Alberta’s disappearing sage grouse continue to make the headlines. Billboard campaigns are revving up, and more people are paying attention. A lot of people are at the wringing of hands stage, saying but what can we do?
Based on past experience, it’s obvious we can’t rely on either the federal or provincial government to save our wildlife and wild places. It’s time for a new tactic, and it seems to me the best idea is to go for the wallets.
A great editorial in The Edmonton Journal this week has pointed out a few key facts.
Alberta cannot afford to offer environmentalists and celebrities another opportunity to give our province a black eye in front of the entire world.
But black eyes are exactly what we’ll get if we continue to spend millions of dollars killing wolves to save caribou and transplanting grouse from Montana that don’t stand a chance of reproducing in a region where indigenous birds are too stressed out to mate.
Pictures of oil-soaked ducks pulled from oilsands tailings ponds were one thing, but imagine if Greenpeace caught biologists on camera chasing down and killing a pack of wolves or sage grouse dancing nervously in front of a gas well.
With our world renowned national parks bringing in thousands of tourists and their money each year, do we really want to turn them away from Alberta? Faced with growing opposition to the Keystone Oil Pipeline, politicians and the energy industry should be pulling out all the stops if they want the revenue from that pipeline.
The energy industry in Alberta is currently waging a public relations war to improve their image. It’s time for them to step up and provide something besides rhetoric. Something concrete and sustainable, like saving grassland habitat and actively working for wildlife protection.