name of a country singer) known as strings, and pools of water in between known as flarks. Actually, there is a bit more to it but I think you get the picture. For weeks I was lounging around the house crooning, "strings and flarks, strings and flarks". My wife became annoyed.
An intensive analysis of one of the fens revealed that these mires are "poor fens" with a mean pH of 5.2 and Ca2T is depleted as water flows through the fens. If that isn't absolutely groovy enough, it also said that, "the patterning of the mires in the Swan Hills as well as in other areas of North America resembles the aapamires in Fennoscandia (cf. Ruuhijarvi, 1960). It has been suggested that these aapamires occur in Northern Europe and in a relatively narrow band across North America."
I should also point out that, in the report, a photo revealed a fen with a seismic line hacked right through it. Nice!
I took some time to get to know the watery, soggy world of fens. It is an excellent word too, rolling smoothly off the tongue. Fens are usually associated with low temperatures and short growing seasons, supportive of diverse plant and animal communities. Of course they tend to be situated in places with high humidity where moisture can accumulate.
It can take a fen up to ten thousand years to mature. TEN THOUSAND YEARS!
Just wait, there's more thrilling wetland action. One fine day, I sidestepped over to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. They have produced a little piece known as, Coniferous Forest: Peatlands, Bogs and Fens. The State of Minnesota is greatly concerned with such things. It went on to describe how peatlands are prehistoric in origin and important water reservoirs and not fully understood. NOT FULLY UNDERSTOOD! It went further: "these communities vary with water chemistry and s
ources, and are very sensitive to disturbances." After ten thousand years, a fen must feel quite violated when some type of massive mechanism takes a stroll through it.As I have already stated, the Swan Hills present a delicious mixed buffet of regions: upper foothills, lower foothills, peatlands, mixed wood forests, deltas, etc. A forest will constantly change as a result of natural and man-made disturbances. Read on.
Originally, in the Swan Hills uplands, there existed spruce-fir forests living to be three hundred years old. High precipitation often prevented fire. Engelmann spruce and sub-alpine fir, were common in the area. The Engelmann spruce is a most interesting tree, often living for five centuries and growing to a height of one hundred feet. (Not if the forestry business has anything to say about it.)
"Of particular interest is the fact that genuine P. engelmannii (on the basis of cone characters) was seen as far east as Goose Mountain, in the Swan Hills, at an altitude of about 4400 ft" (Noteworthy Plant Species And Communities In west central Alberta, E. H. Moss and George Pegg, Canadian Journal of Botany, Volume 41, 1963).
"Canada's most species-rich forests are also the most modified" (Global Forest Watch, 2000).
One freezing cold winter day, I spent the afternoon at the public library browsing through books - tree books. One can only imagine the excitement I felt. Publications that deal with trees are often accompanied with geographic maps showing where certain species belong. Try as I might, I could not find a single book that put the Engelmann spruce tree into the Swan Hills. Now, I have read a plethora of - not easy to find - old reports that put them here. I am also aware that forestry companies "blaze a trail" straight to old growth forest first. Are there any stately or elderly Engelmann spruce trees left in the Swan Hills? Probably not. (There is might still be some puny remnants of this species in the Swan Hills. However, since they are no longer mentioned to exist here, the situation does not look too good.) One more thing: the old beauties that did live in the Swan Hills represented some of the oldest timber in Alberta. And it was the eastern most limit of their range.
Manage:The forestry business isn't exactly mowing down our forests, they are "managing" them. "Manage" is another one of those intriguing words.
Here is a statement by one Mr. V. Maurice who had spent a little time in the Swan Hills (Grouard News, circa 1912-1915):
"Leaving here on Monday morning we traveled to Sucker Creek, taking an old hunting trail from this point, we crossed to the East Prairie River. The country from Sucker Creek to the river is heavily wooded with poplar and yellow birch of a splendid variety and I might say the finest birch I have ever seen outside of Sweden, being about 12 inches in diameter."
