Protecting Birds on the Move in Canada

Nestled within the coronary heart of “North America’s chicken nursery” are huge landscapes, wetlands, and coastal habitats which might be residence to billions of migratory birds throughout the breeding season. Many are touring there from places throughout the Western Hemisphere and should even be passing by your home windows, yards, and parks proper now on their approach north. After they arrive, they are going to be greeted by the protection and bountiful provide of meals made accessible to them annually within the Boreal Forest of Canada.

The Seal River Watershed in northern Manitoba is one among these biodiversity-rich locations inside the Boreal. One other is the western shore of Hudson and James Bays in Ontario. Each areas at present have large-scale Indigenous-led conservation initiatives underway.

The Seal River Watershed is taken into account essential to sustaining and rising wholesome chicken populations all through the hemisphere. The Indigenous Individuals who have lived on, harvested on, and stewarded these lands for millennia are within the strategy of defending it. The Sayisi Dene First Nation together with their neighbors the Northlands Denesuline First Nation, Barren Lands First Nation, and O-Pipon-Na-Piwin Cree Nation—who collectively fashioned the Seal River Watershed Alliance—are in closing negotiations with the federal authorities of Canada and the Manitoba provincial authorities to determine an Indigenous Protected and Conserved Space (IPCA) within the watershed. This huge 12-million-acre IPCA will encompass a community of protected areas. Collectively they may maintain lands and waters, honor Dene and Cree traditions, and welcome guests into the longer term. Go to  www.sealriverwatershed.ca to study how one can help the Seal River Watershed Alliance of their effort to preserve the watershed.

The area alongside the western shores of Hudson and James Bays—or Washaybeyoh and Weeneebeg within the Omushkego Cree language— hosts an array of marine and avian wildlife. Greater than 170 species of birds, together with hundreds of thousands of shorebirds and waterfowl, depend on the area for protected breeding and migration stopover habitat. Every year, migratory birds flying south from their Arctic breeding grounds are funneled by means of right here the place they spend a number of weeks fueling up for his or her lengthy journeys southward. These vitally necessary waters, shores and coastal lands have been residence to the Omushkego folks for millennia, and so they wish to hold these lands and waters wholesome and shielded from hurt. First Nations alongside the coast which might be part of the Mushkegowuk Council, in addition to the Weenusk First Nation and the Fort Severn First Nation, are embarking on negotiations with the Authorities of Canada over a proposed Nationwide Marine Conservation Space (NMCA) that might hold 22-million acres of ocean protected from backside trawling, dumping, oil and gasoline drilling, and different industrial growth. Help this Cree-led effort to guard this shoreline by taking motion right here https://marine.wildlandsleague.org/take-action/

The impacts of the Seal River Watershed Alliance and Mushkegowuk Council’s essential work don’t cease on the Canadian border. Billions of migratory birds that nest and relaxation in these areas are higher outfitted for his or her journeys throughout the hemisphere.

This is only one a part of a a lot bigger story. In Audubon’s Birds on the Transfer, a four-part documentary collection, we observe these migrations from the Boreal Forest to Colombia—tracing the paths of the birds, and the folks and locations working to make sure they make it safely alongside the best way.

Watch the primary episode here and subscribe to our YouTube channel to observe the journey.