Lecture 15 The Necklace around the Arctic

Arctic indigenous peoples and ANWR

in Alaska

There are many sources of Arctic literature; one readable book on the changing Arctic (with emphasis on climate change) is the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, available for download at http://amap.no/acia/

. Here we use material from ACIA, from Charles Wohlforth’s

book The Whale and the Supercomputer, from Wikipedia, from Harald

Sverdrup’s

book Among the Tundra People, available free from PR, from US NatlFish and Wildlife Service ( http://arctic.fws.gov/

), and other sources.

Faroe

Islands

(~Denmark)Shetland Islands (Scotland)

Labrador Sea(see fig.19)

Alaska, ANWR 10K-20 years ago

4500 years ago

AD 500-985

SvalbaardUNIS

Chukchi

coast

Faroe

Islands (between Norway and Iceland), have about 45,000 inhabitants descended from Viking settlers. They still speak their own distinct language, with its roots related to the old Norse spoken by the Vikings. Much about the Viking world was described in epic ‘sagas’ which were written, some in verse,

and somewhat in the spirit of Lord of the Rings. They were written from roughly A.D. 1000 onward, and record much earlier events as well.

The rugged coast of theFaroes

Kirkjabour, first settled by Celtic friars who arrived at the Faroes

in skin boats, around 800 A.D. Viking exploration apparently began abruptly in A.D. 793 with an attack on Lindesfarne, an island off the NE (northeast) coast of Scotland. Viking settlers spread quickly westward to the Faroes, Iceland and Greenland. About A.D. 1000 it reached a brief (maybe 10 year) colonization of Labrador, where recent archaeological digs show a Viking settlement at L’anse

aux Meadows, which you can visit today. This was long before Christopher Columbus ‘discovered’ America.

There is an unfinished gothic cathedral here from the Middle Ages.

Whaling harpoons at Kirkjabour

(Olavar

Hatun, left is a musician who founded the Faroese national choir).

The economies of the Arctic settlements invariably involve fish,

oil or gas: natural resources that are much sought after by their European, North American or Asian trading

partners. But also resources that depend on or affect the environment strongly. The ‘necklace’ of island nations from Canada to Scandanavia

is very diverse, from the youngest solid Earth (Iceland, Surtsey) with its geothermal energy to some very old

Canadian Shield mountains (Greenland, Canada)

INUIT CIRCUMPOLAR CONFERENCEThe Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ІСС) is the international organizationrepresenting approximately 150,000 Inuit livingin the Arctic regions of Alaska, Canada, Greenland and Chukotka, Russia. www.inuit.org/

University of the Arctic: brand new!! Member universities are circled on the map. http://www.uarctic.org

Distance learning; UW’s Canadian Studies Center is involved.

The Inuit

of northern Canada

Aboriginal land claims: the ‘final agreement’ 1993, making an autonomous native territory of Canada

(partial home rule)

Svalbard

780

North was developed for its coal by a Mr. Longyear

of Boston Massachusetts at the turn of the last century. Its capital is Longyearbyn. It is now the site of the northernmost university (UNIS) in the world. How could there be coal just 1200 km

from the North Pole? (Hint: look back at the history of Earth’s temperature in Deep Time…gradually cooling since the dinosaur era..the

Cretaceous.) UNIS

is at http://www.unis.no/

ANWR

and Arctic indigenous peoples

Arctic Refuge is celebrating its

50th anniversary

in 2010

The US Fish and Wildlife Service (Fed. Government) has a website: http://arctic.fws.gov

.

1.5M acres

During the winters of 1984 and 1985, seismic exploration was conducted along 1,400 miles of survey lines in the 1002 area. This work was undertaken by a private exploration firm and funded by a group of oil companies.Several oil companies independently conducted other geological studies including surface rock sampling, mapping and geochemical

testing. Coastal Plain Resource Assessment and Legislative Environmental Impact Statement

(LEIS) that described the potential impacts of oil andgas development. This LEIS included the Secretary's final report and recommendation, and was submitted to Congress in 1987.

Congress declared in Section 1003 of ANILCA

that the "production of oil and gas fromthe Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is prohibited and noleasing or other development leading to production of oil and gas from the [Refuge] shall be undertaken until authorized by an act of Congress."

The

US Fish and Wildlife Service

has stated that the 1002 area has a

"greater degree of ecological diversity than any other similar sized area of

Alaska's north slope."

