Ulukhaktok (Kangiryuarmiutun (Inuit language) spelling Ulukhaqtuuq [ulukhɑqtuːq̚] and known until 1 April 2006 as Holman or Holman Island) is a small hamlet on the west coast of Victoria Island, in the Inuvik Region of the Northwest Territories, Canada.

Like other small traditional communities in the territories, hunting, trapping, and fishing are major sources of income, but printmaking has taken over as the primary source of income in recent years.

The two principal languages in Ulukhaktok are the Kangiryuarmiutun dialect of Inuinnaqtun, which is politically part of the Inuvialuktun group, and English. 

 

History: The first people to settle in the area were Natkusiak and his family in 1937. Two years later, the Hudson's Bay Company relocated from Walker Bay and a Roman Catholic mission was opened the same year.

The English name, Holman, was in honour of J.R. Holman, a member of Sir Edward Augustus Inglefield's 1853 expedition in search for the Arctic explorer, John Franklin. The community was sometimes known as Holman Island. This, however, is the name of the small island outcrop to the east-southeast in the Amundsen Gulf.

In 2006, the community was renamed, Ulukhaktok, the traditional Kangiryuarmiutun name for the area, which means "the place where ulu parts are found", or "a large bluff where we used to collect raw material to make ulus".The large bluff that overlooks Ulukhaktok was the source that provided the slate and copper used to make ulus and give the community its name. Thus, the people who live there are called Ulukhaktokmiut ⁽people of"). Ulukhaktokmiut is a recent word as no people actually lived permanently in this area until the opening of the Hudson's Bay Company store, although people did visit the area to obtain the ulu materials and camp en route to other nomadic seasonal camp areas.

Inuit traded with mainland groups as far east as King William Island and as far south as Great Bear Lake although most commerce occurred with the Inuvialuit and Copper Inuit populations indigenous to the Coppermine River watershed and Bernard Harbour seasonal areas on the mainland. The majority of Ulukhaktokmiut come from a varied background, with family ties extending mainly to the Coppermine River community of Kugluktuk, Nunavut and the communities of the Mackenzie River Delta and Beaufort Sea, though some families have relatives as far away as Gjoa Haven on King William Island, and along the north slope of Alaska as far as Port Clarence on the Seward Peninsula.

Some families are descendants of the Danish explorer-trader Christian Klengenberg. Others are descended from two members of the Vilhjalmur Stefansson-led, Canadian Arctic Expedition. The first was Natkusiak, a friend of Stefansson, and the primary guide and lead hunter of the expedition. Originally from Port Clarence, Alaska he was later known as Billy Banksland, this name coming from his time trapping Arctic foxes on Banks Island. Another member of the expedition with relatives in the area was the Alaskan Iñupiat, Ikey Bolt from Point Hope. Married to Klengenberg's daughter Etna, they lived for several years at Rymer Point before moving to Minto Inlet and eventually to Coppermine (now Kugluktuk).

Economy

The hamlet has seen both sides of the rush for mineral exploration and has regained an appreciation for its wild places and culturally sensitive areas where long-gone relatives once survived and lived with the ice and snow. Some private concerns have witnessed the zeal with which these locals defend their competing interests for the same tracts of land and resources. Other companies have learned to work with residents and this has produced some hope for mineral development around traditional lands and other cultural areas of these Inuvialuit and their fellow Inuit brethren. Arts and crafts are also another source of income with international recognition of local artisans. Occasionally some residents travel to such places as San Francisco, California or Melbourne, Australia, but more often to other regional centres across the north.

Ulukhaktok is home to the Holman Eskimo Co-op which was formed by the residents of the community with the help of a Roman Catholic priest, Father Henri Tardy. The Co-op was formed to provide income to the residents of the community by producing arts and crafts, and is famous for the production of prints. Formally Holman Prints, artists in the community sell their art though the Ulukhaktok Arts Centre. Famous artists who have produced prints for the Holman Eskimo Co-op include Mary K. Okheena and Helen Kalvak. The local school, Helen Kalvak Elihakvik is named after her. The Holman Eskimo Co-op is now involved in arts and crafts, retailing, the hotel business, and cable television. It operates both a Canada Post outlet, and the fuel delivery contract, and is the local Aklak Air agent.

 

Ulukhaktok is also the location of the world's most northern golf course and hosts the "Billy Joss Open Celebrity Golf Tournament" every summer. Over the years they have managed to attract players from the Edmonton Oilers and the Edmonton Eskimos, as well as golfers from other countries. This tournament is growing and features excursions to traditional areas where Arctic char and Northern Lake trout are harvested for subsistence as well as limited commercial fishing and hunting.

 

Climate:  Arctic tundra occurs in the far Northern Hemisphere, north of the taiga belt. The word "tundra" usually refers only to the areas where the subsoil is permafrost, or permanently frozen soil. (It may also refer to the treeless plain in general, so that northern Sápmi would be included.) Permafrost tundra includes vast areas of northern Russia and Canada. The polar tundra is home to several peoples who are mostly nomadic reindeer herders, such as the Nganasan and Nenets in the permafrost area (and the Sami in Sápmi).

