Open season in Canada's national parks?

[mjs1973]

I was listening to "As It Happens" on the way home tonight, and they were discussing the recent ruling that strips the rangers of Canada's national parks of all their law enforcement duties. The woman on the radio was pretty disappointed by this ruling. She was worried that poachers, and other peaple who are up to no good, would take advantage of the parks.

Has anyone else heard about this, and if so, what are your thoughts? I have never been to Canada, and I don't know how their parks are run. I have visited several NP's here in the states, as well as our state and county parks, and I like knowing that there is someone around that can enforce the park rules.


http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2007/...dens-guns.html

[Photo-John]

In my experience, the National Parks in Canada are much cleaner and the people much more sensitive and respectful toward the environment than the average US citizen. So I don't expect it will be a huge problem. Even with guns on their hips, I've heard that rangers in parks like Yosemite have huge enforcement problems. Education, respect, and volume of visitors are the bigger issues, I think.

[another view]

Education, respect, and volume of visitors are the bigger issues, I think.

Agreed - might change the order though...

I haven't been to a Canadian National Park but was at a fairly remote Ontario Provincial Park in '02 - the Slate Islands on the north shore of Lake Superior. Hope to make it back there again in a couple of years. It's about eight miles from the mainland in a lake that can get nasty really fast, so the hundreds of Woodland Caribou (yes, literally) do have some protection because of it. We did everything by the book, paid for our permits, etc. We met a Canadian woman who was out there by herself who knew nothing about the regulations, but out there it's pretty impractical to have a ranger patrolling the area. We saw very few people in the 4-5 days we were out there, and the only "bad" evidence of people's past visits was quite old. It hasn't always been a wild place so a lot of that was probably even left over from the miners and loggers.

[Ronnoco]

Guns are not necessary for Park Superintendents in Canada. They already have Constabulary powers. I was involved in a situation with three sites that ended in the Parks Superintendent calling in 2 cars of Provincial Police to back him up in throwing out the campers in those three sites in the middle of the night. No violence was necessary and certainly no guns were required.

That is typical. If the Provincial Police do not require guns in backing up Parks Officials then the Park Superintendents certainly do not require guns.

Ronnoco