eDNA is a method of sampling wildlife by collecting trace DNA in the environment and sequencing it to acquire a list of species present. eDNA is most often collected through water samples, but can also be collected from soil, snow, or other sediments. Compared to traditional methods of wildlife sampling, eDNA is more cost-effective, may allow for species to be assessed more comprehensively, does not require harming species, and is a less destructive sampling method. This method has the potential application in to community-based monitoring get results into the hands of non-experts faster and could be used to support more informed decision making and adaptive management. Work is ongoing to refine and advance this technology but academics, industry managers, and consulting scientists all agree that eDNA is an important tool in the environmental assessment toolbox. 

Highlighted projects:

LE0069: COSIA eDNA Workshop

COSIA hosted a virtual eDNA workshop in 2020 with over 60 participants from across North America to share current research on the applications of genomics and eDNA tools for biodiversity monitoring and to identify the applications, limitations, and knowledge gaps.

LE0248: eDNA for Amphibian Monitoring

The Land EPA supported a study examining the potential for eDNA methods to survey for amphibians in Alberta.

The Early Successional Wildlife Research (ESWD) program (LJ0013) is a multi-taxa, long-term wildlife monitoring initiative (including but not limited to songbirds, small mammals, amphibians, bats, terrestrial invertebrates, and vegetation). The program is designed to assess whether upland reclamation practices are creating suitable habitats for wildlife. This program collects a variety of data on how wildlife communities re-establish on reclaimed lands and how they change as the landscape matures.

While reclaimed habitats support a greater number of species, these reclaimed habitats (<35 years post-reclamation) support a very different wildlife community than mature forests. This project found that wildlife communities are becoming more similar as forest stands age. In particular, songbird communities varied significantly between forest stand treatments but with time trended towards compositions found in mature forests. Although it is too soon to know if reclaimed habitats can sustain wildlife populations equal to those of mature forests, early results are promising.

This project also identifies recommendations to develop more scientifically robust monitoring studies in the future. For example. a suite of vertebrate species has been identified that could potentially serve as indicators of mature forest habitat conditions.

Read more via publications on the ESWD:

• Making sense of wildlife habitat use on active oil sands mines: Quasi-experiments, occupancy models, trends assessments and upland habitat reclamation
• Wildlife usage indicates increased similarity between reclaimed upland habitat and mature boreal forest in the Athabasca Oil Sands Region of Alberta, Canada

The Mapping Avian Productivity and Survivorship (MAPS) program extended into the Oil Sands Region in 2011 (Boreal MAPS). Since bird data in the region is limited and habitat is disturbed by industrial development, this program will be key to informing impact assessment processes, reclamation monitoring, and project-effects monitoring. The measurement of birds in the environment provides a strong indication of habitat quality and complexity, due to the different needs of individual species. The program set up 66 banding stations over the course of the program (2011-2014) and banded 5000 birds in the first two years of the program.

The primary objective was to establish a network of MAPS bird-banding stations in the oil sands region to advance understanding of avian productivity, survivorship, and habitat use in reclaimed, disturbed, and natural areas. Banding stations encompassed natural, disturbance-affected, and reclaimed habitats. The study also incorporated vegetation surveys, habitat classification, and daily point-counts to evaluate relationships between habitat variables and bird population dynamics. The data collected provide a foundation for calculating vital rates and evaluating the effects of industrial activity and reclamation practices on breeding bird populations in the Boreal Forest.

Across all species combined, adult bird populations in the study area declined by more than 30% between 2011 and 2019, suggesting that stresses on the breeding grounds may be contributing to regional landbird declines.

Reclaimed habitats supported the highest bird densities but lowest productivity likely reflecting that habitat connectivity affects the fledging success and dispersal of young birds and acts as a sink habitat. In contrast, disturbance-affected sites had the opposite pattern. Early hypotheses indicate that vertical habitat complexity, more than the variety of habitat types, strongly influences bird population size and diversity, and that planting diverse, multi-layered vegetation in reclaimed areas may boost colonization and breeding success.

This 2024 report on MAPS provides further details on the project.

Wildlife habitat disturbance extends beyond the immediate physical footprint of development projects, which can increase the perceived disturbance area for wildlife — potentially contributing to population declines. Of particular concern is the disruption of key wildlife corridors. The Wildlife Habitat Effectiveness and Connectivity Research Program (WHEC) aimed to determine whether creating development buffers (referred to as setbacks) around the Athabasca River and its main tributaries would improve wildlife movement in this area.

