Article Origin
Page 3
Commercial whalers almost wiped out the bowhead whale population in the eastern Arctic, but Inuit learned this week they may soon harvest one of the remaining few.
Regional representatives of the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board met in Iqaluit this week to plan for the hunt of a bowhead whale in Nunavut's waters in 1996.
After some emotional lobbying and speech making, delegates finally agreed that the hunt-once approved-will take place in Duke of York Bay in north Southampton Island.
"We have been held back from bowhead whale hunting for the past, I don't know how many yearsbut it's been long enough," said Sam Emiktowt, a delegate from Coral Harbour. "It's not really our fault."
Emiktowt convinced delegates that the first whale should be hunted near his community and Repulse Bay, and not in Cumberland Sound near Pangnirtung.
"The Pang people I don't want you to be sad," said Ben Kovik, chair of the wildlife board, after the decision was reached. "These people will hunt for you-for your Elders."
Hunters and Elders from across Nunavut are expected to take part in the hunt, and muktuk (whale meat) will be divided up and sent to each community.
Emiktowt says Inuit will prove by this hunt that they respect traditional and safe harvesting methods. He said all parts of the whale, including the bones, will be used.
Under the terms of the Nunavut land claim agreement, the wildlife board can request a bowhead hunt one year after starting their bowhead whale traditional knowledge study. They must also look at other information about the health of the bowhead populations.
In December, Kovik wrote to Brian Tobin, then the minister of fisheries and oceans, to say the wildlife management board wants to harvest a bowhead this year.
But recently Tobin quit his fisheries job to seek the premiership of his home province of Newfoundland. Public Works Minister David Dingwall is filling in until Prime Minister Jean Cretien appoints a new fisheries minister.
Dingwall only has until Jan. 29 to overturn the NWMB's decision, and he can only do so on the grounds that the hunt will affect the conservation of the whale population.
Scientists with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans estimate there are at least 600 bowhead whales in two separate populations-one in Foxe Basin in north Hudson Bay, and the other along the east coast of Baffin Island near Baffin Bay.
"In truth, scientist know very little about bowheads in Nunavut waters," said Dan Pike, a former fisheries official now working for the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board.
Pike said the wildlife management board asked fisheries officials how many bowhead whales could safely be harvested without harming the population.
The scientists estimated that taking one whale every three years from Foxe Basin and one every 19 years from Baffin Bay won't hurt the whale populations there.
But those numbers are conservative estimates based on infrequent and inconclusive surveys of Nunavut's bowhead populations and based on the number of known bowhead kills between 1919 and 1985.
That's partly why the wildlife board in conducting a five-year traditional knowledge study. The bowhead study committee has already traveled to 10 communities, interviewed more than 180 people, mostly Elders, and transcribed hours of tape about bowheads and whaling practices.
That knowledge will be used to help set quotas in the future.
Pike said biologists know much more about bowhead popuulations in the western Arctic and Inuvialuit region, where bowhead stocks are much healthier and where whales are harvested annually.
He said the best information available to scientists about Nunavut's bowhead are the meticulous journals kept by the whalers.
"We do know that whalers wiped them out, don't we?" snapped Emiktowt, after listening to Pike's presentation about the depleted bowhead stocks.
Pike estimated that as many as 28,000 whales were killed by commercial whalers between 1700 and 1915 in Baffin Bay aone. They also hunted whales in north Hudson Bay.
That figure drew astonished gasps from delegates who were planning and fighting for the right to harvest only one of the remaining bowheads.
Emiktowt also asked why Inuit should pay for the hunt when it was Europeans who took away their right to hunt with their exploitation of the whale stock.
Keith Hay, a biologist running the bowhead traditional knowledge study, says most Elders interviewed in the study said whale stocks have been increasing.
Hay also found that many Elders have a great passion for the bowhead whale hunt and for the muktuk.
- 1577 views