Grantee: Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative
Project: From Grassroots to Grasstops: Achieving Human-Wildlife Coexistence in Southeastern BC
Timeline: 2025-2029
Southeastern British Columbia is rich in wildlife, including sensitive species such as grizzly bears and wolverines who rely on intact habitat and safe corridors to roam, feed, find mates, and maintain healthy populations. As human activity in the region grows, interactions between people and wildlife become more frequent, posing threats to wildlife and increasing potential financial and safety concerns.
The Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y) takes a proactive approach to human-wildlife coexistence in the region. This includes advising and directly supporting communities with proven preventative solutions like bear-proof waste management, fruit tree harvest and cost-share programs, and electric fencing systems. Working in partnership, Y2Y supports the implementation of on-the-ground coexistence actions in conflict-prone areas and helps to build regional capacity for enduring solutions.
While directly supporting landowners and communities in high-priority areas, Y2Y is also focused on creating conditions for long-term coexistence across British Columbia (B.C.). With the Communities and Conservation program, Y2Y’s goal is to provide people and communities with the resources they need to be bear smart and ensure that policies and funding exist so that best practices for living with wildlife are standard across the region.
By increasing local capacity and championing policy and financial mechanisms for lasting coexistence solutions, Y2Y helps ensure that people and wildlife can safely share the landscape, now and into the future.
Stay tuned for further updates as Y2Y continues this important work.
About Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative
The Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y) uses a partnership-based approach, collaborating with hundreds of community partners to protect the habitat along the spine of the Rocky Mountains, spanning 3,400 km (2,100 miles) from the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem in the south to the Yukon Territory in the north.
Starting from humble roots in 1993, Y2Y has worked with more than 811 partners, building a movement that unifies voices and people who support large-scale land conservation. Their work addresses the needs of people and wildlife, giving animals freedom to roam, protecting habitat for grizzly bears, caribou, wolverines, wolves, and more, while promoting harmony between communities and nature.