For decades the the extruded tusk, actually tooth, of the male narwhal has been thought to be for mating purposes. Now, Canadian researchers have filmed incredible video footage in the high Arctic showing the real purpose of their tusks; feeding. This short documentary highlights four researchers from Fisheries and Oceans Canada describing how they were able to capture the never before recorded evidence of this narwhal behavior. Fascinating!
Polar Bears aren’t the only species that migrate to Manitoba in huge numbers! In fact, snakes are more plentiful in the far northern province of Canada. And, most of those snakes gather in a space about the size of your living room…roughly 75,000 to be more precise!
Paul Colangelo, a National Geographic grantee, recently spent time photographing the largest snake gathering in the world in the Narcisse Snake Dens of Manitoba found in southern Manitoba.
Every spring thousands of red – sided garter snakes amass inside the unique limestone caves of the region and form “mating balls” consisting of hundreds of male snakes attempting to mate with a sole female. The female twists and moves desperately to escape the pit and thus creating these balls of motion rolling on the ground around the area. The female “is desperately trying to get out of the pit,” states Colangelo, an environmental documentary photographer.
The cluster of slithery bodies seems a “frenzy, but a closer look reveals a much finer dance,” Colangelo said in his field notes. “The small males court the larger female by rubbing her head with their chins and maintaining as much contact between their long bodies as possible.”
Interacting and photographing these oft – feared reptiles brings awareness to the species and assists in fostering more appreciation for the fascinating snakes. Colangelo even goes as far as describing the snakes as “cute”. They have “puppy-dog eyes—they just don’t blink,” he quipped.
This massive ice berg off the coast of Ferryland, Newfoundland has been the talk of Canada and other world news stations. What a natural way to enjoy the day..gazing at icebergs floating by.
Iceberg chasers flocked to the coast of this town with a population of only 465 to gaze out at “Iceberg Alley” as this area of the Atlantic is known. This daunting iceberg is 15 stories high above waterline. However this only accounts for 10 per cent of its mass with the other 90 per cent below the surface.
“Most folks can’t wrap their heads around how big it is,” Barry Rogers, the owner of Iceberg Quest Ocean Tours, a Newfoundland tour operator, said in an interview on Thursday.
Over 600 icebergs have drifted into the North Atlantic shipping lanes so far this April, which is widely known as the beginning of iceberg season. The normal count for this time of year is around 80. And, while this parade of sorts is great for watchers the fishing industry in St. Johns for one is being held hostage. The entrance to the harbor is blocked by the dangerous behemoths and the fishermen are waiting for the winds and currents to clear a safe channel.
Icebergs of this size have been 15,000 years in the making. Snow on Greenland turned eventually to glaciers which broke free within the last few years and slowly floated out of Baffin Bay. Eventually the bergs are caught in the Labrador current heading south and end up in Iceberg Alley.
Mario Tama photographed these breathless Arctic photos from a Lockheed P-3 accompanying a NASA crew carrying out Operation Icebridge, an operation initiated to measure Earth’s glaciers and ice sheets. The stillness, colors and textures of the Arctic landscape left Tama speechless.
“It’s such an unexpected landscape,” he says. “It felt like we were flying over a different planet.”
NASA spends 10 weeks each spring in the Arctic when the ice levels are at their highest using a pair of laser altimeters to record ice elevation and three types of radars to measure snow – one of which reaches 300 feet down to bedrock. Flying shifts of up to 12 hours, the crew surveyed hundreds of miles of coastline along Ellesmere Island in Canada and Greenland. While researchers focused on computer screens, Tama focused his camera on a landscape without scale.
“I was looking at shapes and features that I had never seen in my life,” Tama says. “We’d drop through the clouds or take a turn into a valley, and I’d be sitting there trying to process, what am I looking at?”
Last year the National Snow and Ice Data Center NASA and operation IceBridge announced the lowest ice levels for the Arctic and Antarctic in the past 38 years.
“Changes in Arctic sea ice is seen as one of the primary indicators of climate change,” says Nathan Kurtz, project scientist for Operation IceBridge. “It’s been changing so rapidly—the Arctic has been changing and warming. What we’re trying to do is get a sense of what’s driving some of the bigger changes that we’re seeing.”
Tama’s stunning images remind us all of the majestic beauty of the north that is in jeopardy due to global warming!
Ellesmere Island ice field. NASA photo.
Ice pack near Ellesmere Island. NASA photo.