"There are many references to grizzlies in the boreal forest and subalpine conifers were important habitats for bears." Bailey (1931) referred to grizzlies in spruce (Picea. spp.) and other subalpine vegetation and called this "the breeding zone of bears" (The Grizzlies In the Southwest, David E. Brown)."We stayed there with dad shooting squirrels there. In those days squirrels were worth good money, twenty-five cents apiece. We walked all over up there shooting squirrels." (East Prairie Metis, 1939-1979, 40 Years of Determination. The East Prairie Settlement is right in the middle of the Swan Hills. It appears that they were, in fact, very "determined". Every single person in Alberta should read this little book. It is a beautiful and honest account of life in the area.)
The issue of hybridization is interesting. The Pattered Fen report delivers yet another intriguing point.
"Another feature of the upland forest is the apparent introgressive hybridization between the boreal and cordilleran vicariants of Engelmann spruce, balsam fir and lodgepole pine."
Why don't we mosey on down to the southeast corner of the Swan Hills. There is an old provincial park document entitled, Carson Pegasus Provincial Park Resource Conservation and Management Guideline, 1980. It spoke of the surrounding forest: "...the entire area belongs to the boreal forest region but is subdivided into "mixed wood section", for the lowland plain, and "lower foothills section" for the upland." (These days, Alberta's provincial parks seem, in purpose, function and management, to be basically privatized. Is anyone still writing this kind of report? If so, are they objective and available to the public? I doubt it.)
Here is a little passage from a book known as, The Treasure Seekers, The Men Who Built "Home Oil?.
"The Swan Hills area was the wildest most remote terrain in which anyone had yet looked for oil in Canada, a thickly forested wilderness penetrated by only a few forestry trails and all but completely inaccessible except during the winter freeze up."
The above quote is typical of many. In less than one human lifetime (and maybe a couple of grizzly lifetimes), a pristine wilderness has been plundered, polluted, fragmented and simplified.
As you can see, the Swan Hills represent a variety of forest categories: subalpine; upper foothills; lower foothills and mixed woods. It creates a kind of smooth layering effect depending on the altitude. Are you still with me?
Again, I will refer to the book, Rare Vascular Plants of Alberta. It says that about 30% of Alberta's native vascular plants are considered rare. After a few minutes of page flipping, I counted nineteen of them in the Swan Hills. For anyone who is interested (I doubt it) they are: sitka willow, northern-bur-reed, linear-leaved pond-weed, American winter cress, oblong-leaved sundew, English sundew, great sundew, Hall's willowherb, slender-fruited willowherb, pine sap, tall blue lettuce, marsh rush, sharp-pointed wood-rush, capitate sedge, fox sedge, lakeshore sedge, beaked sedge, mountain bladder fern, northern beach fern and long beech fern.
"Subarctic circumpolar species, extending southward in mountain regions, and already reported for northern Alberta and Lesser Slave Lake. We have it from the Swan Hills, and from the Freeman River, 32 miles north-northwest of Whitecourt" (E. H. Moss and George Pegg, 1963).
"The devil's-club, common west of the Rocky Mts., has long been known to occur sporadically from Lesser Slave Lake and the Swan Hills southwestward toward the Rocky Mts., also in a small localized area of Waterton Lakes Park. In the region of our study this plant is much more prevalent than we had anticipated, usually growing in damp spruce-fir woods. Near Windfall River, west of Whitecourt; about 10 miles east of Little Smoky, south of Valleyview, Marten Mt., alt. about 2200 ft, northeast of Lesser Slave Lake" (E. H. Moss and George Pegg, 1963).
Bears do well when they consume a lot of berries. The Swan Hills is renowned for yielding a great abundance of these juicy delicacies. To put it into perspective, an entire cookbook could be written just with the recipes I have found.
"The abundant berry crop in the region [Swan Hills] supports both black and grizzly bear populations" (Nature Guide To Alberta, W. G. Hardy, 1967).
"As most everybody else did in those days [1930's] raspberries, blueberries, et cetera were canned by the hundred quarts" (Sodbusters, A History of Kinuso and Swan River Settlement).
