This summer, Canmore Trail Culture and Rockies Run Collective kicked off the new First 49 event – 4-part series that includes 5-7km time trial trail runs held at the Canmore Nordic Centre. The event united the Bow Valley trail running community with an opportunity to push themselves against the timer. Following the race, a BBQ dinner at the Bill Warren Centre was included in the registration, along with a donation to the Friends of Kananaskis Country.
 
I attended a few of the races and took in the groups passion and joy for trail running. The Friends of Kananaskis is grateful to be the recipient of the $1,000 donation. Thanks for your great trail energy and support!

 

Kananaskis Country is not one park but a multi-use land base consisting of numerous parks and public lands, all managed under one framework. In this series, we’re going to look at each part that makes up K-Country. We’ll look at the history, the rules, and significance the area plays.
 
There are 7 land classifications within the Alberta Parks system, 4 of which you can find in Kananaskis Country:

In 6 of the previous 7 articles in this series, I’ve covered all four land use designations, their rules and significance.

I’m going to cheat a little bit in this article in the interest of education and talk the Kananaskis DISTRICT instead of just Kananaskis COUNTRY. I’m not going far; the area I’m going to cover almost borders K-Country, but isn’t technically inside it, though it is still part of the Kananaskis District for management purposes. I’m deviating to cover another land classification: “Natural Areas”. First off: what’s a Natural Area?

Section 7 of the Public Lands Act enables the Lieutenant Governor in Council (“LGiC”) to set aside lands for use as:
“provincial park, historical site, natural area, ecological reserve, wilderness area, heritage rangeland, forest reserve, forest recreation area, wildlife sanctuary, habitat conservation area, public shooting ground or public resort or for the development of any natural resource”.

So a Natural Area is a land use designation, like a Provincial Park. Natural Areas are governed by the not-so-simply titled “Wilderness Areas, Ecological Reserves, Natural Areas and Heritage Rangelands Act” (which I’ll shorten to “WAERNAHR Act”, if that’s any help). Section 4.01 of that Act enables the LGiC to designate public lands as Natural Areas that meet the following purposes:
(a) to protect sensitive or scenic public land or natural features on public land from disturbance, and 
(b) to maintain that land or those features in a natural state for use by the public for conservation, nature appreciation, low intensity outdoor recreation or education, or for any combination of those purposes, 

Section 5 of the WAERNAHR Act gives direction to the Minister four "programs and measures" they can carry out in a Natural Area:
(a)  for the management and preservation of its animal and plant life and environment,
(b)  for environmental research and reclamation,
(c)  for the furtherance of public education and interpretation in respect of it, and
(d)  generally, for its preservation and protection.

So a Natural Area is, by definition, a protected area, though not, by definition, a “park”. The WAERNAHR Act goes on to restrict human activity in Natural areas, including (but not limited to):

Despite the latter clause, trapping and hunting is permitted in a Natural Area, and Natural Areas can also have grazing rights granted on them. Interestingly, though the WAERNAHR Act enables regulations to be written that support the Act, none have been. This leaves things normally covered by regulation (like camping rules) up in the air.

As noted, Kananaskis Country does not have a designated Natural Area (sort of; see below), but just slightly northeast of the Kananaskis Country boundary is the Ole Buck Mountain Natural Area (“OBMNA”), one of two Natural Areas fairly close to the K-Country boundary (the other is Emerson Creek NA, southeast the Eden Valley Reserve). A high-level view of the OBMNA's location is shown at right. These days, the official Kananaskis Country website says there is one Natural Area in K-Country, and they're probably referring to OBMNA (a click on the link on that page takes you to a list of EVERY natural area in the Province, so isn't clear which one they're referring to). But... the OBMNA is not actually inside the maps that show the K-Country boundary on them. Technicalities, I suppose.

The OBMNA is about as isolated and secret a place as you can find in Kananaskis. It’s “isolated” in the sense that you can’t get to it without getting permission from someone, despite being visible from the TransCanada Highway. It’s “secret” in that there are no signs directing you there, and if you could figure out a way to get to it, I’m betting it’s not marked when you get there, either. 

The OBMNA came into being through Order in Council 454/71 (yes, 1971, pre-dating K-Country by almost a decade), so has been there for 47 years. It’s not very big; just 356 ha (882 acres). OBMNA was #54 of over 80 Natural areas created by Order in Council 454/71. You can see a little more about OBMNA on the official Alberta Parks Land Reference Manual page here. It is described as follows:

Ole Buck Mountain Natural Area is a rolling, hilly site, slightly incised by creeks and gullies. It is mainly forested by a variety of mixed wood stands of aspen, balsam poplar, white spruce and lodgepole pine.
This site is in the Foothills Natural Region, Lower Foothills Sub-region. Five level 1 and 38 level 2 natural history themes have been identified for the Lower Foothills. With the exception of mineral wetlands, all of the level 1 themes are well represented in the parks and protected areas network. Level 2 themes are also well represented. Listed in “Other Natural Areas”. 

No, I have no idea what most of that latter paragraph means, and no, despite asking, I’ve not been able to determine why it got the Natural Area designation, though I have my guesses, which I will get to shortly. 

