The Land
Beaufort Region
(Part I)
by
David Morrison
Curator of N.W.T. Archaeology
(District of Mackenzie)
Canadian Museum of Civilization
Physiography
This westernmost part of the Canadian Arctic is divided in two by the Mackenzie River. 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. 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.
East of the Lakes, the Anderson River flows north into Wood Bay at the base of the Cape Bathurst Peninsula, a great thumb-shaped point thrusting north into the Arctic Sea. 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. 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.
Most 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. 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. 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.