As you have already seen, outside of Waterton National Park, devil's club grows nowhere else in Alberta except for the Swan Hills. It has been described as the most important spiritual and medicinal plant for indigenous peoples who live within its range. It is a berry producing plant and closely related to ginseng. Devil's club is also an important food for bears and therefore is very worthy of mention. (One has to wonder how much of this shrub still exists in the Swan Hills when considering how often logging companies bombard the place with chemicals. To put it into a crystal clear perspective, I strongly urge you to read an article that can be found on the internet entitled: "Plans to Spray Grizzly Forage with Pesticides Put on Hold, BC Supreme Court Decision Sets Important Precedent For Challenging Irresponsible Pesticide use". Devil's club is one of the plants mentioned in this piece. The Swan Hills situation is basically no different than what is mentioned in this article.)
.ust to bore you into oblivion, I want to discuss the understory. Goose Mountain represents the southern most limits of American more rush and leatherleaf. In fact, at one time, the Swan Hills was the only known place in Alberta where American Moore Rush could be found. Let's breeze on down to the southeast corner again.
"The immediate area of the hamlet (Fort Assiniboine) can be set in a wider context; it is on the approximate boarder of the parkland and boreal forest areas of Northern Alberta" (Fort Assiniboine School, Forestry Program and Forestry Centre, Internet).
There are many layers of diversity in the Swan Hills. I could talk about it all day. There are so many other interesting organisms too: orchids, fungi, lichen, mosses, carnivorous plants and so on. And how about permafrost and sinkholes? There is just so much.
Oh what the heck: how about a recipe? It's from Verna E. Blears of East Prairie.
"Pick berries when they are brown in color before ripening [watch out for bears]. Wash and place in boiling water. Then strain the liquid through two thicknesses of cheesecloth. Take pulp and put back on stove, adding sugar and bottle of Certo. Let boil slowly until sugar has dissolved. Then, pour into sterilized jars [by boiling them in water] and seal tight. Makes lovely tasting jelly eaten with cream."
"A spring-fed cienega adjacent to Oak Creek, Yavapai County, Arizona, about 3,800 feet. Now rare, such marshy streamsides were once important foraging sites for grizzlies. Herbaceous plants present at this ungrazed location in July, 1982, included rushes, sedges, horsetails, several species of grass, and numerous forbs" (The Grizzly in the Southwest, David E. Brown).
Doctor Doolittle would have a field day! "Three distinct herds of wild buffalo have been located west of the Slave River... the buffalo resemble the American bison, from which they are descended but life in the hills have made them more agile and fleeter of foot" (Grouard News, 1912-1915). "I've seen rabbits so thick they ate around the base of haystacks until the stacks toppled over." "I killed twelve bears right from the kitchen doorway. All twelve were black bears and some big ones." (Sodbusters, A History of Kinuso and Swan River Settlements)
As far as North America is concerned, virtually every animal that you can think of has existed in the Swan Hills. Just off the top of my head: red squirrel, wolverine, moose, mule deer, white tailed deer, caribou, wolves, black bears, grizzlies, pine marten (which will probably disappear along with the grizzlies), mink, rabbits, elk, an incredible varieties of birds, foxes (several kinds), lynx, cougars, elk, beaver, muskrats, coyote, bats (several kinds) and on and on and on.
"This band of unfertile soil with its forests, muskeg and mosquitoes was a barrier to settlers at a time when there were no roads, railways or planes entering the country, but it was not a barrier to the fur traders who were in fact attracted there as it teemed with wildlife" (The Alberta Story, Department of Education, Edmonton).
Referring to the Swan Hills, it should come as no surprise that early fur traders often spoke of some of the finest quality pelts in North America.
There is a delightful book called, Watch Over the Forest, written by Neil W.W. Gilliat. He describes the demise of the last caribou herd in the Swan Hills. It took place sometime in the mid-nineteen-sixties. It is something of a pitiful story really. He expresses his concern for the woodland caribou, but to no avail. "The second hunting season came... within days the Slave Lake caribou herd was decimated." If anyone wants to learn a little more, this publication is packed full of goodness and is written in a very honest, down-to-earth way.
