Derrick Denholm and Ben Reynolds were timber-cruising in the Wisteria area for Free Growing Forestry of 亚洲天堂 Lake, when they came across a turkey vulture earlier this month. It was feeding on a decaying moose-calf carcass.
The turkey vulture, or the cathartes aura, as the more ornithologically inclined might prefer to call it, is a rare bird in Northern B.C.
According to the vulture society, the bird鈥檚 summer range includes the southern parts of B.C. and Alberta, and extends to Tierra del Fuego, the southernmost tip of South America.
Despite it鈥檚 less than glamorous appearance, the turkey vulture is one of the greatest soaring birds, capable of gliding along thermal lifts over incredible distances. A turkey vulture born in Southern B.C., for example, might spend its winter in Venezuela (proving they are a wise bird as well).
Denholm, who said this sighting of the bird was the first time he had ever seen one in the Lakes District in his 25 years of forestry work, suggested a link between this bird鈥檚 northward migration and a general trend towards a warming climate in general.
鈥淓verything is turned upside down,鈥� he said. 鈥淔or those who don鈥檛 believe that climate change is happening, turkey vultures in Ootsa country is a strange one, that鈥檚 for sure.鈥�
Local conservation officers report that the bird is occasionally sighted this far north of its usual habitat, but it is a rare occurrence.
While one turkey vulture sighting in Ootsa does not make a statistical trend, the University of British Columbia鈥檚 Centre for Forest Conservation Genetics (CFCG) has been tracking shifts in the B.C. ecosystem since 2000, and has noted some alarming scenarios.
鈥淏ased on our model predictions,鈥� said Dr. Tongli Wang, associate director of the CFCG, about 20 per cent of the BC land has already shifted to climates characteristic of different ecosystem zones since鈥� 1961-1990.鈥�
The Lakes District is in the sub-boreal spruce (SBS) zone, predominately covered with lodgepole pine and spruce. This zone is singled out as being exceptionally sensitive to climate change.
Wang鈥檚 2012 research with the CFCG places the Lakes District ecosystem near the heart of projected changes to B.C. forest systems within this century. The 鈥榲irtual disappearance鈥� of our SBS ecosystem is 鈥榯he first large projected change to occur in B.C. under optimistic climate change scenarios鈥�, reads the 2012 study titled, Projecting future distributions of ecosystem climate niches: uncertainties and management applications.
Shifting ecosystems means a lot for the future viability of trees being planted now. According to the research, the Lakes District could see a shift from a climate favourable to current pine and spruce species to one that favours species of dryer and warmer interior Douglas-fir ecosystems.
The turkey vulture as harbinger of things to come may seem like a stretch to some, but the idea isn鈥檛 without merit.
鈥淚t might be expected to see the changes in bird territories as birds respond faster than trees,鈥� said Wang.
