The relation between climate and abundance cycles in barren-ground caribou herds of the Northwest Territories, Canada ...

• Main Author: Zalatan, Rebecca
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: University of British Columbia 2010
• Subjects: Arctic; Northwest Territories; Rangifer tarandus; Tundra
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0092761; https://doi.library.ubc.ca/10.14288/1.0092761

The central objective of this research was to determine if there is a relationship between long-term barren-ground caribou (Rangifer tarandus) abundance and climate patterns in the Canadian Arctic. A long-term dataset indexing caribou abundance was obtained from the frequency of trampling scars on tree roots of black spruce (Picea mariana [Mill.] BSP) in the forest-tundra of central Northwest Territories. Samples were collected from roots of live trees along well-used migration trails in the forest tundra. Two groups of sites were sampled that roughly corresponded with the late summer migration routes of the Bathurst and Beverly caribou herds. The scar frequency distributions were dated from A.D. 1760-2000 and both groups of sites showed similar abundance patterns through time. To best determine the relation between long-term climate and the proxy caribou abundance, local climate data were needed. However, the only annually-resolved climate data in the region is the short length of record (63 years) ...