"These hills support a diverse population of mammals, including concentrations of grizzly bear and moose" (Nature Guide to Alberta).
Birds? Reminds me of an Alfred Hitchcock movie. Two hundred types of songbirds blast through each year. A Swan Hills travel brochure describes it like this:
"Birders" covet big lake country for the fact that some of the most sought after avian species in Canada are found in this region including bald eagles, osprey, barred owls, Canada warblers" (For more info, check out Lesser Slave Lake Bird Observatory.)
On a fine spring day, I found myself stumbling about the shores of Lesser Slave Lake: Hilliards Bay Provincial Park to be precise. Off in the distance was the Swan Hills. An exquisite afternoon it was, toward late May or early June. Most of the "big lake" was still frozen except for a fairly large area that I guess constituted Hilliards Bay. Standing alone on the beach, it was fantastic to say the least. Another person might have felt desolate, lonely, but I wanted the day to last. To my utmost delight, the open water yielded hundreds of white pelicans. They looked relaxed, bobbing with ease. As I stood gazing, a group of them casually moved away. For the great birds, my presence alone was bothersome illustrating just how delicate nature can be. They looked as though they hadn't changed in millions of years, prehistoric if you will. How long had the pelicans been coming here? Will they continue to come for all eternity?
Crane My Neck:Speaking of large goofy birds, the Sandhill crane exhibits a perfectly comical gait, funny yet somehow elegant. In the spring and fall they migrate by the thousands through the Lesser Slave Lake area.
Significant:Here is another important bird fact. The Lesser Slave Lake Bird Observatory, designated in the year 2000 by Birdlife International, is a globally significant, important bird area (IBA). It's too bad the place can't be designated as a globally significant grizzly area.
So many questions...
Like a Nat King Cole tune, why don't we glide effortlessly over to the pygmy owl. One of these little guys will fit comfortably into the palm of your hand. Government biologists are worried that oil and gas activities are threatening their habitat. They are "analyzing data" to see if there is a problem. (Ninety-eight percent of the foothills are open for industrial exploitation. There's your "data"... it looks as though we have a problem!) The pygmy owl inhabits open coniferous and mixed wood forests, from valley bottoms up to the tree line. I found at least two old reports that put them into the Swan Hills. It is distressing to learn that voles are their favorite food. Now, the Swan Hills Waste Treatment Centre has procured a solid reputation for having contaminated voles. Toxicity tends to compound as it moves up the food chain. There is a term for it: biomagnification.
"Breeding species that are especially vulnerable to human caused disturbances, (e.g. American white pelican, great blue heron, bald eagle, osprey and many colonial nesting species). NTM's link us ecologically to the tropics and we bear an international responsibility for their conservation" (Encompass Magazine).Birdlife International estimates that "70% of the earth's 9700 bird species are declining and that at least 2000 are in danger of extinction." and states "Human disturbances is an important factor in the abandonment of nests and breeding failures. Power boats, jet skis and float planes are anathema to nesting loons, grebes and other water fowl."
Allow me to pause for a minute and give you a list of some communities in the area: Kinuso, Joussard, Swan Hills (township), Fox Creek, Valleyview, Whitecourt, Slave Lake, Fort Assiniboine, Faust, East Prairie, Grouard and a few more to be sure. The Public Library or the Internet will offer more. Check it out.
They can move through clear liquid with lightening precision. Leap a building in a single bound. Taste great with lemon. Of course I'm talking about fish... fish man, fish.
"We used to link chord with an ordinary spoon hook to catch pickerel eight inches around and three feet long [wow], jackfish were up to four feet long" (Where the Red Willow Grew, Valleyview and Surrounding Districts).
