As the threat of large-scale mining continues to bear down on the headwaters of the Flathead River Basin – and as funding for conservation research hits a snag – Ric Hauer believes the North Fork Flathead River’s recent designation as one of the most endangered rivers in North America arrives with appropriate timing.
American Rivers, a nonprofit conservation group, has pegged the North Fork as the fifth-most threatened river in its 2009 edition of “America’s Most Endangered Rivers.” British Columbia’s Outdoor Recreation Council published a similar list and put the North Fork Flathead River at No. 1.
Proposals for coal mining and coalbed methane extraction at the Canadian headwaters of the North Fork have conservationists in both Canada and the United States concerned. Growing discussions about gold and phosphorous exploration don’t sit well either. While there are strict regulations on resource exploration in the U.S., Canada’s land-use laws are lax.
“Countries may recognize borders, but rivers don’t, and pollution doesn’t stop at the border,” said Will Hammerquist of the National Park Conservation Association. “Strip mining and coalbed methane development in Canada will harm Glacier National Park, the Flathead River and Flathead Lake.”
Canada’s Cline Mining Corp. is currently engaged in a pre-application process to remove a mountaintop and open a mine in the Foisey Creek drainage, a headwater tributary. Meanwhile, British Petroleum is pursuing coalbed methane development in the Canadian Flathead region. There are also proposals for gold and phosphate exploration just north of the Montana border.
The North Fork flows southward from British Columbia across the border, forming the western boundary of Glacier National Park and feeding the Flathead River Basin. Scientists and conservationists are worried that mining would devastate habitat for the basin’s native fish species: bull trout and westslope cutthroat trout. The basin is also home to a host of other wildlife.
Hauer, a researcher with the University of Montana’s Flathead Lake Biological Station, said the arrival of mining presents the most dire threat to the basin’s ecosystem in centuries.
“This is the worst thing in 200 years,” Hauer said. “I can’t imagine anything worse.”
With provincial elections approaching in Canada, Hauer hopes the American Rivers designation brings greater awareness to the threat mining poses. He says stricter land-use laws need to be enacted because even if current mining proposals get tabled, existing regulations north of the border leave the door open for future development.
“This isn’t going away,” Hauer said. “It’s never going to go away in British Columbia until we negotiate an end to it.”
He added: “This is just going to keep cycling and recycling and then it’s going to be our children and grandchildren dealing with this.”
Hauer has been active in research efforts to study the potential effects mining will have. While studying British Columbia’s Elk River Valley, an area near the Flathead that already has mining, Hauer said he has noted “very, very high” levels of nitrate pollutants. He has also documented substantial imbalances in the biodiversity, with sensitive organisms decreasing and tolerant organisms increasing. He calls this a “classic response” to mining.
The Cline Mining Corp. funded an environmental study and found no fish in the Foisey Creek drainage, which feeds into the North Fork. Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks subsequently conducted its own research and found the drainage to be a bustling fishery, well suited as a spawning ground for native westslopes and bull trout.
But Hauer and fellow researchers have run into money troubles, forcing them to “barebone through the summer.” The Congressional appropriations committee opted to not provide funds to the Biological Station this year. Those funds, Hauer said, “really got us going last summer.” Hauer expected to receive funding every year for five years, but said the committee decided the issue isn’t “enough of a federal problem.”
Because an international border is involved, and much of the affected land is federal, Hauer doesn’t buy this argument.
“That’s nonsense,” Hauer said. “This couldn’t be more of a federal problem. It’s more of a federal problem than a state problem.”