Ecology - Information Sources

Information Sources

Some of the traditional ecological knowledge of the northern Yukon ecosystems, held by the Elders of Old Crow, has been recorded in the 1999 publication, The Land Still Speaks (Sherry and the Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation 1999), although the publication is focused on the Dempster Highway. Specific ecological knowledge related to Vuntut National Park has not been recorded in detail, although the ongoing oral history project (Nagy 1999) will hopefully capture a great deal of ecological information. Fortunately many archaeologists, palaeontologists and biologists working in the Old Crow Basin have recorded interesting fragments of local knowledge concerning ecological relationships (e.g., Balikci 1963, Morlan 1973, Fafard 1999).

Other than the traditional knowledge held by the people of Old Crow, our knowledge of the ecosystems of Vuntut National Park in winter is somewhat limited. Some limited observations of birds and mammals in winter are found in the reports of RNWMP and RCMP winter patrols.

In the 1970s there were several studies with important ecological aspects carried out in connection with the proposed Canadian Arctic Gas Pipeline. A major study carried out for the Canadian Arctic Gas Study Limited (Hettinger et al. 1973) on the vegetation of the northern Yukon Territory describes major plant community types, characterizes terrain types according to plant cover and soil properties, and describes growth characteristics of plant communities. This study also covers succession, fire ecology and the ecology of soil formation. Unfortunately, only two of their many study sites are within the Old Crow Flats Special Management Area and none are within Vuntut National Park.

Strang (1973) investigated the effects of disturbance in permafrost terrain and the kind and degree of damage caused by different agents, as part of the Environmental Social Program.

Terrain sensitivity maps were prepared for some parts of the northern Yukon in the early 1970s in conjunction with northern pipeline studies (Van Eyk and Zoltai 1975). There have not been any follow-up studies on terrain sensitivity and disturbance resulting from seismic and other operations carried out in the Old Crow Flats and Vuntut National Park.

Recent work by wildlife biologists from the Canadian Wildlife Service (CWS) and Government of the NWT, particularly in relation to caribou ecology, provides the background for what is one of the most important ecological issues concerning the Vuntut Gwitchin, the Old Crow Special Management Area and Vuntut National Park, that is, the well-being of the Porcupine Caribou Herd (Russell et al. 1973 etc.). Few other aspects of the northern Yukon have been studied as intensively from an ecosystem point of view. Recent studies of moose conducted in the area have also had an ecological focus (Mauer 1999, ANWR website).

A relatively new ecological concern, the issue of competition between caribou and muskoxen, has not yet received any study in the northern Yukon, however the topic has been considered by many biologists in other areas, particularly Banks Island (e.g. Nagy et al. 1996, Larter and Nagy 1996).

Wiken et al. (1981) classified the northern Yukon into four ecoregions which were further subdivided into many smaller ecodistricts. They described many aspects of the ecology of these ecodistricts in detail. A new system of classification is being developed by the Yukon Ecological Working Group (YEWG 2000). In the new system, Vuntut National Park includes parts of three Ecoregions: the British-Richardson Mountains Ecoregion, the Old Crow Basin Ecoregion, and the Old Crow Flats Ecoregion. These Ecoregions are referred to at several stops on this ecological journey. The ecoregion and ecodistrict classification is discussed in Appendix 1 to this chapter, and fuller descriptions of landforms, soils, and plants of these ecodistricts are presented in the following chapters, especially Chapter 4, Geomorphology; Chapter 6, Soils; and Chapter 10, Vegetation.