Mountain Caribou and Old-Growth Forests

• Main Authors: Clayton Apps, Trevor Kinley, Joe Scott, Candace Batycki, John
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Key Words; conservation planning; habitat models; landscape occupancy; mountain caribou; woodland caribou; Rangifer tarandus caribou; British Columbia; Rangifer tarandus
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.613.801; http://www.llbc.leg.bc.ca/public/pubdocs/bcdocs/400484/apps_edited_final_feb_8.pdf

Mountain caribou are woodland caribou that are native to the mountainous region of cedar-hemlock and spruce-subalpine fir forests in southeastern and east central British Columbia and adjacent parts of Montana, Idaho, and Washington. This globally unique area is often called the Interior Wet Belt or the Inland Rainforest. Mountain caribou are distinguished from other types of caribou by their dependence for late-winter food on hair lichens (‘old-man’s beard’) that grow on old trees at high elevations. Mountain caribou require this food because the 3-m snowpacks that are typical of this region rapidly bury ground-based foods. During spring and early winter, caribou often descend from spruce-subalpine fir forests to cedar-hemlock stands on valley bottoms. Regardless of season, mountain caribou are virtually always in landscapes dominated by old-growth forest.