BBC Wildlife - UK (2020-05)

May 2020 BBC Wildlife 61

year; the fence – complete with holes to

allow passage to other wildlife – is to protect

neighbouring farmland.

Captive they may be, but the park

needs these animals. Bison play a

key role in the natural processes of

Canada’s rough fescue grasslands,

an ailing habitat that has dwindled

to 5 per cent of its former range,

and so too is under restoration

here. By wallowing, these hefty

mammals open up the earth for

seedlings; by targeting grasses,

they allow wildflowers to thrive.

Clockwise from top

left: white-tailed

deer frequent the

road verges of Riding

Mountain National

Park; the prairie

ecosystem of the

Lake Audy area makes

it ideal for bison

reintroduction; the

park is home to some

3,000 moose, whose

enormous antlers

grow in spring and are

shed in winter; sunrise

at Whirlpool Lake.

Youngsters jostle, a mother

tends to her calf, a male rubs his

head roughly against a rock.

As a national park, Riding Mountain enjoys

something of a low profile compared to the

bucket-list honeypots of Banff and Jasper, further

west in the Rockies. Leaving the bison behind, I

pore over the map, taking in a plethora of delicious

names that read like something straight

out of the Old West – Grey

Owl’s Cabin, Reeves Ravine,

Rolling River Road. Shaped

like a handgun, the park

sits atop the Manitoba

escarpment and

comprises a 3,000km

mosaic of grasslands,

aspen parkland and

boreal forest – an island

wildlife refuge amid the

perfect geometry of crops below.

Brief encounter
While the bison command the
grasslands, the cool damp of the park’s
boreal forest – a land of lichens and shrubby
trees, carved up by tightly winding creeks – is the
realm of the moose. This, the ultimate symbol
Whirlpool Lake: All Canada Photos/Alamy; deer: John Borthwick/Lonely Planet Images/Getty; bison: Rolf HickerPhotography/Alamy; sign: Mauro Toccaceli/Alamy; moose: Visual/Alamy of Canada’s great outdoors, is next on the list.