This project found no indication that the arrangement of mines has led to the isolation of wildlife populations. A result likely due to the presence of continuous accessible habitat to the east and west of the mines, allowing populations to remain connected. This project recommends that setback distances from the Athabasca River are unnecessary to conserve large mammals.

The WHEC Final Report can be accessed here.

The Boreal Ecosystem Recovery and Assessment (BERA) project is a research partnership of academic institutions (University of Calgary, University of Alberta, Trent University, University of Waterloo), non-for-profit partners (ABMI), and private-sector companies (Alberta-Pacific Forest Industries Inc., Canadian Natural Resources Limited, Cenovus Energy, Imperial, and ConocoPhillips Canada Resources Corp.). Its central goal is to understand the effects of industrial disturbance on natural ecosystem dynamics in the boreal forest and to develop strategies for restoring disturbed landscapes. BERA’s wildlife-focused projects seek to understand how wildlife behaves on or near linear features and how such features impact populations of forest specialists.

To date, the BERA project has produced over 40 peer-reviewed papers investigating the impacts of resource extraction on boreal forests and best practices for monitoring and restoration. Approximately a quarter of these papers study wildlife, with a particular focus on birds. These findings are used by land managers to inform decision-making. The program uses advancements in remote sensing and drone imagery to predict seismic line recovery and investigates mounding techniques that enhance forest recovery. Monitoring of extraction sites included alterations to animal behaviour post-disturbance, effects of wildfire, and impacts on soil properties.

To learn more:

BERA Official Website

Peer-Reviewed Articles and Infographics

Open-source Forest Line Mapper Tool and Infographic

Acquiring a broad picture of biodiversity intactness and human footprint growth is essential to plan future outcomes of resource management. To do this, the Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute (ABMI) developed a report that assessed the status of 425 species and found Biodiversity Intactness Indices for multiple taxonomic groups. Additionally, they assessed the OSR’s human footprint. Overall, d. Despite a 20% increase in footprint between 1999 and 2012, the average Biodiversity Intactness Index across 425 species was 88%. This indicates that much of the habitat across the region is in good condition although human development activities are impacting habitat suitability in some areas.

 Human footprint increased from 12% to 17% between 2000 and 2021, with agriculture (8%), forestry (4%), and energy (3%) being the main types of human disturbance in 2021. As a result of more recent extreme fire years, wildfire (8%) had a larger impact than human activities (3%) from 2010 to 2021.

Ongoing research focuses on vegetation regeneration on seismic lines and their impacts on species like Woodland Caribou

The ABMI continues its field and geospatial monitoring programs, with updated data available through the Online Reporting for Biodiversity (ORB) tool. 

Read the final report here.

Species including birds, bats, and amphibians can be reliably monitored and tracked through their sounds. Through the Bioacoustic Unit Project, autonomous recording units (ARUs) were deployed across oil sands leases to collect and analyze recordings of animal vocalizations to detect rare or hard-to-detect species. Understanding species populations, movements, and changes to the soundscape is essential to detecting ecosystem changes. 

This project established the Bioacoustic Unit as a leading authority on wildlife acoustic monitoring with standardized methods, technical expertise, capacity for data processing, and applied research to support environmental management and biodiversity monitoring. It also:

• Developed standardized bioacoustics monitoring protocols.
• Created public-facing and analysis-focused web platforms.
• Built automated recognizers for 11 rare species and have been working on additional methods of species detection. 
• Established statistical methods to create density estimates and distance estimates. 

Their findings have contributed to improvements in Sensitive Species Guidelines, wetland monitoring, cumulative effects modelling, and standardized monitoring approaches for rare species. 

You can learn more about the current state of the Bioacoustic Unit (SENSR) here. 

Associated papers and reports:

Habitat selection at different scales for a declining aerial insectivorous bird as determined by autonomous recording technology 

Rusty Blackbird (Euphagus carolinus) population and distribution data in the Athabasca and Cold Lake Oil Sands region of Alberta using Automated Recording Units (ARUs) Classification threshold and training data affect the quality and utility of focal species data processed with automated audio-recognition software

There are a series of projects focusing on caribou reclamation across the oil sands including the Algar Caribou Study, Landscape Ecological Assessment & Planning (LEAP) project, Regional Industry Caribou Collaboration (RICC), ABMI Caribou Reclamation Research, and the Linear Deactivation Project (LiDea). 

