Eagles' Nest Coned
UBC proceeds to obstruct campus eagles' nest to clear the ground for Polygon Homes development.
Wednesday morning, September 14, 2022, campus residents stood in vigil as private contractors obstructed the local eagle nest with a metal cone. The eagle nest has been a problem for ongoing construction in UBC’s south campus neighbourhood for about half a decade. During the pandemic construction slowed in building sites around the nest. A pre-pandemic development had been compelled to modify its building footprint when the developers realized the nest was in the way. The current development (by local giant, Polygon Homes, headed by noted UBC donor, Michael Audain) might have been forced to modify building plans and development schedule, except that UBC obtained a permit for them to obstruct the nest. Polygon Homes has been silent on this issue despite their founder’s oft celebrated conservation values.
According to The Ubyssey, “UBC declined to comment further on [eagle obstruction] consultation, referring The Ubyssey to a UBC Properties Trust [UBC PT] update on the nest.” UBC’s University Affairs department referred A Campus Resident to the same UBC PT’s web update. The update currently on the Properties Trust webpage has been altered since their pre-labour day September 2nd update. The revised update provides no indication of the changes made in the text. As they are a private company they are under no legal obligation to indicate or maintain a public record of the significant edits they made to their September 2nd update.
Deflecting comments on the eagle nest to UBC PT is consistent with UBC’s actions on previous requests for information regarding UBC’s wholly owned subsidiary, UBC Properties Trust (UBC has four direct appointees on the corporate board). UBC does not see the need to comment on UBC PT actions as Properties Trust is not part of the university. Since they are not part of the university (despite being a wholly owned subsidiary) UBC will not (or will rarely) speak to matters under the purview of Properties Trust. Close to two decades ago a UBC School of Journalism student attempted to get financial records from UBC related to Properties Trust. UBC deflected the student to Properties Trust who refused to respond. An FOI request was submitted, but becuase properties trust is a private company, the FOI rules of the day did not apply to them. Deflecting university issues through Properties Trust has a long standing history at UBC.
I have twice this summer spoken with a provincial government official who has been involved in discussions with UBC PT, their consultants, and the private consulting foundation owned by David Hancock. In our last conversation they expressed impatience with public opinion that was critical of obstructing the nest. “This has been done hundreds of times,” I was told. I asked if there was data documenting the success of the technique available to review. “No,” I was told, “it’s in proprietary reports that can’t be released without the consultants’ permission.” When I pressed further, he deferred to the accumulated wisdom of David Hancok, “he has fifty years of experience” I was told.
I won’t claim expertise in obstructing eagle nests. However, having spent many decades in my home laxyuup (traditional territories) on the north coast of British Columbia I have accumulated some years of traditional knowledge from my family and my own observations. What I am concerned about (and hope my worry is unfounded) is the artificial nest looks nothing like any of the many nests I have observed in my lifetime. Typically nests are set almost at the top of the tree with 360 degree unobstructed access. The artificial nest set up by Properties Trust is about midway up the tree with restricted access. The revised Properties Trust update says nothing about this problematic placement of the artificial nest (at least as of writing this story).
Earlier in June of 2022 I spoke with a Hancok Wildlife researcher who said the coning with artificial nest technique works. I asked him for a list of reports and/or publications that provide background to the coning technique. He replied as follows:
We were involved in the early stages of mitigation planning for this nest site, but I understand Diamondhead Consulting is now leading the mitigation plans for UBC and I cannot speak to what plans they currently have in place or the permits they are seeking.
What I can suggest is that for the projects we have been involved with, our mitigation success rates have been upwards of 90% depending on what type of mitigation plan was implemented. You will not likely find anything speaking to specifics in any publications or best practice guidelines at this time. We are still sitting on about a decades worth of data of raptor mitigation programs within British Columbia but have not yet had time to write it up formally for publication. Permits would be issued by FLNRO out of the Surrey office and they could inform you as to what conditions were affiliated with the nest coning. (Hancok Foundation, email. June 28, 2022. in author's files).
To date, neither UBC PT, UBC, nor the Ministry of Forest folks who issued the permit, have publicly released a copy of the permit or the specific terms of reference of the permit. It is not clear under what authority they refuse to release the provincial government issued permit.
Whether the obstruction and artificial nest will work remains to be seen. One hopes that it will work. However, as one wildlife ecologist recently pointed out, “biodiversity and climate crisis issues won’t be resolved one nest at a time, but unless we see each nest as part of the larger network of cumulative effects we will keep doing nothing one nest at a time.”
Meanwhile the eagles are as yet unaware of what might await them upon their anticipated return in January 2023.