Looking forward to the upcoming northern lights season in Churchill and some amazing photo nights in Natural Habitat’s Aurora Pod! This should be another spectacular aurora borealis season in the north. Stay tuned for regular updates starting in January!
Photographing northern lights from the Aurora pod. Alex De Vries – Magnifico photo.
Port of Churchill grain shipping operation on the Churchill River. Port of Churchill photo.
A First Nations group based in Northern Manitoba is in the process of buying the Port of Churchill and Hudson Bay rail line from OmniTrax, a Denver ,Colorado based company. The town known as the polar bear capital of the world has been struggling to keep the ancillary business viable in these changing times.
The First Nations group provided a letter of intent for the purchase of the port and the Hudson Bay line – the stretch of track from The Pas to Churchill – as soon as both sides complete necessary research on the transaction.The rail line is the lifeline that connects all the small communities that have no road access in the region.
“It’s a group of communities along the line and others that, you know, over the period of time have always believed the railway was theirs. This now can become a reality based on current negotiations,” said OmniTrax president Merv Tweed. With the invested interest that the group has to keep the rail line running smoothly as a means of access to their remote communities, train service there and onto Churchill should thrive for the distant future.
At this juncture of the negotiations the buying group nor the purchase price of the assets has not been specifically identified.
“They’ll make their own statement in their time,” Tweed said.
For the next 45 days OmniTrax and the First Nations group will engage in a “due diligence period in which both parties will work together to ensure that a purchase becomes a reality,” a news release from Omnitrax stated. Omnitrax has agreed to work with the First Nations group for the next several years to facilitate a smooth transition. However, given the lack of success that Omnitrax has had in managing the port and increasing the shipping quota, this new regional rooted infusion might be a time to try new strategies for building the business and attaining higher levels of success.
OmniTrax acquired and began operating the port and rail line in 1997, though a reduction in grain shipments has placed financial strain on the operation. An attempt to diversify and specifically ship oil through the port was met with voracious public outcry which inevitably killed the initiative. The operation just seemed dead in the water after that battle this past year.
All these factors combined spurred the company to announce earlier this month plans to sell the operations. A quicker than expected sale agreement and local interest in the growth of the operation has instilled high hopes for the next phase in the life of the Port of Churchill. The operation employs roughly 100 local workers.
Polar bear sow and cub wearily survey their surroundings constantly aware of predators. Justin Gibson photo.
A Manitoba Conservation official has found evidence that wolves near Hudson Bay have learned to hunt polar bear cubs.
Polar bears are generally considered the top of the Arctic food chain, but recently a pack of wolves apparently distracted a mother bear long enough to take her cub in the Kaskatamagan Wildlife Management Area in northeastern Manitoba, said Daryll Hedman, the wildlife manager for the province’s northeast region.
“This is the first strong indirect evidence I’ve ever seen of wolves preying on a polar bear cub. They probably killed the cub and dragged it away.” reported Hedman.
For four years now Hedman has been conducting polar bear maternity den emergence surveys in the region by helicopter. These wolf and polar bear encounters have been somewhat lore and something he has not witnessed firsthand. This past March Hedman saw evidence of such an attack for the first time. Now the unreal became real. “This doesn’t happen often. It still seems to be a very rare event.” stated Hedman.
Arctic wolfpack searching for a meal on the ice. Carnivoraforum.com photo.
“We’ve had reports of wolves predating on polar bears [the cubs] in the past by lodges and First Nations, mostly when the polar bears are coming off the ice onto land at the end of July,” said Hedman.
“In our most recent report, a First Nations trapper reported to me what looked like a polar bear-wolf encounter” in the wildlife management area east of York Factory on the Hayes River, which runs along the Hudson Bay shoreline to the Ontario border.
“He said a single adult polar bear track was leaving the den site. About five days later, we were doing our survey by helicopter. We landed [at that site] and there was definitely evidence of polar bear and wolf tracks.”
Wolf pack working together. Digital Vision photo.
Members of a wolf pack get a mother’s attention, then the rest of the pack grabs her cub, Daryll Hedman says. (Cameron MacIntosh/CBC)
This most recent attack that Hedman saw evidence of was pretty conclusive and pointed towards a sure attack of a polar bear by wolves.
“There was also a single cub track leading up to the wolf encounter, and after that, only the single track of a female polar bear going out to the ice of western Hudson Bay,” stated Hedman. “The polar bear cub was probably four or five months old”. he added.
“It happened right on the tidal flats of Hudson Bay,” he said, noting the area contains a pretty healthy population of moose, the main prey species for wolves along the Hudson Bay coast in Kaskatamagan.
“I’ve had reports from people who have actually seen this sort of thing before,” he said.
“What usually happens is the sow polar bear can’t react quickly enough when the wolves are in a pack. Some of the wolves are getting her attention and the others go for the cub.”
Scientists and researchers studying these animals have also documented wolves hunting polar bear cubs.
“In 1983, the late Malcolm Ramsay and I found evidence of a pack of wolves in the Churchill denning area that had learned to kill polar bear cubs when they were on their way to the sea ice from their maternity dens,” polar bear specialist Ian Stirling wrote in his book Polar Bears: The Natural History of a Threatened Species.
“Where the polar bears den, there are no wolves, but once they leave the dens and get closer to the coast, they might encounter wolves.”
(Excerpts and quotes supplied by Martin Zelig for CBC News)
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This amazing polar bear video filmed around Wapusk National Park in Manitoba near Churchill is just right to get everyone in the holiday mood. Watching these playful polar bear cubs interact with their mother and with each other really inspires the feeling of the coming season. With all the stress that accompanies the hustle and bustle of this time of year, watching this footage from Parcs Canada will surely put you in a relaxed mood. Enjoy!
Two orphaned polar bear cubs were discovered in the Kaskatamagan Wildlife Management Area near York Factory on the southeastern Hudson Bay coast. After an extensive search failed to locate the mother, Manitoba Conservation decided to relocate the Assiniboine Park Zoo in Winnipeg. The pair were 10 months old in early fall when they were moved to the zoo and they join two cubs relocated from the Churchill area in late October.
Polar bear cub being relocated by helicopter from Hudson Bay area. province of Manitoba photo.
Polar bear cubs chance of survival is nearly impossible under the age of two. Bear cubs stay with their mothers for two full winters in order to learn skills such as hunting out on the pack ice.
Recent discoveries of wolves preying on polar bears in the Kaskatamagan area provoke thought on the mother’s disappearance. Although there’s no evidence of adult polar bears being taken by wolves, there have been documented occurrences of cubs being lured away and killed by wolves. This is pretty incredible news since polar bears have been perennial kings of the food chain. Further news on this issue will be worth watching.
Common procedure in relocating polar bear cubs to the International Polar Bear Conservation Centre at the zoo in Winnipeg calls for a medical exam and a 30 – day quarantine period in which the bears are isolated from public or media interaction.
Once in Winnipeg, the cubs will go through a 30-day quarantine during which they will be kept isolated from the public and media.
Polar bear cub being examined by veteranarian. Province of Manitoba photo.
In late October two 11 – month old male polar bear cubs came to the zoo after a civilian in Churchill accidentally shot the cubs mother with a cracker shell. Cracker shells are used to scare bears away from the area though this one struck the mother causing heavy blood loss and eventually death. Manitoba Conservation decided it was the best scenario form the bears to spend their lives in the zoo to insure their survival.
“Polar bears at this age (11 months) need to stay with their mothers for at least the first two winters to learn how to hunt and to avoid attacks by other, larger polar bears,” the province said in a news release.”Polar bear experts have advised that cubs of this age do not have any chance of survival if left on their own.”
