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The definition of “hunting” is at the centre of a ruling from B.C.’s Environmental Appeal Board (EAB) that upheld a decision to punish a wildlife biologist for his actions toward an endangered caribou herd he is studying in northern B.C.
Doug Heard, a former provincial government wildlife biologist and an adjunct professor at the University of Northern B.C., has spent the past decade working to restore an endangered caribou herd at Kennedy Siding, a 223-hectare section of critical habitat for threatened woodland caribou located southeast of Mackenzie, B.C.
His methods to collect caribou hair for DNA samples were determined to be illegal.
On Nov. 7, 2024, Heard was caught by Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship staff on a live webcam using a device described as a “cable caster” to shoot small clamps, referred to as alligator clips, with the intent of collecting caribou hair for research at a feeding station.
The ministry said that although Heard had a permit to collect DNA samples from hair and fecal pellets, he was not allowed to remove hair from the animals directly.
Heard’s permit was removed and he appealed the decision. In a ruling released May 7, the EAB determined his actions indeed met the definition of illegal hunting under B.C. law.
Hair is part of animal as defined by Wildlife Act
The definition of hunting in the Wildlife Act includes pursuing animals with the intent of capturing, even just hair, “whether or not the wildlife is then or subsequently wounded, killed or captured,” the tribunal herd.
Retired biologist Doug Heard is helping a threatened caribou herd survive and recover through an experimental program that gets him up close and personal with the wild animals. Catherine Hansen reports.
The province argued allowing Heard’s actions to stand “would allow individuals to shoot at and stalk wildlife so long as their intention was to capture only a specific part from an animal rather than the entire animal.”
The Environmental Appeal Board agreed.
Citing a previous decision, the tribunal said the permit allowed Heard to collect samples from caribou “opportunistically” in the area where hunting is otherwise not allowed.
Heard argued the cable caster was less invasive than his previous efforts to gather hair samples, including using a dart gun and a toy crossbow, among other methods.
Those were determined to not be a valid use of his permit in previous decisions by the board in 2021 and 2022.
“Both the 2021 and 2022 decisions suggested ‘less invasive’ techniques to obtain samples than those proposed by [Heard] be used in order to reduce possible disturbance to caribou. However, [Heard] fails to acknowledge the fact that in both decisions the suggested method for hair collection was that it could be collected ‘opportunistically.'”
Heard was eligible to reapply for a wildlife permit as of May 2.
He declined to comment on the decision when reached by CBC News.