"Those who campaigned to establish the Arctic Refuge recognized its wild qualities and the significance of these

spatial relationships. Here lies an unusually diverse assemblage of large animals and smaller, less-appreciated life forms, tied to their physical environments and to each other by natural, undisturbed ecological and evolutionary

processes."[26]

Refuge mammal listGray WolfWolf Story: A family of wolvesWolf Story

(Polish language version)Polar BearsPolar bear denning

locations and habitatsBrown BearsBlack BearsMoose migration studyWildlife Trends: North Slope MooseCaribou

(Porcupine Caribou Herd, Central Arctic Herd, Caribou and the Coastal Plain)Maps of Caribou locationsCaribou movements in a late spring year (1987)A Caribou Year

(and a scientist's year)Frequently Asked Questions about CaribouThree caribou herdsMuskoxenDall

Sheep

Birds:Refuge bird listWhich Arctic Refuge birds travel to or through your area?Bird migration routesWorldwide bird migrationTundra SwansSnow GeeseMap of Snow Geese fall use areasEider Egg Hunt:

Field Research along the CoastWildlife Trends: Peregrine FalconsBluethroatsBuff-breasted Sandpiper

Fish:Refuge fish listArctic GraylingMap of Arctic Grayling locationsDolly VardenMap of Dolly Varden

locationsArctic Cisco

•

ANWR

contains 3.2% of the Alaskan Arctic coastal plain.

•

"Environmentalists and most congressional Democrats have resisted drilling in the area because the required network of oil platforms, pipelines, roads and support facilities, not to mention the threat of foul spills, would play

havoc on wildlife. The coastal plain, for example, is a calving home for some 129,000 caribou.“

•

Yet, Congress has repeatedly debated changes that would allow oil and gasextraction from the coastal plain. “Drill, baby, drill” became a chant of the last presidential campaign.

Nationalpetroleumreserve(1923)

US Oil Consumption today is about 20 million barrels of oil/dayANWR

will not save us!"If the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was used to meet 100% of

U.S. demand, it would last for 215 days under the low estimate, and 525 days or just 1.4 years if it contained 10.4 billion barrels“ (Wikipedia) But the amount of oil is really unknown: see Analysis of Oil and Gas Production in ANWR (http://www.eia.gov)

Typo:Million!

ANWRhighest estimateof 10B barrelsis just 33 barrelsper US citizen,

‘Porcupine’ caribou herd muskoxenGwinch’in

people have lived with this herdfor many thousands of years

source: http://arctic.fws.gov

American Golden Plover .. seasonal migration: energy and time.

The plover comes to ANWR, the coastal plain of Alaska, to have its young in summer, then

it doubles its body

weight for the flight over the ocean to South America, eating no

food on the journey. Its northward migration depends on stopovers at reliable wildlife preserves in the U.S. In ANWR

the numbers of plovers seems to be declining at about 8% per year, though

it is very difficult to count them.

•

satellite view:

http://www.360cities.net/area/arctic-national-wildlife-refuge-alaska

•

Wikipedia’s

view of the controversy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_Refuge_drilling_controversy

•

Pres Obama

said, "I strongly reject drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge because it would irreversibly damage a protected

national wildlife refuge without creating sufficient oil supplies to meaningfully affect the global market price or have a discernible impact on US energy security." Senator John McCain, while running for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, said, "As far as ANWR

is concerned, I don’t want to drill in the

Grand Canyon, and I don't want to drill in the

Everglades. This is one of the most pristine and beautiful parts of the world."[21]

•

Europeans first contacted the natives of the Arctic in early explorations. The Vikings had little contact with Greenlandic natives during their 400 years (beginning in 985) of occupation. Much later the Hudson’s Bay Company was established in a charter from Charles II of England in 1670 to trade for furs to make beaver hats .

http://www.hbc.com/hbc/history/

•

“Along the shores of James and Hudson Bays natives brought furs annually to these locations to barter for manufactured goods such as knives, kettles, beads, needles, and blankets.”

And we might add, for sugar, rifles and alcohol.

On the northern edge of the refuge is the

Inupiat

village of

Kaktovik

pop. 258

and on the southern boundary the

Gwich'in

settlement of

Arctic Village

pop 152

•

“The Alaska Inter-Tribal Council, which represents 229 Native Alaskan tribes, officially opposes any development in ANWR” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_National_Wildlife_Refuge

•

"Sixty to 70 percent of our diet comes from the land and caribou

is one of the primary animals that we depend on for sustenance." The Gwich'in

tribe adamantly believes that drilling in ANWR

would have serious negative effects on the calving grounds of the Porcupine Caribou herd that they partially rely on for food.

. <http://www.columbia.edu/~sp2023/scienceandsociety/web-

pages/Native%20Communities.htm

•

“In May 2006 a resolution was passed in the village of

Kaktovik

calling

Shell Oil Company

"a hostile and dangerous force" which authorized the mayor to take legal and other actions necessary to "defend the community. The resolution also calls on all North Slope communities to oppose Shell owned offshore leases unrelated to the ANWR

controversy until the company becomes more respectful of the people.

