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Conclusions concerning the impact of climate change on XGCA wildlife and wild horses are
based on the best information available, including a partial search of the scientific literature,
extensive grizzly bear, wildlife and wild horse habitat surveys in the XGCA, discussions with
elders,
local ranchers and others as well as field observations dating back to the first
intensive wildlife surveys in 2001.
Due to the short time frame of this project and the large number of plant and animal species
in the XGCA ecosystem, the approach in this section was to select a small number of tree and
habitat types that are known to be important to a range of species and use these as well as a
small number of animal species as “climate change indicators”. For plants and habitats, a
fair amount of literature was available to draw upon. For wildlife species, resiliency
assessments were based on the types of overall North American distribution and range of
habitats
that some of the animals occupy today, and whether the wildlife are specialists or
generalists
in terms of habitat ranges.
Forest and Vegetation Impacts
Conclusions regarding the impacts of climate change on the XGCA forests and vegetation are
based on the specific climate projections for each of the key Biogeoclimatic Ecological
Classification (BEC) zones of the XGCA (discussed in section 4.2). The BEC system uses
vegetation, soils, and topography to infer the regional climate of a geographic area. Areas of
relatively uniform climate are called biogeoclimatic units, where climate refers to the
regional climate that influences ecosystems over an extended period of time. The BEC unit
can be expressed as statistics derived from normals of precipitation and temperature6 The
ClimateBC model was used to forecast potential changes to climatic variables in the medium
term (2020 and 2050). The climate projections based on the worst case emissions (A1F1)
scenario were used to describe possible effects on the forests of the Xeni Gwet’in Territory.
The projected climate variable changes by 2020 and 2050 are presented along with climate
normals (1960‐1999) by BEC subzone. Although the model predicts changes to climate
envelopes as classified by the BEC system, the changes do not represent changes to the
forest
ecosystem itself. Potential changes to the forest are inferred with the help of expert
opinion
and literature reviews7.
Water Resource Impacts
Conclusions regarding the impacts of climate change on XGCA water resources have been
developed after extensive literature reviews, particularly recent hydrological research
conducting
by the Pacific Climate Impact Consortium. In addition to the literature reviews,
field
observations and water sampling data since 2006 are consulted to establish a baseline.
Fishery Resource Impacts
Conclusions regarding the impacts of climate change on XGCA fishery resources have been
developed through extensive literature research. Additionally, the author’s observations are
based on a number of fishery research projects undertaken in the XGCA on behalf of the
6 Downloaded from http://www.for.gov.bc.ca/HRE/becweb/system/how/index.html. See Appendix
2 for a more detailed description of the BEC system.
7 This simplistic approach was taken due to the budget constraints of this project. Models are now
being developed that will project effects of climate change on vegetation (Campbell et al. 2009).
6