Features

Area:

• Waterton Parkland encompasses foothills fescue, foothills parkland, sub-alpine and montane natural sub-regions.
• The land surrounding Waterton Parkland in Alberta and British Columbia is used for mining, oil and gas extraction, recreation, logging and ranching.  The exception is the roadless, protected Akamina-Kishinena Provincial Park in British Columbia and the large Glacier National Park found to the south in Montana.
• To the north and east of the Waterton Parkland lie grassland plains and the Municipal District of Pincher Creek and Cardston.  Land here is generally privately owned by ranchers.
• The Blood First Nation operates a timber reserve in the valley of the Belly River though there are no permanent residences there. The Blood Indian Reserve land, included in the Area of Concern, is used primarily for farming and livestock purposes.
• For Waterton Biosphere Reserve management purposes, the Waterton Parkland region is roughly divided into three zones. The core zone of the reserve is the legally protected Waterton Lakes Provincial Park. Outside of this zone lies a buffer zone intended for use by interests compatible with conservation. Beyond this zone lies a privately owned transition zone, or area of cooperation, where sustainable land use practices are meant to be conducted.

Township and Range map: JPG | PDF		Natural Subregions map:  JPG | PDF

Watershed:

• The Waterton Lakes Chain consists of over 100 kilometres of rivers and streams, wetlands, and as many as 80 lakes and ponds.
• The Waterton and Belly Rivers are the two major regional drainage rivers that empty into the Oldman River Basin, which in turn, empties into the South Saskatchewan River Watershed and heads west to Hudson Bay.
• Wetlands that exist in the Waterton Parkland are critical habitat for numerous wildlife species.

Environmentally Significant Areas map:  JPG | PDF

Environmentally Significant Areas:

• The Waterton Lakes National Park is considered to be an internationally significant area because it is home to features unique on the planet.
• The remaining portion of the Waterton Parkland Area of Concern contains numerous nationally significant areas.  This means that these areas contain features that are limited in distribution at a national or are the best examples of a particular feature in Canada.

Biodiversity and Ecosystems:

• Waterton Parkland has a rich diversity of wildlife and vegetation because of its location at a junction between grassland and mountain regions.  Species characteristic of the northern and southern Rockies mix and co-exist alongside prairie species.

Vegetation:

• Waterton Parkland is home to extensive plant life that is rare elsewhere in Canada and Alberta.
• Rare species include mountain lady's-slipper, Lyall's scorpionweed, Brewer's monkeyflower, pygmy poppy, mountain hollyhock western wakerobin, Lewis' mock-orange, white-veined wintergreen, Waterton moonwort and Bollander’s quillwort—some of which are only found in the Waterton region.

Wildlife:

• A selection of mammals found in the area include: masked shrew, vagrant shrew, water shrew, little brown myotis, long eared myotis, big brown bat, pika, white-tailed jackrabbit, least chipmunk, yellow-pine chipmunk, red-tailed chipmunk, yellow bellied marmot, hoary marmot, Richardson’s ground squirrel, Columbian ground squirrel, thirteen-lined ground squirrel, golden mantled ground squirrel, red squirrel, northern flying squirrel, northern pocket gopher, Beaver, deer mouse, bushy tailed wood rat, Gapper’s Red-backed Mouse, Western jumping mouse, Heather vole, meadow vole, long tailed vole, water vole, muskrat, porcupine, coyote, gray wolf, red fox, black bear, grizzly bear, marten, ermine, long tailed weasel, mink, wolverine, badger, striped skunk, river otter, cougar, lynx, bobcat, elk/wapiti, mule deer, white-tailed deer, moose, bison, mountain goat, mountain sheet/bighorn sheep,  pygmy shrew, silver haired bat, northern bog lemming, fisher, least weasel,  (Source: J. Dewey Soper, Canadian Wildlife Service, Report Series, number 23)
• A selection of herptiles found in the area include: boreal toad, spotted frog, long-toed salamander, tiger salamander, boreal chorus frog, northern leopard frog, wandering garter snake, red-sided garter snake, plains garter snake and bull snake.
• A selection of avifauna in the area include: tundra swans, cinnamon teal, northern shoveler, hooded merganser, bald eagles, Golden eagle, prairie falcon, Canada geese, osprey, sandhill cranes, orange-crowned warbler, MacGillivray's warbles, Red-breasted nuthatch, boreal chickadee, three-toed woodpecker, white-tailed ptarmigan, gray-crowned rosy finch, rock wren, and Brewer's sparrow.  

Cultural:

• The Waterton parkland is the traditional home of the Blackfoot First Nation.
• Abundant archeological sites dating back as far as ~11,000 years dot the Waterton Parkland.
• Explorers, gold miners, Whiskey runners, and settlers have all called this area home.

Geology:

• Upper Waterton Lake Parkland is characterized essentially by a linear geomorphic profile of alpine glaciation as a result of pronounced erosion by glaciers, originating mainly in the mountains to the south and moving in a northward direction. The preglacial valley was deepened and widened by this glacial erosion. Similarly, tributaries to the main Waterton valley tend to be relatively straight or to appear broadly curvilinear in planar view.
• A thousand million years ago, the Waterton Parkland was flat plain submerged under a shallow sea.  Sedimentary layers were laid over millions of years and compressed into rock.
• One hundred millions years ago, a massive tectonic plate collision resulted in the formation of the Rocky Mountains.  In some areas, giant blocks of sedimentary rock layers were thrust on top of other others, creating areas where upper rock layers that are millions of years old lie on top of much younger rock layers.  This phenomenon is particularly evident in Waterton Parkland’s Lewis thrust.
• Although the park currently contains no active glaciers, glaciation has had an enormous impact on the Waterton Parkland.  Glaciers carved the jagged edges of the mountains, deepened the u-shaped mountain valleys and deposited the sediment that forms the rolling grasslands.
• After the final of four glacial periods that occurred in the area, large blocks of ice that were left in the valley bottoms melted to form deep and beautiful mountain lakes.
• Two alluvial fans exist in the Waterton Lakes National Park.  The Cameron and Blakiston fans were formed by deposits left by glacier meltwater carrying debris into mountain lakes.  This debris amassed and spread at the mouth of the feeding rivers, resulting in the characteristic fan shape of these geological features that are still in flux due to moving water today.