Mayor Sonsalla

says Shell has failed to work with the villagers on how the company would protect

bowhead whales

which are part of Native culture, subsistence life, and diet. “ Juneau Daily News 24 May 2006.

•

Indigenous people are already facing great challenges from global warming, which is concentrated …amplified…in the Arctic. As sea ice recedes, winter storms (with large ocean waves) damage the foreshore. Wildlife is threatened by receding ice and permafrost.

•

The village of Shishmaresh, Alaska has had to be moved

permafrost

animation:http://arctic.fws.gov/permcycl.htm

permafrost temperature has risen 0.5 to 1.50C from 1980 to 2005 at this site

“The warm weather associated with late freeze-up makes caribou less likely to travel long distances thus slowing the autumn migration. In addition tobeing slowed by the warm weather and their own lack of initiative to move, extended thin ice conditions hamper movement, because the ice does notsupport the animals when they try to cross waterbodies

in their path.” ACIA Ch.3

We survive by caribou.When you hunt caribou it can take up to three weeks for the trip.That’s why we need to protect our caribou.That’s why I brought some caribou for you to taste. Eddie Camille, Liidlii

Kue, Denendeh,March

11, 2003 (ACIA

Ch. 3)

source: Frozen GroundData Center, NSIDC

(US Nat.Snow and Ice Data Center,Univ

of Colorado)

•

The tundra is like my dear mother to me! We herded reindeerwith the whole family. How else should we do it?We took care of the shelter.We knitted, we washed, wesmoothed down clothes.What did we do? We baked bread.When it is warm, it is warm.When it is not warm, it iscold. I spent my whole life on the tundra. Even after Iretired, I spent a year in the tundra. Life was easy; theonly thing we missed was the television. Before that allwe did was to stay in the earth hut. Summer or winter,always living in the shelter in the tundra. MariaZakharova, Lovozero

Elder (ACIA

Ch. 3)

•

The number of days that snow-roads over the tundra can be used by truck transport has decreased from 220 (1970) to 125 (2000).

“A thousand years of hunting the bowhead whale from floating ice had instilled in the Iñupiat

both a profound understanding of this environment and a special

ability to perceive its changes. Whalers seek out multiyear ice because it provides a strong platform for pulling up whales and it anchors the shorefast

ice in place with its great mass. In the winter of 2001—2002, however, as for several years prior, little multiyear ice appeared at Barrow. The shore ice didn’t form as solidly as it should, and it lacked the big, solid anchors that multiyear ice, or even

new ice with large pressure ridges, would have provided. And on March 18, something

strange and unsettling had happened. The ice went out, leaving open water right up to the beach in front of Oliver Leavitt’s house. No one could remember the ice going out that early. Normally, it goes out in July. A dozen seal hunters floated out to sea on the ice. Search and Rescue helicopters went out to find them and bring them home. Some didn’t know they were floating off into the Arctic Ocean until the helicopter showed up. You can’t tell you’re moving when your whole world starts to

drift away.“ Charles Wohlforth-The Whale and the Supercomputer ….100 tonnes, 200 years: whales are the largest animals ever to have lived on Earth

“The biggest connection between traditional knowledge and the spiritual way of life is about respect; respecting the environment, respecting the land, respecting the animals,”

Impacts of the changing Arctic specific to indigenous communities

“Food security Obtaining and sharing traditional foods, both cultural traditions, are very likely to become more difficult as the climate changes, because access to some food species will be reduced.The

consequences of shifting to a moreWestern

diet are likely to include increased incidence of diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular diseases. Food from other sources may also be more costly.

“Hunting Hunter mobility and safety and the ability to move with changing

distribution of resources, particularly on sea ice, are likely to decrease, leading to less

hunting success. Similarly, access to caribou by hunters following changed snow and river-ice conditions is likely to become more difficult. Harvesting the threatened remaining populations of some marine mammals could accelerate their demise.

“Herding Changing snow conditions are very likely to adversely affect reindeer and caribou herding (e.g., ice layers and premature thawing will make grazing and migration

difficult and increase herd die-offs). Shorter duration of snow cover and a longer plant growth season,

on the other hand, are likely to increase forage production and herd productivity if range lands and stocking levels are adequately managed.

