Sharon Hill, Windsor Star
April 7, 2008
The public consultation process on a proposed Middle Island cormorant cull is a "joke," Cormorant Defenders International spokeswoman Liz White said Friday.
White sent a letter Friday to Environment Minister John Baird complaining that three documents about the cull, including a draft environmental assessment report, are not available online where the request for public comment is posted. People who want the documents have to contact Point Pelee National Park.
"At the very time when the timing is the most crucial in terms of public comment is the time when they make it the hardest to get the documents. Why on earth would you have to ask for it?" White said Friday.
Although Parks Canada counters it was being proactive by automatically sending the documents to people who had e-mailed comments or been involved in meetings, White said the documents should be posted online. She is asking two weeks be added to the 21-day comment period in case people need documents mailed. The deadline for comments is April 23.
"I think it makes it a joke. It means that they're taking a very, very short period of time. What that tells me is they don't want to consult longer because that cuts into their possibility of time for culling."
Parks Canada said it didn't post the documents online because that isn't the way the Canadian Environmental Assessment registry works, said Stephen Woodley, Parks Canada's chief scientist and spokesman.
He said the documents would have been e-mailed to more than 2,000 people automatically.
Parks Canada is proposing to reduce the double-crested cormorant population on Middle Island by more than 6,000 breeding adults in five years. Because of the "rain of guano" that's killing vegetation, including species at risk, it wants to reduce the number of cormorant nests from 4,026 to between 438 and 876 nests by 2012. Woodley said the island's ecosystem is dying.
The timing is important for both sides. The best time to shoot adult cormorants is early in their nesting season in April.
The plan is to shoot only adult breeding birds that don't have chicks or are sitting on nests with half-developed eggs that are less than two weeks old. "We're bending over backwards to meet the highest humane standards," Woodley said.
A cull could be held later if trees are marked early in the nesting season so those birds won't be shot. That system only works if, once most of the cormorants have built nests, the cull is done within two weeks.
There are cormorants on the island but no nests yet, he said. The tree marking could be done in the next few weeks. Whether a cull will be held this year depends on a Parks Canada decision after the comment period and an April 23 court date in Toronto. Two groups against the cull will be asking for an extension to a federal judge's order not to hold a cull until a further order of a judge.
The animal protection groups -- which are members of Cormorant Defenders International -- are also asking for a judicial review, arguing Point Pelee National Park should complete a management plan as is required every five years. The last management plan was in 1995 before Middle Island was acquired by the park.
Information is available on the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency's website at http://www.ceaa-acee.gc.ca/050/index_e.cfm