This is the first of three stories investigating the decline of the Bathurst caribou herd.

NWT - Antoine Michel remembers when he ran out of shells on a fall caribou hunt in the 1980s.

The Bathurst caribou herd has declined by more than 315,000 animals since 1996. The GNWT reported this year a drop of nearly 100,000 animals in three years. - photo courtesy of CircumArctic Rangifer Monitoring and Assessment Network

Northeast of his home community of Lutsel K'e somewhere near the Thelon River, a 900-km waterway stretching from Whitefish Lake to Hudson Bay, Michel made the journey back to the community to stock up on shells and head back to hunt food to feed his family.

Michel's words were filled with awe as he described the sight of Caribou, stretching from the Thelon River to Lutsel K'e, some 150 kilometres. Across the vast, barren land, thousands of caribou could be seen as he made the trek to the small, remote community on the edge of Great Slave Lake.

"It was a beautiful thing to see," Michel said.

For Michel, the memory of the abundant herd is just that – a memory.

"We used to chase caribou away from the airport so planes could land," Michel said. "We don't have to do that anymore.

"We're worried about it. "

In September of this year, the Government of the Northwest Territories announced the Bathurst caribou herd, the main source of caribou for many Aboriginal people in the NWT, had declined to a historic low. Government figures estimate a drop of 96,250 animals, to 31,897 in 2009 from 128,047 in 2006.

Based on those estimates, the GNWT and the Tlicho government are now asking the Wekeezhii Renewable Resource Board to determine if all commercial, outfitter and non-aboriginal hunters should be banned from hunting the caribou until 2012 when the next survey is scheduled. This sets the stage for a battle pitting aboriginal subsistent hunters and aboriginal and territorial governments against non-aboriginal hunters and the multi-million dollar hunting lodge and outfitting industry.

The lodge owners say the restrictions will put them out of business. Two outfitterrs, who disputed government numbers, launched a lawsuit in 2007 when hunting restrictions were imposed. The suit was later dropped in 2008 when a report was commissioned through the Alberta Research Council by the GNWT to examine the territorial government's caribou count methodology.

Traditional values

But for some people the question is not what's going to happen, but "what happened?"

"Our main source of food is the caribou," said Noel Drybones in an interview for the West Kitikmeot Slave Study (WKSS) in 1999. The survey looked at the importance of traditional knowledge to the Aboriginal way of life. "If we lose the caribou, we will be pitiful."

In 2005, 68 per cent of Lutsel K'e residents relied on caribou for six meals or more a week, while 25 per cent relied on at least one meal, according to the WKSS report.

For centuries, Aboriginal people's understanding of the caribou has been based on a strong spiritual connection and a deep respect for the animal.

"When hunting, you take everything from the caribou and leave nothing but some guts," said an Aboriginal elder, identified only as Noel M, in an interview with the WKSS. "People always have respect for the caribou because it is our main diet and you never hit, poke and whip caribou. Once someone (disrespects the caribou), the caribou will (migrate) further out and that is very bad for the people."

Knew it was coming

In the 1980s, the Bathurst caribou herd was one of the largest herds in the territory numbering 472,000 animals in 1986, the healthiest count on record since surveys began in 1970. The herd range is massive. The caribou travel north to Bathurst Inlet in the summer months, where calving takes place, to as far south as the NWT-Saskatchewan border during the winter months. They can roam as far west as Deline, staying north, for the most part, of Great Slave Lake in the winter months, and as far east as the Thelon Game Sanctuary in Nunavut, overlapping winter ranges with the Beverly and Ahiak herds.

Both scientific studies of the three herds and traditional knowledge confirm the three barren-ground herds overlap on the winter range.

"Sometimes both this herd (Bathurst) and (the) Beverly mix up," an elder told the WKSS in 2002. "They are both coming to spend the winter near Lutsel K'e. Some people are saying that the Beverly herd are here ... all mixed up with the Bathurst."

The GNWT's department of Environment and Natural Resources estimates an annual five per cent decline of Bathurst caribou since 1986 until now. The figures are based on calving ground surveys completed at the peak calving period, which is historically at the beginning of June when cows (females) reach the traditional calving ground near Bathurst Inlet. Surveys were conducted every two years between 1980 and 1986. Between 1990 and 2009 survey frequency became sporadic ranging from every three to seven years.

