Civilization.ca - The Land-Beaufort Region (In Detail)-I

The Land
Beaufort Region
(Part I)
by
David Morrison
Curator of N.W.T. Archaeology
(District of Mackenzie)
Canadian Museum of Civilization

The Arctic takes its name from the Greek word for bear, arctos, for it lies under the constellation of the Great Bear. For the modern

geographer, it can be defined in two ways. One is astronomical, for the Arctic Circle, at 66 degrees 30 minutes north, defines the lowest latitude in which the sun does not set for a 24-hour period at the summer solstice. In other words, the Arctic is the land of the midnight sun. The other way is vegetational; the Arctic lies north of the tree line, in an area where summer temperatures are too cold to allow the growth of trees. Of the two definitions, only one is appropriate to the lower Mackenzie valley area, and that is the vegetational definition. The Arctic Circle runs through well-forested country, to the south of such Subarctic settlements as Fort MacPherson and Tsiigehtchic (formerly Arctic Red River). The tree line lies further north, actually reaching tide water at the West Channel of the Mackenzie River, and again in the upper Eskimo Lakes. North of it lies the Arctic, the home of the Inuvialuit.

Physiography

This westernmost part of the Canadian Arctic is divided in two by the Mackenzie River (Mackay 1963). To the west, in the northern Yukon, are the austere Richardson Mountains and their foothills, the northernmost extension of the Rockies reaching nearly to the sea. In front of them lies a low, narrow coastal plain, cut by a few fast rivers like the Firth, the Babbage, and the Blow. To the east of the Mackenzie lies the low, pond-dotted Tuktoyaktuk Peninsula, bounded on the south by the Eskimo Lakes (Rampton 1988). These so-called lakes are actually an arm of the sea coming in from Liverpool Bay in the east almost as far as the Mackenzie River, moulded into several lake-like basins by ice-push ridges, remnants of the continental glaciers of Ice Age.

East of the Lakes, the Anderson River, second largest in the area, flows north into Wood Bay at the base of the Cape Bathurst Peninsula, a great thumb-shaped point thrusting north into the Arctic Sea (Mackay 1958). Most of the peninsula is drained by the Horton River, the northernmost navigable river on the North American continent. Once the Horton flowed north and west to empty into Harrowby Bay on the west side of the Cape Bathurst Peninsula. But a few hundred years ago it broke through a barrier of low alluvial hills to the east, and now empties into Franklin Bay, leaving a tell-tale series of stagnant oxbows to mark its former path

(Mackay 1981). The alluvial hills through which it cut are part of the famous Smoking Hills, full of sulphur and other combustable materials, which have been burning in various locations for thousands of years (Mathews and Bustin 1982; Yorath et al. 1975).

Aside from the Richardsons, and the Smoking Hills, almost all of the western Canadian Arctic is comparatively flat and low lying, with a heavy alluvial mantle of soil. Nowhere is it more so than in the Mackenzie Delta itself, a vast marsh only a few metres above sea level, dotted with ponds and cut by innumerable meandering streams (Mackay 1963). Travelling by water in summer, it presents an almost impenetrable maze through which only long-term residents can easily find their way. Inuvik, the largest town in the area, and Aklavik, the oldest, are both located on or in the Delta, in part because of the excellent muskrat trapping it affords. But it is poor in other animal resources, and was little occupied until the trapping industry began in the late nineteenth century.

Climate

The area has a typical Low Arctic climate (Mackay 1963: 153-163). Summers are short and cool, although near the tree line temperatures of 30 degrees centigrade are not unknown. By early September summer is definitely over, with freezing temperatures at night. Freeze-up occurs in late October, and temperatures in January and February typically run to -35 degrees centigrade or colder. By May the Mackenzie River is beginning to break, although the coast is still locked in ice. Inland, the Eskimo Lakes and various other large bodies of water are usually ice covered into late June. In the winter there is little or no daylight from late November until the end of January, while in the summer one can read inside a tent at midnight with no artificial illumination.