The Arctic The Inuit And The Polar Bear

The Arctic,The Inuit and the Polar Bear,is a account of the most unexpected and incredible experience that I had ever had,living with three Inuits well within the Arctic circle.I became part of their extended family and for three weeks I worked,slept and ate with them,eating Inuit food,which is high in protein and fat and low in carbohydrates.I had to adapt to their diet,culture and to twenty four hours of daylight.this was very hard to do as there is no dawn or dusk to indicate the start and finish of each day. None of this was planned,it seemed like fate that I was destined to go,and celebrate my sixtieth birthday in a remote part of the world and if I had learned about it earlier in Life I would have jumped in with both feet at such an opportunity. I learned first hand of how they cope with a complete change in their lifestyle from being a nomadic race to learning to live in the twenty first century by white man's rules.In days gone by they were completely self sufficient but now they have to buy products from the 'south' such as clothes,snowmobiles and white man's food which has not done them any favours and has introduced obesity among other illnesses.They now have to earn money to pay their way in our world,and in their environment it is very difficult to do. The hunt was very difficult and all of us were working over eighteen hours each day and only sleeping when we were exhausted.At first it was difficult to realise that the temperatures were down to minus forty as the sky was blue and the sunshine made it appear warm but if you removed your gloves you could get frostbite within minutes. After a two day journey on snowmobiles pulling our sledges from Arctic Bay to the hunting grounds,we made base camp and from then on we reverted to using the dog sleighs,this was truly unbelievable and was exciting to say the least,it was remarkable how these dogs performed,they did all that their master asked of them and even more.How the could work as hard as they did on the minimum of food astounded me,any other dog would have died. For the first time in my life I was living with true hunters,these guy do it not for sport but for pure necessity,they needed food to survive.They were true masters of their art.At the start of our hunting day we released the dogs from their chains and harnessed them to their sledge in readiness to start our daily routine,which often lasted eighteen hours before we returned to camp and tied the dogs to their chains,where they stayed until the next day. To be free in such a pristine and frozen wilderness and be as one with nature is something that I would love to repeat,it was a remarkable twenty one days,we started from Arctic Bay as three Induits with their client,after two days I was part of the team and returned as close friends,I was now part of their family and will remain so for ever,I can't wait to go back in the summer and learn about how they survive and prepare for the winter to come.

The aim of this book is to contribute to culturally inclusive, equitable and effective wildlife conservation and management in the northern regions—and by extension, in other regions where indigenous systems of co-existing with wildlife also struggle to work with positivistic science-based assessments of conservation needs. Given the diverse worldviews, perspectives, and agendas of all those seeking to influence conservation of the iconic polar bear, it is impossible in a single book to provide a comprehensive treatment of the management problems Inuit residents of the Canadian Arctic and their government co-management partners face at the present time. Consequently, what is presented in this volume are the generally under-reported perspectives of Arctic residents that reflect an experiential understanding of events taking place in the region, and of some others whose views also augment assessments being used to develop polar bear conservation initiatives.

A lonely old woman adopts, cares for, and raises a polar bear as if he were her own son, until jealous villagers threaten the bear's life, forcing him to leave his home and his "mother," in a retelling of a traditional Inuit folktale.

From bestselling author James Raffan comes an enlightening and original story about a polar bear’s precarious existence in the changing Arctic, reminiscent of John Vaillant’s The Golden Spruce. Nanurjuk, “the bear-spirited one,” is hunting for seals on Hudson Bay, where ice never lasts more than one season. For her and her young, everything is in flux. From the top of the world, Hudson Bay looks like an enormous paw print on the torso of the continent, and through a vast network of lakes and rivers, this bay connects to oceans across the globe. Here, at the heart of everything, walks Nanurjuk, or Nanu, one polar bear among the six thousand that traverse the 1.23 million square kilometers of ice and snow covering the bay. For millennia, Nanu’s ancestors have roamed this great expanse, living, evolving, and surviving alongside human beings in one of the most challenging and unforgiving habitats on earth. But that world is changing. In the Arctic’s lands and waters, oil has been extracted—and spilled. As global temperatures have risen, the sea ice that Nanu and her young need to hunt seal and fish has melted, forcing them to wait on land where the delicate balance between them and their two-legged neighbors has now shifted. This is the icescape that author and geographer James Raffan invites us to inhabit in Ice Walker. In precise and provocative prose, he brings readers inside Nanu’s world as she treks uncertainly around the heart of Hudson Bay, searching for nourishment for the children that grow inside her. She stops at nothing to protect her cubs from the dangers she can see—other bears, wolves, whales, human beings—and those she cannot. By focusing his lens on this bear family, Raffan closes the gap between humans and bears, showing us how, like the water of the Hudson Bay, our existence—and our future—is tied to Nanu’s. He asks us to consider what might be done about this fragile world before it is gone for good. Masterful, vivid, and haunting, Ice Walker is an utterly unique piece of creative nonfiction and a deeply affecting call to action.

Gives information about polar bears which inhabit the Arctic regions of Russia, Norway, Canada, the United States, Denmark, and Greenland and discusses their relationships with humans.

Polar bears—fierce and majestic—have captivated us for centuries. Feared by explorers, revered by the Inuit, and beloved by zoo goers everywhere, they are a symbol for the harsh beauty and muscular grace of the Arctic. But as global warming threatens the ice caps’ integrity, the polar bear has also come to symbolize the environmental peril that has arisen due to harmful human practices. In the past twenty years alone, the world population of polar bears has shrunk by half. Today they number just 22,000. Urgent and stirring, On Thin Ice is both a celebration and a rallying cry on behalf of one of earth’s greatest natural treasures.

A treasury of information and outstanding photographs brought together to reveal the fascinating life of the symbol of Arctic survival, the polar bear