Inuvik (Mar 31/06) - In late February, eight Natural Resources Technology Program (NRTP) students and two instructors from Aurora College in Inuvik joined seven students and two instructors from the Thebacha Campus in Fort Smith in the first-ever joint winter camp.

From left to right, Thebacha Campus Natural Resources Technology Program (NRTP) instructor Terry Armstrong demonstrates necropsy with students Joe Heron and Larry Greenland. - photo courtesy of Alice Graham

The camp was located about 95km east of Lutsel K'e. Its goal was to get the students out onto the land for two weeks and give them hands-on experience with a variety of important wildlife techniques, including caribou hunting, meat cutting and aerial surveys.

The Inuvik crew flew to Fort Smith and jumped on one of four Twin Otters filled with ski-doos and camp gear, which was transported to the camp the following day.

Fort Smith instructor Larry Penner chose the location on the edge of Magpie Lake because it was on the caribou's migration route and there were plenty of trees for firewood nearby.

We spent the first couple of days chopping wood and setting up eight McPherson tents - five for students, two instructor tents, and one cook tent. The tents were comfortable, with good woodstoves, and plenty of space. Camp activities were meticulously organized by Thebacha Campus NRTP Instructors Kevin Antoniak, Larry Penner and Terry Armstrong.

Students were divided into three work groups and rotated through each activity, while additional instructors were flown in and out of camp on Cessna-185 airplanes.

Earl Evans, a respected elder and hunting legend from Fort Smith, accompanied the Inuvik group out to the camp. Earl harvested five caribou on the third day of camp and demonstrated his skinning and meat cutting techniques.

The next day, Larry Penner supervised target shooting with the students, using bolt action .270 calibre rifles. Then the group went caribou harvesting on ski-doos, but unfortunately spotted no caribou. The next hunting group came back with two barren-ground caribou in the morning, which was an exciting start to the day!

Terry Armstrong demonstrated caribou necropsy, and then the students performed necropsies on the remaining caribou. Necropsy involves cutting the caribou open and examining internal organs and fat content to determine the animal's health. These animals were healthy, weighing close to 200lbs. each, and had minimal parasites.

After that, we set up a meat cutting tent and butchered the animals under Kevin Antoniak's expert instruction. Students learned important meat cuts and how to execute them - tenderloin, backstrap, brisket, ribs, and many others - and then wrapped up the meat, which looked quite professional! The next hunting group harvested eight caribou, so there were many more necropsies and meat cuts to do. The beautifully packaged pile of caribou meat went back to Fort Smith, where NRTP students plan to distribute it to local elders and the womens shelter.

After the caribou activities were completed, it was time to choose pairs for the three-day survival exercise. Each group was transported to a location about an hour's walk from the camp, and was required to build a lean-to and stay in it the first night.

Students constructed quite a variety of them, ranging from small enclosures to log cabins! Most folks had a pretty cold first night - it was -35C and windy - but everyone kept busy chopping wood to keep the fires going and got to know each other a bit better.

When the sun came up it was a lot warmer, about -10C, so each group built a quinzee. Quinzees are also known as south of the treeline igloos, and are constructed by shovelling snow into a large dome shape and hollowing out the inside.

The second night was warmer. With several bodies, candles burning and the door sealed, it was probably close to zero degrees inside each shelter!

After three days of survival, students were quite happy to signal their instructors to pick them up and go back to the camp, where sleeping in tents with woodstoves became a luxury!

Everyone had a day off after the survival exercise, so students did camp chores and participated in a variety of leisure activities like ski-dooing, snowshoeing, hiking and cooking delicious caribou steaks and soup. The last few days of camp were spent rotating through three activities: aerial surveys on a small fixed-wing aircraft, radio telemetry and ice fishing.

Students planned flight lines for each aerial survey with Terry Armstrong, and counted the caribou they observed in high and low density areas. For the radio telemetry exercise, three caribou collars were hidden by Larry Penner and students used an antenna in various locations to pick up signals given off by each radio collar. Signals at each location were plotted on maps, and each collar was later located using triangulation.

We also set a fishing net through the ice of Magpie Lake under the instruction of Berny Bergman, an enforcement and compliance specialist from Fort Smith. Berny made the complex process look easy by drilling a large hole in the ice and feeding a jigger underneath to another hole about 60 yards away. It was very interesting and the net caught several lake trout and whitefish.

After that, it was time to tear down the tents and clean up the camp. The Inuvik crew returned to Yellowknife on the last Twin Otter load on Friday night, and although it was sad to see the end of our winter camp, it was pretty amazing to take a shower and scrub the layers of grime off our skin!

The entire camp went well. We had a hardworking, friendly group of students from both campuses, and the Fort Smith instructors did a thorough and excellent job of teaching wildlife techniques and various bush skills.

The Aurora Campus NRTP Class of 2006 would like to thank Thebacha Campus instructors Kevin Antoniak, Larry Penner and Terry Armstrong for inviting us to their well-organized winter camp, and providing such comprehensive instruction. We would also like to thank Earl Evans and Berny Bergman for sharing their vast amounts of knowledge of caribou hunting and winter fisher

- Alice Graham is an Aurora College Natural Resources Technology Program (NRTP) instructor in Inuvik.