SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - The minister of Environment and Natural Resources (ENR) has cancelled all barren-ground caribou hunting in an area roughly the size of New Brunswick.

The restrictions, announced Thursday, also affect aboriginal hunters and will go into effect Jan. 1.

All harvesting will be closed in a no-hunting zone stretching north of Yellowknife: from the Tlicho winter road to Gameti, east to the Hoarfrost River in the East Arm and north to Nunavut. According to a map issued by the department, the area covers approximately 70,000 square kilometres.

In addition to the conservation area, commercial, non-resident and resident harvesting will be off limits in the North and South Slave regions.

"Using the best information available, we have determined the most reasonable conservation method is to limit the harvest of caribou from the Bathurst herd," Minister Michael Miltenberger stated in the release.

Miltenberger is currently in Copenhagen at an international climate conference. He is not expected return to the territory until next week.

At least one aboriginal hunter says he's going to hunt anyway.

"For Dene people, we really cannot stop. It's just the way life goes for us," said Bobby Drygeese, a band councillor with the Yellowknives Dene First Nation. "The majority of time the Dene people, we hunt for our families, we just take what we need, we don't take extra meat or extra caribou."

Drygeese said he expected there to be an uproar among First Nations communities who live off the land.

"Nobody is going to like it, especially the aboriginal people. It's our treaty right to hunt caribou without any restrictions," he said. "There won't be planned hunts but I'm sure certain families will go. I'm going to go out soon for a caribou hunt. I need some food for our family as well."

He said throughout the consultation process, the Yellowknives had pushed for restricted hunting for NWT residents and outfitters and this was the first he'd heard of a ban on aboriginal hunting.

"It's not right. We told them no restrictions," Drygeese said. "Finally the government puts a stop to the hunt but they're not supposed to be stopping the Dene way of life."

Montana-based hunting guide John Andre said he hopes First Nations fight the government's decree.

He said he was outraged by the decision.

"For them to close down aboriginal harvesting, this is how people there eat. They don't have the right to do that," he said.

Amanda Peterson, an outfitter whose family runs the Peterson's Point Lake Lodge, located approximately 350 km north of Yellowknife, said she was disappointed the government had made the decision prior to public consultations scheduled to be held in February.

"I understand the precautionary measure but it's deflating because it's almost like a decision has been made. How does a minister modify this," she said, adding from her experience, she has only ever seen healthy caribou. She said she doesn't think the benefit of cancelling the outfitting hunt will make up for the huge loss her family and employees will be facing this winter.

In November, the Tlicho and territorial governments released a joint report that proposed a ban on caribou tags for commercial, resident and outfitter hunts until 2012. Public hearings regarding the proposal were supposed to give interested parties the opportunity to share their concerns. A long list of intervenors, including Peterson and Andre signed up to share their perspectives.

The new restrictions will remain in place until the Wek'eezhii Renewable Resources Board makes recommendations on how to proceed said Judy McLinton, an ENR spokeswoman. She said the board's report isn't expected until March.

McLinton also said the restrictions will be monitored in the restricted zone through compliance checks.

To accommodate for the change, the department also announced it is created two new wood bison hunting zones in the North Slave region. One of the zones is only open to people with tags provided by the Tlicho government or the Yellowknives Dene. The second zone will be open to general hunting licence holders for unrestricted hunting. All hunting in that area would have to be reported to ENR within 72 hours.

The release did not specify where these zones would be, how many tags would be available and whether hunters would be able to kill cows.