A cheesy old book entitled, the Fishes of Alberta (Paetz-Neilson), has maps that more or less pinpoint known locations of each fish species. I simply counted the ones in the Swan Hills. (If a particular fish species is heavily abundant in the Swan Hills, it will have a star in front of it.) They are: *arctic grayling, cisco, lake whitefish, mountain whitefish, dolly varden, rainbow trout, *northern pike, long nose dace, flathead chub, *lake chub, pearl dace, northern redbelly dace, * Longnose sucker, *white sucker, * burbot and trout-perch.
A few items from this publication are worth mentioning. A particular grayling comment caught my eye. The Swan Hills is well known to be teeming with this delightful fish.
"Spawning occurs in streams in May and early June at about 40-45 F." [Grayling] are extremely susceptible to various forms of pollution."
"Several populations [of grayling] in the Athabasca drainage from the south slope of the Swan Hills and the headwaters of the Athabasca River in Alberta are believed to be native."
There will be some more grayling discussion further upstream, but for now, let's talk suckers. The two above-mentioned sucker species spawn in the streams from April to June, with beach spawning common and necessary in many Alberta Lakes ("suckers": referring to white and long nose sucker).
"Occasionally the spawning concentrations of these species will be so dense in shallow streams that the water literally appears to be moving with them" (Alberta Natural History).
No self-respecting bear could pass up a tantalizing fish dinner. The Swan Hills grizzlies often grew to a magnificent size. Surely the abundance of fish is, at least in part, the reason for this phenomenon. (Outside of Yellowstone National Park there is no known population of grizzly bears east of the Rocky Mountains that are known to exploit this resource, therefore, it is a significant proposal. One could be put virtually anywhere in the Swan Hills and only be a few paces away from a river, stream or wetland. Fish would have been spawning in some of these places and bears would have for sure, at least some of the time, capitalized.)
Finally, (from Fishes of Alberta) there is the very unattractive burbot. "Burbot occur in the cold parts of lakes and both in large and small streams." This is interesting: "Burbot are occasionally caught by sport fisherman but are seldom eaten. When skinned however, it is a tasty fish. The liver is extremely high in vitamin A and D and is comparable with medicinal cod liver oil."
Rivers and streams were incredibly abundant with fish in the Swan Hills. These days, there are public health advisories and lakes artificially stocked with rainbow trout.
Arctic grayling are prolific in the Swan Hills. The rivers and streams are/were loaded with them. Apparently, to this day, by some miracle, there is still some decent grayling fishing. Here's a list of some other fish that have succeeded in these parts: mountain whitefish, rainbow trout, lake chub, flathead minnow, pearl dace, longnose sucker (hence, the community of Sucker Creek), white sucker, burbot, brook stickleback, spoonhead sculpin, etc.
I found a report from 1968. It presented a list of fish in the Little Smoky River: Lake Chubb, long nose sucker, trout-perch (what the hell is a trout-perch?) red-sided shiner and yellow perch.
"We knew there were fish [in the Swan Hills] because the first thing we did was catch some including a beautiful bull trout minnow weighing a good two and a half pounds" (Sagitawah Saga, The Story of Whitecourt).
There are many wonderful photographs of bygone years in the Swan Hills. They often showcase a spectacular, almost never-ending supply of fish. Photographs are excellent in this case too, because we all know about the accuracy of fish tales. (For most men, lying and fishing are synonymous... it is accepted guy-behavior.)
In the Goose Mountain area (center of Swan Hills) there can be found a type of ground beetle (bria metallica). Usually this bug only dwells within the sub-tropical, coastal mountains of British Columbia.
And then there are the leaf-mining flies in the Swan Hills that were hitherto completely unknown to science. Cool.
Lesser Slave Lake is the second largest body of water in Alberta. At one time it fostered a fine population of lake trout. The circumference of the lake is known to harbor any number of interesting features:
"The small river that forms the outlet of the lake is about 25 yards in width, very torturous, hemmed in by low banks that are almost uniformly wooded with aspen copse and willow between which it winds with gentle current at a depth sufficient for large Hudson Bay Company's boats heavily laden. The soil on either side near the river seems excellent sandy loom, and when free of timber abounds with rich grass and peavine. Ere it joins the Athabasca the river widens to a span of 50 yards, passes over a series of gentle rapids while its banks become more varied in contour, through still closely wooded" (Reverend DM Gordon, 1879).
