Dena K’eh Kusan (DKK), the Kaska proposed Indigenous Protected and Conserved Area (IPCA) in Northern British Columbia, holds 9.6 million acres (3.9 million hectares) of remote landscape located in the Boreal Cordillera ecozone, rich in lush wetlands and diverse wildlife like caribou, moose, elk, mountain goat, and waterfowl.

Kaska DYND Guardians were joined by Remote Sensing Specialists from Ducks Unlimited Canada’s (DUC) National Boreal Program to do the important work of mapping wetlands within the DKK.

Objective

The objective of this project was to develop a baseline wetland inventory of the DKK region, in support of Dena Keyah Institute’s endeavor to protect the biodiversity of the area and contribute to its cultural continuity. The information would support identification of crucial areas for wildlife, perform habitat assessments, plot movement patterns for large ungulates, and generate risk assessments for proposed projects.

Investment in a wetland inventory for this region will help close that knowledge gap and enable the development of habitat models for key management species (e.g. caribou) and species at risk in the area (e.g., little brown bat, common night hawk, and olive-sided flycatcher). In addition, boreal wetlands store and sequester significant amounts of carbon. The wetland inventory will help decisions makers protect these valuable, natural climate change mitigation tools and provide a baseline for monitoring the effects of climate change on wetland assets over time.

Partners

Dene Keyah Institute and Dane Nan Yeh Dah Kaska Land Guardian Program partnered with Ducks Unlimited Canada’s (DUC) National Boreal Program to support DKI’s IPCA management plan, providing wetland maps and other spatial products like carbon storage to complement our planning and decision-making processes.

Funding for this work was provided by North America Wetland Conservation Act (NAWCA), Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC), and support through Dena Keyah Institute funding source.

North American Wetlands Conservation Act

Activities

Wetlands 101 Training

Ducks Unlimited worked directly with DKI and DNYD Land Guardians to understand needs and concerns, as well as engaging directly with the DNYD Guardians to provide training opportunities to assist with knowledge generation and sharing through field work.

Team members identified vegetation species and their coverage (i.e., as a percentage) and heights, used to determine wetland (or upland) land cover types. This assessment involved assessing peat conditions, general wetness, etc. Collecting this data will allow project team members to calibrate their landcover calls prior to conducting aerial helicopter surveying.

Wetlands Mapping, Classification and Ground Truthing

In late June 2022, the field season began with boots on the ground, surveying road-side wetlands with the Kaska Land Guardians, exchanging western and Indigenous knowledge about wetlands, water, and wildlife (Indigenous Leadership Initiative, 2022).

Then the team took to the air, spending approximately 40 hours in a helicopter visiting over 400 sites. DUC’s field crew consisted of a navigator, who guides the pilot to the site, wetland ecologist, who describes vegetation species to determine a wetland type, and a recorder, who records all the information. the data collected on these flights was combined with optical, radar, and topographic satellite data. The result is a reliable and easy-to-read collection of maps of the region.

The data collected on these flights was combined with optical, radar, and topographic satellite data resulting in a reliable and easy-to-read collection of maps of the region.