Wildlife haven

The mountains are home to some of Labrador's best wetlands and salmon and brook trout habitat. They provide a haven for a threatened woodland caribou herd, along with moose, black bear, osprey, bald eagles and a species of special concern, the eastern population of the harlequin duck. Marine mammals abound in the coastal waters, including six species of seals and 16 species of dolphins and whales. On occasion, polar bears can be seen on the pack ice or on offshore islands.

The Mealy Mountains
Porcupine Strand
  (Photo: Protected Areas Association)

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Cultural importance

"The Innu people have surely erected the most beautiful and the greatest monument, as never built by human kind, to have never altered the soul and the body of the earth."

Gilbert Pilot
Innu person from Maliotenam, QC

The Mealy Mountains are steeped in the traditional history of the first peoples of the land. For countless generations, the Labrador Innu have been sustained off this land they call Akamiuapishku. The Labrador Inuit and the Labrador Metis have strong traditional, cultural, and subsistence ties to the area we know the region also once hosted the Vikings, because of a gravesite hidden within the study area that dates around 1000 AD.

Recreational values

Adventure and discovery await the hardy nature enthusiast in this future national park. Wilderness experiences could include world-class canoeing, hiking, rock climbing, kayaking, coastal walks, cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, wildlife viewing, and photography.

Opportunity

The Mealy Mountains site is one of ten new national parks to be established over the next five years, as promised by the federal government in 2002. After three decades of promises to protect this region, we now have a rare opportunity to secure it for future generations.

Status:

In the spring of 2008 Protected Areas Association distributed 5,000 postcards across Canada and around the island. We don't have complete numbers of how many of those postcards arrived in the Premier's mailbox - although many people told us they had mailed them in. However, as an organization we delivered 1,818 signed postcards.

Our 1,818 signatures included:     

• citizens from Happy Valley-Goose Bay
    
• people from Labrador City
    
• people from Roddickton
    
• teachers and school students from across the Island and a class in Ontario.
    
• people from St. John's
    
• concerned citizens who showed up to information sessions in St. John's on
  February 21 and at Gower Street United Church
    
• students from across the province and faculty at Memorial University of
  Newfoundland, College of the North Atlantic and the Marine Institute
    
• Nature Canada and Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society officials and other workers in the environmental sector from across Canada

Every one of these signatures represents some time explaining the issues - from a two-hour presentation to a two-minute explanation in front of a display board in a supermarket.

On April 8, 2008 the Steering Committee on the proposed Mealy Mountains National Park met after a two year break. At that meeting the Steering Committee was given a lot of information, which they needed to process. Members of the Steering Committee formed a working group, which communicated frequently throughout the intervening month.

On May 6, the Steering Committee reconvened and achieved consensus on the new park boundaries of the Mealy Mountains National Park. Protected Areas Association has still not seen a map showing the new park boundaries.

Sometime in the summer of 2008 the park proposal will be submitted to the provincial and federal cabinets for approval.

Contact:
Office of the Premier                                              Office of the Prime Minister
Government of Newfoundland and Labrador          House of Commons
Confederation Building, East Block                        Ottawa, ON K1A 0A6
P.O. Box 8700, St. John's, NL A1B 4J6               (no postage required)
premier@mail.gov.nl.ca                                          pm@pm.gc.ca

cc.
Minister of Tourism                                                Canadian Heritage Minister
Recreation and Culture                                           House of Commons
Government of Newfoundland and Labrador          Ottawa, ON K1A 0A6
Confederation Building                                           (no postage required)
2nd Floor, West Block
P.O. Box 8700, St. John's, NL A1B 4J6