. The Canadian field-naturalist. 328 The Canadian Field-Naturalist Vol. 113 COSEWIC National Ecological Areas Northern Mountain. Pacific COSEWIC EcoloQical Areas compiled by the NWT Certre for Remote Sensing. YeBovAnite. NWT from the Ecological Ramework of Canada Database. AgricuKurB and A<]n-Foods Canada and Environment Canada. 1995. Southern IVIountain 300 0 300 600 Kms Figure 4. National Ecological Areas of Canada used by COSEWIC as a guideline for establishing the national significance of terrestrial and freshwater populations. the way in which the proportion of designations has changed
. The Canadian field-naturalist. 328 The Canadian Field-Naturalist Vol. 113 COSEWIC National Ecological Areas Northern Mountain. Pacific COSEWIC EcoloQical Areas compiled by the NWT Certre for Remote Sensing. YeBovAnite. NWT from the Ecological Ramework of Canada Database. AgricuKurB and A<]n-Foods Canada and Environment Canada. 1995. Southern IVIountain 300 0 300 600 Kms Figure 4. National Ecological Areas of Canada used by COSEWIC as a guideline for establishing the national significance of terrestrial and freshwater populations. the way in which the proportion of designations has changed over the past 20 years with respect taxo- nomic groups (Figure 1) and infra-specific designa- tions (Figure 2). Better insight into the current state of species at risk is provided by the update reports (Figure 3). In the 77 cases that species status was re-examined, 25% were considered to have worsened, 22% to have improved, and 53% to have remained the same. This provides Httle support for the supposition that Canada is facing a growing endangered species crisis. The Future of COSEWIC Over the past several years, the Canadian govern- ment, in consultation with stakeholders and provin- cial/territorial governments, has been formulating a federal endangered species act. The legislation will replace COSEWIC with a new body charged with responsibility to provide objective, scientific assess- ments of Canadian species-at-risk. At the time of this writing, the composition, function, and reporting relationships of this new body have not been made public. Conclusions COSEWIC has proven to be an effective instru- ment in providing credible assessment of status for Canadian species. Status assessment has provided recognition of individual species' plights by scien- tists and the public and has provided the scientific basis for subsequent recovery actions. However, only a small fraction of the country's biota has been assessed and the composition of the list is influenced by the number
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