More than two decades after pressure from environmentalists shut down an aerial wolf kill program, the province is considering a new lethal strategy.

But before it pulls the trigger, Ministry of Environment officials are canvassing environmental groups to judge reaction to a targeted program to kill wolf packs by helicopter in a bid to save mountain caribou threatened with extirpation.

Two B.C. conservationists confirmed Friday they received e-mails from species at risk recovery co-ordinator Chris Ritchie asking for reaction to a proposed lethal wolf strategy in targeted areas.

“We would be interested in your sense of the response from the ‘common man/woman’ in the region you live,” Richie wrote.

“I realize that the opinion is likely to span a wide gamut, but local insight is always valuable.”

Representatives of those groups have scheduled a conference call Monday to consider the request.

“As a member of the public I see it as evidence of the failure of our wildlife programs that we got to this point,” said Lawrence Redfern, a co-ordinator with the Mountain Caribou Project, a coalition of conservation groups.

Nearly all the world's mountain caribou, an ecotype of woodland caribou found across northern Canada, are located in B.C. in an area stretching north from the U.S. border to the northern Rockies. Numbers have dwindled to fewer than 2,000. Some isolated herds have 50 animals or less.

Both Redfern and John Bergenske, executive director of Wildsight, are wary about endorsing an aerial wolf kill without detailed information on areas, wolf and caribou numbers and assessing what other activity, including snowmobiling and logging, is occurring there.

Both those activities can lead predators more easily into mountain caribou winter habitat.

“Government is really concerned about reaction,” Berganske said. “They’re caught between politics and what the science team is recommending. It’s a tough situation for everyone involved.”

The province shut down its controversial aerial wolf kill program on the eve of Expo 86. It was briefly tried again in 1987 but scrapped for good since. It was used at that time to protect ranching and hunting interests.

Richie. the provincial species-at-risk co-ordinator, confirmed in an interview he is formulating a strategy to use an aerial kill, which he acknowledged is expensive and controversial.

The program would be used in one area as a trial project. The only wolf packs that would be considered is where there are 50 caribou or less in a herd, where there are closures to heli-skiing, logging and snowmobiling and where there is radio collar evidence of wolves ranging in caribou habitat. A healthy herd has about 200 caribou or more.

One area that fits that definition is the Groundhog Mountain, in the Wells Grey area, as well as other areas in the Kootenays.

“We’re quite aware of the charged nature,” Richie said. “We’re trying to find the best example, one that would be the most effective and most successful.”

The program has not been approved by government, he cautioned, and remains in the idea stage.

B.C. environmental groups, First Nations, and B.C.’s heli-skiing industry signed on to a plan in 1997 that protected 2.2 million hectares of mountain caribou habitat from logging and road building. Part of that agreement was opinion from a government science team that targeted wolf kills may be necessary as a last resort.