Natural History and the Deep Roots of Resource Management

Abstract

I stand shivering at the edge of a block of ice roughly the size of Connecticut. The wind blows the coyote fur ruff on my parka hood; I stamp my feet to encourage circulation to my toes. Behind me a vast white plain stretches toward the unseen Brooks Range, while in front the cobalt blue water of the Arctic Ocean shimmers in the golden midnight light. Late May, the sun will not set again until mid-August. Instead, it rolls along the horizon each night, west to east, before arcing back into the sky. I’m perched atop a jumbled mass of icy blocks rumpled up a couple weeks ago by the slow, grinding collision of floating pack ice with the more stable shorefast ice. For a couple days the sea had simply disappeared—replaced by an immense interlocking puzzle of ice. Sure enough, though, the wind shifted direction and pushed the pack ice back out toward the northern horizon. I stand at the edge of this ice cliff, scanning the water intently. This arctic springtime, on the sea ice near Point Barrow, Alaska, yields no flowers. Rather, the movement of animals marks the season of renewal. Seabirds and waterfowl stream past in flocks of tens and hundreds of thousands, all heading toward the bounty of the Mackenzie River delta. My quarry, too, heads in that direction, and for the same purpose—to transform the summer profusion of nutrients and invertebrates into offspring. Bowhead whales have traveled the ragged ice edge along the northern Alaskan coast since before human memory. But in the past few years, scientists and conservationists have become alarmed at the scarcity of bowheads. Local Inuit want to celebrate the spring return of the whales by hunting a few, as they always have. The American government, the world leader in the reform of international whaling laws, finds itself in an awkward political position—caught in the crossfire of two laudable intentions, honoring the traditional subsistence habits of indigenous peoples and saving the most