Zooming into the location at right, the OBMNA is not too far northeast of the Sibbald area, due north of the Jumpingpound Demonstration Forest. The OBMNA has two adjacent parts; a small triangle on the west side, and a square-mile (one section) eastern block.

You’re going to have to take the above description of what’s in the OBMNA on faith, because I haven't been there -- despite trying for 2 years. This is the first article in this whole Elements series where I can offer no photos from the area. I doubt you will get there, either. The issue is accessing it legally.

On the north side of the western portion, and the entire west and south sides, the OBMNA borders the Stoney Indian Reserve. The road leading to and through the OBMNA is a private road on the Reserve that you need written permission from the Band Council to use. The road dead-ends just south of the Natural Area, and it has residences along it.

To the east of the OBMNA (and the small bit north of the eastern portion), the land is a mix of private land (yellow) and Crown land with Grazing Leases (light green), all within the Municipal District of Bighorn (the MD's land map for the area is at right) -- meaning you need written permission from the landowners, or direct permission from the grazing lease holder to cross their land to access the OBMNA. That is required even for the leased Crown land pursuant to Section 5(1) of the Recreational Access Regulation.

Under that regulation, the lessees of the Crown Land aren’t obligated to let you cross if there are livestock or crops present. If you want to try, here’s a link to the province’s Grazing Lease look up tool, that will tell you who you have to contact to gain recreational access on any Crown land with a Grazing Lease in the province. I started trying to contact the area's Grazing Lease holders in January 2018 (conveniently, you can only call them during a 90 minute window, only on Wednesday nights, and at least 7 days before you want access). I left multiple messages over several weeks, finally made contact in May, and was told cattle are on it annually from April until October, meaning summer access was never possible. I had hopes of trying for late October 2018 (yes, during hunting season), but can't for other reasons.

On top of that hurdle, the roads that come closest to the OBMNA to the east are not public; they’re private well roads owned by Shell, and you need to have permission or a road use agreement to drive on them, or even walk or bike on them (local ranchers do have that permission). The closest you can legally approach the OBMNA without any permission is about 8 km away, unless you drive through the Stoney reserve.

So, in short, “you can’t get there from here”; you need written permission from someone to drive on their road, plus separate written permission from someone to cross their land, just to get to the OBMNA. You could try using a helicopter -- except you can't land an aircraft there. Park's own website says in big, bold letters: There is no public access to this natural area from park or Crown land. Or the air. What's left; tunnelling?

My guess as to why that splotch of land got a Natural Area designation is that it was isolated Crown land that could not be accessed. In 1886, a rancher named John Robinson held this small chunk of what was then just public land under a Grazing Lease. It was not forested then. In the mid 1920’s Robinson relinquished the lease. It didn’t have a Grazing Lease on it for 50 years; the forest grew in naturally and it became awful for grazing by the 1970’s without substantial tree clearing. As an undevelopable island, rather than just leave it as undesignated Crown Land, it was given a protected status. This is typical of other Natural Areas I have looked at: small, remnant, difficult to access “natural” spaces.

The satellite imagery at right shows houses have been built within the western section of the OBMNA. I suspect they pre-date the land being designated (the roads do), but have no way of telling, nor do I know what this does to the land designation status. Logging has occurred on the Stoney Reserve lands right up to the western boundary of the OBMNA, and my understanding is that they accidentally logged a small portion of the western portion OBMNA as well before being stopped.

Members of the Copithorne family have the grazing rights to most of the land on the eastern side of the OBMNA, in part or in whole. The Copithornes started homesteading in the Jumpingpound area in 1888. It was in the 1970’s that then-Minister of Transportation Clarence Copithorne was one of the original visionaries involved in the creation of Kananaskis Country as we know it today. I spoke with Clarence’s son, Roy Copithorne; he kindly gave me the land's history, and told me only hunters ever access the area.

Alberta Parks’ own website says
“Natural areas are protected area lands that have been set aside to support a broad spectrum of recreational activities.”

And of course the WAERNAHR Act says Natural areas are there "to maintain that land or those features in a natural state for use by the public for conservation, nature appreciation, low intensity outdoor recreation or education, or for any combination of those purposes"

This is one Natural Area that probably only sees a handful of local residents using it for any activity in any year, including members of the Stoney nation – hardly a “broad spectrum”, for any "purpose" whatsoever. The Stewards of Alberta’s Protected Areas Association data available here on the area suggests that there was at least one person acting as a Volunteer Steward for the OBMNA in 2002, 2003 and 2011; I couldn't find out who. But other than that… I’m not sure if the "nature" there is "appreciated" by anyone at all.

My attempts to learn about the OBMNA started with a conversation with a Conservation Officer in 2016 who's responsibility area includes the OBMNA. His message at the time was prophetical: “Good luck with that”. Good luck to anyone who wants to try out the "broad spectrum of recreational activities" in a place that is literally impossible to get to.

Ole Buck Mountain Natural Area:
 
Camping: Unclear; random camping is only allowed in Wildland parks, so probably no. 
Fires: Unclear; probably not, but I'd ask.
Hiking: No designated or maintained trails. 
Mountain biking: Not permitted.
Horseback Riding: Not permitted 
Hunting: Permitted (if you could get there).
Services: None at all, including no public road access