Studying grassland birds in the Waterton Park Front
Zack Moore travelling to specific locations to count birds in June 2021 in the Waterton Foothills Parkland. (Photo by Zack Moore)
In 2020, I was fortunate to be selected as one of the first students to receive a Weston Family Conservation Science Fellowship through the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC). This program provides graduate students with the resources to address data gaps and questions related to NCC-specific land management projects, leadership opportunities and targeted training. For my master’s research at the University of Manitoba, I studied grasslands in the Waterton Park Front, in southern Alberta, on the traditional territories of the Blackfoot Confederacy Nations, the Stoney Nakoda Nations and the Tsuut’ina Nation.
Coming from Ontario, I had very little understanding of the Prairies or the Rocky Mountains. My undergraduate education taught me about conceptual ideas about conservation biology and evolution, but I had never experienced Prairie landscapes. After college, I moved to Pincher Creek, in southern Alberta, for an internship with NCC. As soon as I arrived, I couldn’t get enough of the constant moments of awe. Driving through the foothills and seeing the contrast between the sprawling flats, the rolling hills and the endless chain of mountains took my breath away every day.
The Foothills Parkland Natural Subregion of Alberta is highly conserved through non-profit land trusts such as NCC and Southern Alberta Land Trust (SALTS). The area is about 45 per cent grasslands, and half the area has never been cultivated, which is very unusual for these types of habitats. This region provides important buffering habitat surrounding Waterton Lakes National Park for wide-ranging mammals, such as elk, grizzly bears and wolves.
The longer I spent near Waterton, the more I learned how little I knew compared to the local communities.
I was fortunate to stay with a local family who introduced me to friends and neighbours. Everyone I met seemed intimately connected to the grasslands and mountains. They knew how purple crocuses gave way to pink shooting stars in early spring, and where the elk moved from calving in spring through to mating in fall. They knew how the rain in early spring would affect the fire season later in summer. Their knowledge and love of the land inspired me to get involved with the local community to learn as much as I could.
One of the most interesting things I learned was how grazing and fire help conserve large tracts of native grassland by creating a mosaic of different habitats that meet the needs of many different species. Having large herbivores on the land provides similar disturbances to the millions of buffalo that used to roam the Prairies, and the use of the land for cattle ranching often prevented its conversion to agriculture.
The extirpation of buffalo is one of the many great harms of Canada’s colonial past and present. While we cannot undo this past and the harms it still causes the Indigenous Peoples of this Treaty 7 area, the current use of cattle as a conservation tool echoes the fact that people have managed this landscape for millennia. Two really interesting ongoing projects are the buffalo reintroduction efforts in Banff National Park and on the Blood Reserve, which highlight not only the ecological significance of large herbivores, but also the cultural importance of buffalo specifically.
Field research equipment for recording bird sounds and vegetation data in the Waterton Foothills Parkland. (Photo by Zack Moore)
My internship had been about cows, plants, bug, and bears, but because I was eager to delve deeper into the wonders of the Prairies, I jumped at the chance to study grassland birds for my master’s research. In North America, birds that depend on grasslands have had steeper population declines over the last 50 years than most other groups of birds. They are critical aspects of the diversity and function of these ecosystems, and their population decline has been primarily attributed to habitat loss from agriculture. My research focused on which birds used the grasslands and which habitat variables (e.g., plant communities or the layout of the surrounding landscape) affected the diversity of bird communities.
I had loved watching the ducks in all the wetlands back home in Ontario, but what I didn’t realize about birding in the grasslands is that it’s 90 per cent done by ear. It was a steep learning curve learning alone during COVID-19. I can’t even begin to describe the frustration of tracking down birds calling anonymously from their grassy hideaways; and me doubting whether every second savannah sparrow I heard was maybe a similar-sounding LeConte’s sparrow buzzing in the open fields. I did pick it up, though, and with the help of my assistants (and the Merlin app), we documented over 130 species of birds on these lands, including many of conservation concern.
Savannah sparrow at Waterton Park Front, AB (Photo by Emily Pejc)
The results of my research revealed that the community of birds here at the edge of the Prairies is limited because of how complex the environment becomes in the foothills. But by looking at some simple categorizations of the grassland based on the cover of non-native species, you can get a good depiction of which are most likely to occur and how abundant they will be. I defended my thesis in August 2024, and am working with NCC on submitting it to peer-reviewed journals. My fellowship also helped me get my current job recognizing Key Biodiversity Areas that are disproportionately important for conservation, of which the Waterton area is (of course) one.
I’m thankful for NCC and this program because it gave me the opportunity to continue working in my adopted Prairie home. Not only did NCC and partners’ conservation work allow me to experience the incredible mix of wildness and human connection in the Waterton area, but the Weston Family Conservation Science Fellowship let me give something back to an area that gave a lot to me personally, professionally and spiritually. It’s now my hope that the results of these past years of my research will help inform NCC’s future management, securement and restoration work with the birds in mind.
About the Author
Zachary Moore is a Weston Family Conservation Science Alumni.
