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The article discusses the changes in bird populations in Alberta over the past few decades. The author reflects on their childhood experiences with birds and notes that many once-common species are now missing. However, new bird species have emerged in urban areas due to the growth of trees and parks. The article also highlights the challenges facing bird conservation, including habitat loss, pesticide use, and climate change. Despite these challenges, there is hope for bird conservation as interest in birding has increased, and there is a growing awareness of the need to protect bird species. [Extracted from the article]

The conservation and nature writer and former superintendent of Banff National Park SAYS NO OUR FIGHT AGAINST THE MOUNTAIN PINE BEETLE is doomed to failure. Alberta was afforded an invaluable lesson by BC's slow response to the mountain pine beetle eruption that began in the late 1990s: Impacts of a burgeoning outbreak can be mitigated only by early and aggressive actions that reduce beetle populations. If Alberta were truly concerned about managing our forests for watershed health, we would reform logging practices so that logging left forests looking and functioning more like the kinds of forests that pine beetles give us - for free. [Extracted from the article]

Climate change is a serious threat to rivers like the Elbow, because most climate models project less winter snow and more rain. In fact, the largest part of the river is underground, in its alluvial aquifer, the hidden part of the river that connects to all the secret groundwater flows that seep through the mountain and foothills landscape. The part of the alluvial aquifer that lies under the modern river's floodplain is where the river's heart beats, but it's a heartbeat so slow and secret that few of us perceive it. Alluvial aquifers generally lie beneath the floodplains of gravel-bed rivers like the Elbow, although they can wander where buried river channels offer paths of low resistance. [Extracted from the article]

The article focuses on efforts of Alberta, Canada to address the issue of water scarcity through Water for Life strategy, and talks of bedrock aquifers as ground water resource, growing issue of ground water pollution due to petroleum industry, and need for government to consider groundwater as a form of national security.

The article discusses the disadvantages presented to wolves in Alberta despite its conducive physical environment for them. Topics include Alberta's wolf management policies, the Alberta chapter of Wolf Sheep Foundation, game herd protection failure by the Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development, efforts to save the caribou herd at wolves' expense, and the liberated manner of killings wolves and third-party bounties.