The Algar Caribou study investigated winter habitat use, diet, and reclamation innovations in the Algar range. In the Algar (and nearby Egg-Pony Range), researchers found that lichen, a key winter food source, was relatively rare in the landscape, with the greatest abundance occurring in ecosystems burned 50 to 80 years ago. Over half of caribou winter diets consisted of terrestrial and arboreal lichens, and higher lichen consumption was linked to improved nutritional condition. Caribou selected lichen-rich sites that were farther from winter roads, and physiological indicators suggested that accessing lichen near roads was stressful. The study recommended conserving lichen-rich habitats, conducting further research, and testing methods to restore these critical areas. In parallel, reclamation innovations in the Algar region advanced caribou habitat restoration, including integrating Landscape Ecological Assessment & Planning (LEAP), navigating government approval processes, and employing matting in wet areas, using various mounding techniques (Leap Frog, Bar mounds, flow pot).

To learn more:

• Presentation on Caribou Habitat Restoration
• Caribou Conservation: Restoring Trees on Seismic Lines in Alberta, Canada 

Despite many organizations carrying out restoration activities in caribou habitat, the Regional Industry Caribou Collaboration (RICC), along with COSIA and Alberta Innovates, identified a lack of current state-of-knowledge reports and collaborated to synthesize these learnings and identify opportunities to reduce costs and improve effectiveness of caribou habitat restoration.

Opportunities to reduce costs include:

1) Re-establish vegetation to sufficient densities on linear features to reduce wolf movement

2) Prioritize restoration efforts where the key targets are going to be achieved

3) Restricting restoration activities to winter is a major constraint and uncertainty

4) Create more time and space for planning 

5) Train operators

6) Be aware that investing in new equipment is expensive and high-risk

7) Explore innovations for creating microsites

8) Use drones and UAVs in operations

The current state of knowledge recommends:

Planning: Restoration planning should prioritize re-establishing dense vegetation to limit predator movement, integrate multiple disturbance types for caribou recovery, leverage new technologies for flexible operations, and incorporate advanced regeneration to improve efficiency.

Implementation: Success depends on skilled operators, flexible yet well-informed planning, sufficient treatment intensity (e.g., dense planting and use of barriers), and continued testing of innovative tools and techniques, including effective winter and upland restoration methods.

Monitoring: Monitoring should capitalize on advances in remote sensing and UAV technologies to track vegetation recovery efficiently, reduce ground surveys, and continue improving species-level detection for more precise assessment of restoration outcomes.

Many large-scale projects have informed our understanding of caribou and the restoration of their habitat. 

To better utilise reclamation resources, the Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute (ABMI) developed a zonation method to prioritize townships for restoration of linear features across five caribou ranges (Red Earth, Richardson, West Side Athabasca River, East Side Athabasca River, and Cold Lake). Each township’s priority level was modelled on the potential increase of undisturbed caribou habitat that could be achieved through linear feature restoration, accounting for restoration cost and potential for future resource development.

To learn more: 

Access the report

Prioritizing Zones for Caribou Habitat Restoration in the Canada’s Oil Sands Innovation Alliance (COSIA) Area Version 4.0

View the infographic

The Linear Deactivation Project (LiDea), led by Cenovus, is designed to accelerate the recovery of linear disturbances by restoring them to the structure and function of the surrounding forest. Using silvicultural treatments including site preparation, mounding and ripping, planting, and stand modification, they aimed to increase conifer growth, reduce line visibility and accessibility for caribou predators, and restore species distributions. They found that mounding and ripping enhanced site regeneration, producing higher stem densities than both untreated lines and undisturbed forest stands, although effectiveness varied across sites.

One technological development described in this project was the use of amphibious equipment, which extended the time window for restoration, but has a slow transit speed and required the transport of operators and fuel.

To learn more:

Presentation on Caribou Habitat Restoration Caribou Conservation: Restoring Trees on Seismic Lines in Alberta, Canada

A full summary and roadmap of Linear Feature Restoration in Caribou Habitat is available here.