“Cultural loss For many Inuit, climate change is very likely to disrupt or even destroy their hunting culture because sea-ice extent is very likely to be reduced and the animals they now

hunt are likely to decline in numbers, making them less accessible, or they may even disappear

from some regions. Cultural adaptation to make use of newly introduced species may occur in some areas.

source: ACIA: Ch. 18

“Also, underlying the human concerns is the rich web of the Arctic ecosystem. If this changes, and it is likely to, then human habitability of the Arctic becomes uncertain.

“Climate change that happens gradually is difficult for people to perceive. Even in Barrow, where the Iñupiat

depend on wildlife, ice, and the timing of the seasons for their livelihood, some hunters fought the realization until faced with

the terrible spring whaling season of 2002. By then, the ice, the Earth, and the elders were

all telling the same story.” (Wohlforth

op.cit.)

•

It is ironic that fossil fuels are responsible for some of the warming which is altering the Arctic ecosystem…which sits on top of more oil and gas.

We cannot change nature, our past, and other people forthat matter, but we can control our own thoughts andactions and participate in global efforts to cope withthese global climate changes.That I think is the mostempowering thing we can do as individuals.

George Noongwook, St. Lawrence Island Yupik, Savoonga,Alaska, as quoted in Noongwook, 2000; (source: ACIA Ch.3)

•

an approximate quotation, remembered imperfectly:

Natives in Alaska dealing with white men from the south have difficulty. They feel a lack of nuance, too much directness, a demand for immediate answers. The native will consider the matter quietly. He or she

will not answer directly or argue. “We keep our differences inside”.

There are an estimated 150,000 natives living in the Arctic. These were nomadic people, moving with the seasons, with the migration of caribou, with the whaling and sealing time. Then they were settled in littlevillages with prefabricated housing. There has been a lot of problems with alcohol and violence, and many live on welfare. What is the purpose in theirlives, these men and women with hunters genes, with a keen ability to livein the harsh outdoors?

But, now, there is the University of the Arctic…http://www.uarctic.org

/www.mnh.si.edu/arctic/features/croads/chukchi.html

Chukchi

nativesof Arctic Russia

Harald

Sverdrup

Among the Tundra People, 1938

The natives of the Chukchi

Coast were nomadic, living in the forests in winter and moving to the seacoast in summer. They herded/domesticated caribou/reindeer, using them for virtually everything: clothing, food, pulling their sleds. This

is a stark contrast to the plains natives of central Canada (in the ‘Barrens’) who followed the caribou migration. Sverdrup

was the scientist on Roald

Amundsen’s

6 year attempt to reach the North Pole, mostly frozen in the ice near the Chukchi

coast. Sverdrup

lived with the natives rather than sit on the ship year after year.

•

From Sverdrup’s

book:The sleeping tent has no door or door opening; you simply lift up the front wall and

crawl in or out. By the back wall stands the lamp, usually a flat wooden dish with an inlay of metal, occasionally an enameled plate. The lamp is filled with seal oil, and in front lies the wick, a row of moss or finely cut wood, which burns with a clear flame and gives a surprisingly good light. The lamp stands ona

wooden bowl filled with seal oil or reindeer fat. Across the lam lies a small wooden stick for fixing the wick when the lamp is smoking, or threatens to die –

this happens often. The wooden stick also serves another purpose. Since it is always greasy, it is easily lighted in the flame, and it is very convenient for lighting a pipe. From time to time the house wife must pour seal oil from the bowl into the lamp, and what she spills on her fingers she licks off with relish. Seal oil is a delicacy to the Chukchi, and one which I never envied them.

Inside the sleeping tent there is room for six to eight persons. No matter how cold it is outside, the tent warms up quickly. The lamp heats, the many people give

off heat, and when food and tea are brought in steaming hot, the temperature rises to such an unbearable degree that even the Chukchi

find it necessary to raise the front wall and let some fresh air in. But they don’t like to let out the heat; they want to keep it for the night when the lamp is out. Then every little opening is closed up tight. With only a few people in the sleeping tent, the night can still be reasonably comfortable, but with many lying like sardines in a box, the air

becomes thick and pungent. In the morning you wake up in an atmosphere saturated with steam from wet clothing and perspiring bodies, and seasoned by a sour smell of stale tobacco. When I first crept into a sleeping tent, I nearly passed out, but fortunately the nose adjusts itself rapidly to strange stenches, and after a couple of weeks I was immune to the particular Chukchi

odor.

This carved horse is one of the earliest works of art known to mankind, along with cave paintings from about this period. It is from the tusk of a woolly mammoth, at the edge of the glacial world of 31,000 years ago. Very much in the spirit of current native art of the far north, it reminds us that people chose to live in these harshly cold places.

Possibly this was because of the food and fuel provided abundantly by the rich Arctic ecosystem…all the way along the food chain …..Vogelherd, Germany