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20 <br />Treaty Act between the United States and Great Britain (Canada), which was ratified by <br />Congress on December 8, 1916. This Act assured legal protection for migratory bird <br />species in Canada and the United States and provided a basis for preventing the hunting of <br />species requiring complete protection. <br />The significance of the establishment of WBNP in the Northwest Territories in December <br />1922 (Raup 1933) was not realized until three decades later when the whooping crane <br />nesting grounds were discovered there (Allen 1956). WBNP is a vast boreal forest and <br />muskeg area (4,288,542 he) set aside by the Canadian government (Raup 1933) as a <br />preserve and management area for the wood bison Bison bison athabascae). The portion of <br />the Park occupied by nesting whooping cranes is primarily located northwest of the <br />intersection of the boundaries of Saskatchewan, Alberta, and the Northwest Territories <br />(Kuyt 19780. <br />Aransas NWR was established in 1937 to protect the whooping crane and other wildlife of <br />coastal Texas (Stevenson and Griffith 1946., Howard 1954). The Refuge includes 22,148 <br />he of Blackjack Peninsula and adjacent properties, and provides essential wintering habitat <br />for whooping cranes. On Matagorda Island another 44,606 ha in State and Federal <br />ownership, is managed in conjunction with Aransas. For additional protection, 5,236 ha of <br />adjoining wetlands known as the Proclamation Boundary have been closed to hunting. <br />In the 1940's, many questions regarding the life history and ecology of the whooping crane <br />were unanswered. The Service and the National Audubon Society (NAS) attempted to <br />remedy this situation by setting up the Cooperative Whooping Crane Project. The goal of <br />this project was to achieve species survival and population growth through increased <br />protection and sound management. Robert P. Allen became the principal investigator; his <br />studies culminated in the monograph The Whooping Crane (Allen 1952) published by the <br />National Audubon Society in 1952. <br />This monograph established a foundation for subsequent research and management. The <br />interest of many private citizens and organizations; the dedicated efforts of Federal, State, <br />and Provincial personnel in the United States and Canada; the awakened concern of people <br />along the migration route; and newspaper accounts alerting hunters to avoid mistaken shots <br />were all important by- products of the heightened awareness stimulated by Allen's study. <br />In April, 1985, Bert Tetreault, Director General of the Canadian Wildlife Service and Robert <br />A. Jantzen, Director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service signed a memorandum of <br />understanding (MOU) entitled Conservation of the Whooping Crane Relating to Coordinated <br />Management Activities (Lewis 1991). The MOU provides a more formal structure to the <br />cooperative working relationships that have characterized these two nations' joint efforts in <br />management and research of whooping cranes. Under the new agreement, each Service <br />appointed an employee to be responsible for inter- and intra- nation coordination of whooping <br />crane management and research. The MOU discusses disposition of birds and eggs, <br />postmortem analysis, population restoration and objectives, new population sites, <br />international management, recovery plans, and consultation and coordination. The MOU <br />was renewed for another 5 years in April 1990. <br />