Anne Gunn, a former biologist with the GNWT, said because the herd was considered healthy money was not allocated to conduct surveys on a consistent basis.

Once the population became a concern the GNWT committed to conducting calving ground surveys every three years beginning in 2003.

"Because there was no decline it wasn't a priority (for the government). Eventually we got enough money together and we did the 2003 survey," said Gunn.

The first recorded decline in the caribou population was in 1990, when the numbers fell by 120,000 to 352,000 from the 472,000 animals counted in 1986. In 1996, the survey concluded the herd remained stable at 349,000. However, a 2003 survey found the number of caribou to have plummeted again, dropping to 186,000 – a decrease of 163,000 animals. Government surveys have partly attributed the sharp drop to low calf survival rates.

Researchers focus on calf survival

Gunn, who recently retired, dedicated more than 20 years of her career studying caribou in the NWT and around the world. She said after the 1996 survey she began to anticipate a downward shift in the number of Bathurst caribou.

"We knew we were past the peak and it would eventually head downward," she said. "In 2001 we started again agitating for funding and we started looking at calf survival, because we needed a number of years to detect a trend.”

The 2003 survey was completed during the first half of June when female caribou begin to reach the traditional calving ground (female caribou are a major factor to determining the size and direction a herd may be heading). Prior to 1980, caribou were counted visually, giving a less precise count. The nine surveys done after 1980 were photographic, giving a better, more accurate count.

The 2003 survey found the number of caribou one year or older and breeding females declined by 85,000 and 70,000 respectively from 1996.

"What we are seeing is alarming," Gunn said. "It's natural for caribou to decline, but there seems to be a degree of synchrony in these declines which might suggest landscape and continental changes."

A 2006 survey of breeding females counted only half the number found three years earlier.

Gunn said the decline can only be characterized by one word: "complex." However, a crucial finding in 2001 and confirmed during the survey in 2003 could be the main reason the herd has declined drastically - the survival of calves.

"Calf survival is measured in April and we go out and look at the caribou to see how many calves there are to cows," Gunn said of calf to cow survival ratio, an integral part of determining the size of a herd. "There was a significantly statistical decline from about 2001 onward in calf survival. This meant that those few years where there were very few calves being recruited into the herd."

According to a GNWT report, calf survival rate declined significantly between 2001 and 2004 to an average 20 per cent calf survival rate compared to 39.5 per cent between 1985 and 1996. During the same time period the calf to cow ratio also declined to approximately one calf for every five cows from two calves for every five cows.

"If you look at the age structure of the herd, you end up with a weaker year classes," Gunn said, adding there is a large gap between young and old caribou. "I would suggest that is one of the factors that had something to do with the accelerated decline. You had a shift in age structure to older cows. Even if calf survival improves ... there is a time lag before they become producers."

Decline anticipated

Gunn said the anticipated decline after the herd peaked in 1996 led to special preparations for the 2003 survey. "We were expecting a decline and I was starting to think about what information it would take to have supporting information for a trend in breeding females," she said. "(The 2003 report) was the first measured evidence there was a decline. We prepared for two years previously for that survey. We wanted to make sure it was a rigorous as we could make it.

"It was carefully planned because we knew it would come under scrutiny and we wanted to be very sure that if we said there was a decline that we were as confident as we could be and it was a credible conclusion."

Studies show the herd is in decline but traditional knowledge of the herd suggests the decline to be normal, according to Michel.

"I've been hunting all my life," he said. "We moved here in the 50s. I remember those days. During the 50s there were no caribou like (today) around the communities. Our elders used to tell us it ran in cycles. There would be a lot of caribou for 20 years and then they'd go. They'd stay (away) about seven years and then they'd come back to the community."

But for Gunn, what's happening can't be explained by traditional knowledge. She said she knew going into the 2003 study the way people in the North look at the caribou would forever be changed.

"It's sad," she said. "You're starting to see there are less caribou and you start to think what it's going to mean for people. Particularly because it's coinciding with other landscape changes, like mining. It's news that is hard on people.

"On one hand you know you're the bearer of bad news and people are going to be upset. You know it's going to cause a whole raft of problems and controversy."

Next week, the second part in the series will look at what might be causing a decline and if a decline is actually happening.