ºìÐÓÊÓƵ

A majestic grizzly mother and her two cubs splash after some spawning salmon in a riverine pool located in Nuxalk territory, home to abundant wildlife. Nearby, ecotourists are eager to catch a glimpse of the bear family.

Interactions like these between people and animals are the focus of work by UVic professor Chris Darimont and his graduate students. Darimont, Raincoast Research Chair in Applied Conservation Science, has spent his career researching questions brought to his UVic (ACS) by communities and other partners on topics related to animal conservation.

One of their recent studies, led by recent PhD graduate Kate Field, found grizzly bears that visited ecotourism areas along the Atnarko River on the province’s central coast were less likely than others to encounter conflict with people in communities downstream. Findings in this particular study suggested that, if done responsibly, ecotourism did not predispose the animals to have conflicts with humans.

“Our lab has studied wolves, deer, mountain lions, black bears, grizzly bears, mountain goats, salmon, humpback and killer whales, and more, all within the context of the coupling between nature and society,” says Darimont (BSc ’00, PhD ’07). “We cannot understand the life of the grizzly bear, for example, without understanding its connection to people.”

Partnerships in action

Working with Indigenous communities has always been important to Darimont and his team. During his own graduate work, he learned how to engage respectfully with local communities, long before academia started shifting toward more inclusive research. The value in considering not only wildlife but also the relationships people have with animals led Darimont to learn from people with deep, long-term knowledge.

The recent grizzly bear study conducted by Field, who earned a PhD in geography from UVic in 2025, a Bachelor of Science in 2016 and an Master of Science in geography in 2019, was an example of these partnerships. “The Nuxalk and BC Parks had jointly managed grizzly-bear ecotourism in Tweedsmuir Provincial Park,” says Darimont. “And they were interested in working with researchers to assess the conditions for bears in the park. Do ecotourists impact bears?” Another key question was whether the bears involved in ecotourism viewings affect people living in nearby communities.

Field worked closely with Nuxalk scientists to examine how ecotourist numbers and salmon conditions might affect grizzly-bear behaviour. Remote cameras and genetic tagging revealed some answers.

It turned out that how ecotourists influence bears depended on how much salmon were around. When there was plenty of salmon, fewer bears tended to show up when ecotour sites were busy with people. Presumably, many bears want to avoid the crowds of ecotourists, preferring to catch salmon in peace elsewhere. But when salmon numbers were low, cameras showed that bear numbers will increase at ecotour sites, where the fishing is good. And those bears most likely to tolerate the ecotourists are mothers with cubs.

This information—and much more gathered by Field’s team—is currently being used by the Nuxalk and parks team to update management procedures in Tweedsmuir. “Working with managers to apply science to their community-specific conservation objectives hugely motivates our work,” says Field.

Research findings

Field worked with crew members from Nuxalk Fisheries and Wildlife to track grizzly bears by collecting their fur and images, as well as data related to their behaviour at ecotourism sites. Nuxalk knowledge also played a huge role. “The people informed this study as much as the bear data,” says Field. “Our colleagues’ in-depth knowledge about the river and how bears use it directly informed our decisions in the field, like site selection, for example.” This collaboration allowed the partnership to answer local questions about whether and how ecotourism affects grizzlies.

Field and team also assessed whether the bears at the ecotourism sites were the same bears that later got into conflict in downstream communities. Genetic screens between ecotour bears and those captured or euthanized in conflict showed only one match in 30. Mathematical modelling revealed that such a low match suggested that ecotour bears were in fact less likely to be involved in conflict.

The team had hypothesized that bears exposed to ecotourism were more used to people and therefore more likely to encounter conflict with humans. “That’s not what we found, which suggests other explanations for conflict. Locally-driven conflict-reduction programs, like the Nuxalk Bear Safe initiative, use education and mitigative action to address conflict-drivers in the community,” adds Field.

The finding made sense to the research team, including the Nuxalk. “Well-fed bears, like the ones at ecotour sites, generally don’t need to take chances,” says Field.

Collaborative approach

Darimont has built his research career around this kind of collaboration with people and scientists in local rainforest communities. “I was fortunate to be welcomed and guided by many in Bella Bella who told me what they expected of me as a researcher and as a community member,” says Darimont. “Little by little, it is how I came to understand how research should be done. My students and I are still learning today.”

That original relationship has grown over 25 years. Since the lab’s inception in 2012, several generations of UVic graduate students have been embedded in the Heiltsuk community, explains Darimont. “We also learn from neighbouring nations, including the Kitasoo Xai-xais, Wuikinuxv and Nuxalk with which we also partner."

The ACS Lab crew loves what they do. “Our job is to inform decision-makers of the likely outcomes of various policy decisions, whether those be more restrictions or development. Our job is not to lobby; it is to give leaders a fair sense of the outcomes of various scenarios from the perspective of science,” says Darimont. These information streams join others derived from Indigenous knowledge, economics and other dimensions on which decisions are ultimately made.

The statement loops back to the overarching philosophy of the Applied Conservation Science Lab. The research draws on ecology, geography, social sciences and more. Most importantly, the work is designed to deliver evidence so it can be applied.

“The managers from Indigenous governments are increasingly at the centre of wildlife policy in BC,” says Darimont. “When the Nuxalk and BC Parks came to us with questions , we aimed to deliver evidence that could contribute to their policy.”

—Anne MacLaurin, BA ’91, Cert ’00

This article appears in the UVic Torch alumni magazine.

For more Torch stories, go to the UVic Torch alumni magazine page.