Ice along the Baffin Island coast Greenland. NASA photo.
NASA avionics technician surveys the Arctic landscape. NASA photo.
Glacier on Ellesmere Island. NASA photo.
Baffin coast ice field Greenland. NASA photo.
In a time when the Canadian Arctic is the focus of energy and trade route exploration, there are human cultural issues that need to be part of the picture as well. Maatalii Okalik, is a young advocate for the ever expanding Inuit youth population and her passion is ensuring all young people of the north will be able to live to the same standards as other Canadians. The 27 – year old is president of Canada’s National Youth Council and her mantra is just that,;“to ensure that Inuit live the same quality of life as fellow Canadians.”
Maatalii Okalik Pres Natl Inuit Youth Council. Maatalii Okalik photo.
Okalik knows the road to Inuit health and education equality will be long and winding and will require hurdling deep – rooted social issues frozen in Canada’s colonial history. Okalik fervently believes that the federal government needs to be more active in revitalizing cultural practices, preserving and facilitating native languages, preventing suicides and upgrading and possibly subsidizing some infrastructure problems.
In Okalik, it appears the Inuit young population will have an inspired advocate for years to come. She was recently bestowed the honor of Indspire Laureate, given to Canadian indigenous professionals and young people demonstrating exceptional achievements in their chosen career. Additionally, Okalik was rewarded with the Qulliit Nunavut Status of Women Council’s Outstanding Young Woman Award!
Arctic Deeply, a northern publication recently interviewed Okalik and she conveyed some pretty informative and interesting thoughts on life in northern Inuit communities. Describing the most pressing concerns and issues of Inuit youth Okalik outlined a basic long – term action plan.
Foremost is the Inuit language -Inuktitut- not being allowed in residential schools. English has been forced upon students therefore degrading the native language of the Inuit people. Okalik contends that federal government in Ottawa should actively push to ensure that Inuit youth should be able to access crucial learning materials in their native language. This would set a basis for equitable education for all Canadians. When the Inuktitut language is watered down the culture will slowly be lost when exposed to the rest of the world.
Secondly, Inuit culture and customs have been identified as an identity crisis currently for Inuit youth. As the youngest, fastest growing population in Canada, Inuit youth are finding cultural practices hard to keep up with. School and work and raising young families impose time and cross – cultural constraints on the continuation of age – old Inuit culture. Youth programming has been seen and proposed as a solution. tradition and modernity need to be woven together more smoothly so to ease the differences between the two.
Inuit children in Pangirtung, Nunavut. Robert Galbraith photo.
The third, and most pressing issue, is suicide prevention in the north within the Inuit population. Inuit suicide rate ranks highest within Canada as well as internationally per capita. Okalik and her colleagues contributed to the national Inuit suicide prevention strategy identifying suicide historical tendencies and plans to control them in Inuit communities.
In all these issues it’s crucial to have Canadians as a whole understand the vast gap in social services whether it be housing, food insecurity, cultural access for youth, education or access to quality and equal health care. With Inuit communities existing on the lower end of the spectrum here, there needs to be help assimilating the people to a better way of life being exposed to them from outside. “To me it just doesn’t make sense for Inuit in our particular communities to be living in Third-World conditions. There should be a priority of Canada to address that inequity. It would be a proactive measure that would prevent some of the dire statistics, including our suicide rates.” states Okalik.
Okalik feels her dreams and definitive career moment will be when all Canadians, including Inuit, enjoy the same quality of life. “I think I’m happiest when I see understanding in someone’s eyes – whether that’s an Inuk youth who learned about the history of colonization, or a federal bureaucrat or high-level minister who decides that this should be a priority and it’s a basic human right.” Then that person might be motivated to try and solve the dilemma and possibly influence policy decisions that might impact Inuit in a favorable manner.
Okalik’s near – term hopes are for the federal government to follow through with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s call to action #66 restoring power to indigenous communities all across Canada including most urgently Inuit communities in the Arctic. “The other thing that I think that I’d like to see is the telecommunication of the Canadian Arctic to be at par with southern Canada, including internet and phone. We recognize that these are essential services. It’s not at par in the Arctic. That influences education. It’s really important. Especially when, across the Arctic, we don’t have hospitals in all of the communities. Telehealth for example, is something that’s being explored. We should have access all across the board. As well as internet.”
Lastly Okalik believes that air services across the Nunavut settlements need to become more essential since there are no roads to communities. Many of the social inequities pointed to here are critically impacted by this transportation mode.