Arctic tundra contains areas of stark landscape and is frozen for much of the year. The soil there is frozen from 25 to 90 cm (10 to 35 in) down, making it impossible for trees to grow. Instead, bare and sometimes rocky land can only support certain kinds of Arctic vegetation, low growing plants such as moss, heath (Ericaceae varieties such as crowberry and black bearberry), and lichen.

There are two main seasons, winter and summer, in the polar tundra areas. During the winter it is very cold and dark, with the average temperature around −28 °C (−18 °F), sometimes dipping as low as −50 °C (−58 °F). However, extreme cold temperatures on the tundra do not drop as low as those experienced in taiga areas further south (for example, Russia's and Canada's lowest temperatures were recorded in locations south of the tree line). During the summer, temperatures rise somewhat, and the top layer of seasonally-frozen soil melts, leaving the ground very soggy. The tundra is covered in marshes, lakes, bogs and streams during the warm months. Generally daytime temperatures during the summer rise to about 12 °C (54 °F) but can often drop to 3 °C (37 °F) or even below freezing. Arctic tundras are sometimes the subject of habitat conservation programs. In Canada, many of these areas are protected through a national Biodiversity Action Plan.

 Tundra tends to be windy, with winds often blowing upwards of 50–100 km/h (30–60 mph). However, in terms of precipitation, it is desert-like, with only about 15–25 cm (6–10 in) falling per year (the summer is typically the season of maximum precipitation). Although precipitation is light, evaporation is also relatively minimal. During the summer, the permafrost thaws just enough to let plants grow and reproduce, but because the ground below this is frozen, the water cannot sink any lower, and so the water forms the lakes and marshes found during the summer months. There is a natural pattern of accumulation of fuel and wildfire which varies depending on the nature of vegetation and terrain.

The biodiversity of tundra is low: 1,700 species of vascular plants and only 48 species of land mammals can be found, although millions of birds migrate there each year for the marshes.There are also a few fish species. There are few species with large populations. Notable animals in the Arctic tundra include reindeer (caribou), musk ox, Arctic hare, Arctic fox, snowy owl, lemmings, walrus, seal, and even polar bears. Tundra is largely devoid of poikilotherms such as frogs or lizards.

Due to the harsh climate of Arctic tundra, regions of this kind have seen little human activity, even though they are sometimes rich in natural resources such as gold, rubies, diamonds, petroleum, natural gas and uranium. In recent times this has begun to change in Alaska, Nunavut, Northwest Territories, Russia, and some other parts of the world: for example, the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug produces 90% of Russia's natural gas.

Relationship with global warming

A severe threat to tundra is global warming, which causes permafrost to melt. The melting of the permafrost in a given area on human time scales (decades or sooner) could radically change which species can survive there. Many species are facing severe threats to their survival right now.

Another concern is that about one third of the world's soil-bound carbon is in taiga and tundra areas. When the permafrost melts, it releases carbon in the form of carbon dioxide and methane, both of which are greenhouse gases. The effect has already been observed. In the 1970s the tundra was a carbon sink, but today, it is a carbon source. Methane is produced when vegetation decays in lakes and wetlands.

The amount of greenhouse gases which will be released under projected scenarios for global warming have not been reliably quantified by scientific studies, although new studies in Greenland, Nunavut and Antarctica are pointing to heavy sourcing of greenhouse gases. It is certain the impact of increased greenhouse gases from this source will be massive. In addition, as countries continue to use fossil fuels like coal, natural gas, propane and gasoline (which carry gases in the higher atmosphere) and then carried off to the north and south poles, this will accelerate the warming effect of the tundra and the disappearance of icebergs and glaciers will cause a rise in sea levels. This also causes a warming of the waters around the world causing more energy for storms to form and threaten populations in towns and cities.

People around the world are already feeling the effects of global warming, i.e., more severe weather events including stronger winds, more storms with heavier rainfall, hail, freezing rain, snow, ice, tornadoes and hurricanes.

The world is a global village and unless we all put pressure on governments/industries to curb greenhouse gas emissions, many low lying communities will experience storm surges and flooding to the point of having to evacuate populations, and even disappearance under water. Other communities are starting to see drought including agricultural droughts that affect crop production. Drought is a period of unusually dry weather that persists long enough to cause problems such as very dry forests and fires, crop damage and water supply shortages.and harming the ecology/ecosystem of the area.

 Sources:Wikipedia and this author.

 

 

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 Ulukhaktok-Holman Island-

Map of Holman Island.

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Walrus lounge around.

Caribou herd checking us out.

Polar bears.

Female with her cubs.

Traditional transportation of dog sled team.

Now of course, people use ski-doos too.