Literally, in every corner of the Swan Hills there is intriguing and anomalous stretches of land heavily laden with sand. They are present on the east-end of Lesser Slave Lake, north of Fort Assiniboine, north of High Prairie and near Fox Creek. It is just another fascinating feature of the place.
"Much of the lowland area [Lesser Slave Lake] is underlain by extensive glacial lake deposits up to thirty metres thick. " (Nature Guide to Alberta).
Rarely is the Swan Hills recognized as being its own distinct region (I will mention it often), in part, because of its highly transitional nature. This is a critical observation. When maps are concocted, they don't tend to notice how naturally occurring zones bleed into each other - transitional, ecotones, etc.
"There are also gradual transitions [in the Swan Hills], e.g. from alpine fir to white spruce to lodgepole pine to black spruce, providing strong support for the concept of vegetational continuum" (E. H. Moss and George Pegg, 1963)."The transitional zones where forest meet different types of habitats are called ectones. These ectones can be very broad and contain species form both of the surrounding habitats. This means that the diversity of both plants and animals in ectones is very high. These transition habitats are often overlooked when parks and nature reserves are created [the Swan Hills is the perfect example], and are simply dismissed as not being a true forest. However, ectones are not only home to many species that are not found in either of the adjacent habitats, they may also be important to the evolution of the species" (Rissler P.1995, The Status of Science Examining Ectones, Bio Science 45:318-325).
The above statement says it all. It is common sense, when different habitats overlap it easily spells diversity: a flourishing hotbed of existence. This message cannot be driven home with enough force. (Stay tuned, I will return to this theme again.) The Swan Hills was, at one time, a miraculous wilderness. Why can we not show respect for such a place?
The word "paradise" has often been used to describe the Sawn Hills. Lesser Slave Lake is known as the "Jewel of the North".
How did the Swan Hills get its name you might ask? Well, indigenous people believe that giant swans nested on the estuary of the Assiniboine River. Thinking that during summer thunderstorms (and there are some beauties), the thundering wing beats of the great birds would fill the air as they fled for shelter. Is this making reference to the trumpeter swan, the largest of all waterfowl?
"The Rocky Mountain population of this magnificent bird was reduced because of loss of habitat, and over-hunting during the earlier part of this century. Less than 2000 individuals survive east of the Rocky Mountains" (Friends of Elk Island Society).
Between the years 1897-98, began the mad Klondike gold rush for Yukon gold. To make it, there was an overland route that basically started in Edmonton. A part of the trail (between Fort Assiniboine and Grouard) blasted through the Swan Hills. Called the Chalmers Trail (or Klondike Trail), some of it is still visible today. My God, the thought of hacking through this soggy, overgrown wilderness is nightmarish. (For those seeking a little adventure, and a look at the old trail, take a trip to the Sandhills Wilderness Park near the town of Fort Assiniboine.)
Some nervy, gold seeking, adventurers gave the journey a shot. Of them, only one hundred and sixty souls reached the Yukon. Five hundred and eighty people either turned back or remained in the Swan Hills area. Thirty-five died trying. Amazingly, only one person perished on the Chalmers portion of the trail: a girl who is mentioned in my dedication.
Somehow, most of the adventurers made it through the Swan Hills safely. It was another story for their ill-fated horses: they dropped like flies - the place was littered with them. Stories abound of torturous deadfall and crippling mud. It was simply too much for the great four-legged beasts. There is even a place called "Dead Horse Meadows".
There is a York Boat full of interesting history: the fur trade, steamboats (these are great), trading posts, the mink trade (which took a tremendous toll on the fish populations), intriguing native folklore, rough and ready explorers, frontier legends, excellent Indian Treaty stuff and much more. Is this not the stuff of great tourism? And it is a resource that will never run out you know...
Go to Part 2 - The Exploitation of the Swan Hills
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