Higdon Wildlife Consulting

06/25/2025

"Inuit hunters were the first to notice the increase in killer whale numbers in the Canadian Arctic. Their observations were the basis for Higdon and others to start looking at the phenomenon, and no study of orcas in the Arctic would or could exist without Indigenous communities’ input and support. Ultimately, the people who depend most on the sea and know it best will always be the most important partners in understanding the shifting ecosystems of a changed and changing Arctic."

I had a nice chat with Sierra Club journalist Ian Rose back in the spring about Arctic killer whales, Inuit observations of changing ecosystem dynamics, and the importance of local community interest and support to successful research programs. Ian's article came out this week.

An influx of these powerful, intelligent predators could mean trouble for other marine mammals

01/05/2025

Polar bear skins spread out to dry on the Hudson’s Bay Company warehouse roof at Pangnirtung, 1939. From "Harvesting the Northern Seas", by A. Dudley Copland in the Winter 1974 issue of The Beaver.

The published The Beaver as a Canadian magazine starting in 1920. It still exists today, but as Canada's History. It was re-named in 2010, and is now published by Canada's National History Society. The entire run has been scanned and is available as an online archive. Fantastic resource for historical ecology nerds like me - I'm currently pulling information on whaling in (and other tidbits on bears and whatnot).

12/30/2024

This paragraph is from an article in the May/June 2024 issue of The Wildlife Professional (published by The Wildlife Society for its membership). The article, "Preparing the Next Generation" by Raymond Iglay and Nathan Roberts, is full of good advice on what is needed in wildlife degree programs to set students on the right path. Providing students with a strong foundation in written and oral communication skills should always be an undergraduate program goal.

12/23/2024

This is a great video showing the articulation of a cougar skeleton that is now a permanent display at the Manitoba Museum. It's a gravity mount articulation, and it is really neat to see the process. I still have to get to the museum and see the exhibit, but I think I saw this cat before - I sat in on a necropsy of a bycaught cougar at the Assiniboine Park & Zoo a few years ago, which might have been SK-10 (I need to check my photo dates). Story from the museum in comments.

Discover the incredible journey of SK-10, a cougar that traveled over 1,000 km from Saskatchewan to Manitoba. After his passing, his remains were entrusted t...

10/03/2024

Sad news on CBC this morning - a child in Ontario has died from . There was a bat found in the child's room, and the parents searched for evidence of bites or scratches, didn't see any, and therefore didn't seek medical attention. Not blaming the parents here, but ALWAYS seek medical attention if you wake up to a in your house. The smallest scratch or scrape is enough to introduce the virus, and once you start showing symptoms of the disease, it's too late. Treatment, when started soon enough, is almost 100% effective.

09/19/2024

This is a great interpretive sign that very effectively shows how a reacts to having their space violated. Avoid getting too close and having a moose "stomp the living daylights out of you", as the sign notes. Produced by Alaska State Parks for use by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, and displayed at Potter Marsh in Anchorage, Alaska.

09/06/2024

I've only read the Abstract so far, but this new paper on mountain lion (cougar) recolonization looks interesting, and relevant to the situation currently playing out here in Manitoba.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320724003185?via%3Dihub

09/06/2024

I've joked that PLoS ONE has two types of papers - those that have corrections, and those that don't have corrections yet. The four most recent notifications on the website right now include three corrections and one retraction! I have read some really good papers in that journal, but it's also definitely the one with the most corrections based on my experience. None of the below papers are wildlife-related, ditto for most corrections and retractions.

07/07/2023

Inuit in Nunavut and Nunavik hunt bowhead whales, but the current license allocation system doesn't allow for carrying over unused tags from one year to the next. Greenland and Alaskan harvests have carry-over structures built in to the management systems, and there is interest in allowing similar carry-over provisions in Canada.

Resource management requested science advice on the sustainability of Canadian license carry-overs or credits to subsequent years. So we modeled a number of different scenarios with varying assumptions on current and historic population size and harvest scenarios to explore potential impacts on bowhead population status.

We concluded that, based on our current understanding of bowhead population status and growth, modest licence carry-over provisions can improve resource access for Inuit while allowing continued population growth.

Research Document 2023/051

06/12/2023

Rabies in ungulates like moose is rare, but not unheard of.

Wildlife officials believe the moose may have been bitten by a rabid fox.

06/12/2023

Today I learned that Richardson's Ground Squirrels (Urocitellus richardsonii) are found in Edmonton, Alberta. Edmonton is right at the western and northern extent of their range. This one is part of a colony in the far west of the city, along 100 Avenue NW. This is a common species back home in southern MB, but it's always fun to watch "flickertails" doing their thing. The scientific name honours the Scottish naturalist Sir John Richardson.

04/22/2023

"If you look even at the London parks, there used to be thousands of sparrows there, but now they’re almost completely absent."

Interesting read, and it's always neat to consider how perspective changes from one place to another. In North America, invasive House Sparrows are contributing to declines in native species. In their native United Kingdom, conservationists are concerned due to massive population declines. And the declines are certainly apparent - in 7 days in the London area this month I saw fewer House Sparrows than I normally in a day in Winnipeg.

Number of house sparrows spotted has dropped by nearly 60% since 1979, according to RSPB annual survey