Yukon Herald – October 11, 2032

Appendix 1. Scenario narratives. Scenario Story Line – S1 – “Doom and Gloom” High Cumulative Impacts, Unpredictable Change, Exploitative Yukon Herald – October 11, 2032 Yukoners Work/Play Hard as Landscape Changes Around Them “What happened to hunting to with and people moving here from fill your freezer?” is a commonly uttered southern provinces may not have grown question lately. In Supergrocery’s up with hunting as a way to put food on weekly sale pamphlet, chicken breast the table.” was listed at $3.38/lb., the same price as Though even for First Nations in Toronto. it’s not all roses. Felix Jackson says, Because of cheap groceries, the “There aren’t enough caribou and moose surge of wage jobs, and changes to anymore to hunt those animals alone and species composition and abundance out we don’t have subsistence rights to bison on the land, people hunt less frequently and elk. If you want tags you have to pay. and mostly recreationally. To pay you need a job. If you have a job For those who continue to hunt, you can only hunt on time off so you hunting has become a different ball need a truck and a snowmobile to hunt game. During the past seven years, due faster. Since you have the truck and to the “conservation concerns” snowmobile you need the job. It is a provisions of the Umbrella Final cycle. Once you start you are stuck. Agreement, First Nation members have Those subsistence ways are old ways.” had hunting priority for caribou, sheep, Because of reduced hunting and moose. This has meant that non- pressure wildlife management and First Nation hunters have had to try their economic development on the landscape luck exclusively with elk, bison, or deer. are the main things contesting growing “Growing up we ate moose meat,” numbers of elk, wood bison and deer. says 32 year-old and avid hunter Simon “These species are taking over Caliber while looking up from a freezer the ranges of caribou, moose and sheep. full of venison. “There hasn’t even been Simply put, they are better able to adapt a lottery for a caribou tag in several to the current circumstances.” By current years. It’s still meat but it’s just not the circumstances, Kluane Region Wildlife same.” Biologist Leanne Rogers refers mostly to According to Whitehorse District the human exploitative pressures that Conservation Officer Jim Walker, even have changed wildlife habitat, but the though elk and wood bison populations landscape has changed in ways beyond have grown, the decline in hunting is not human control as well. surprising. “Hunting takes time. A lot more time than walking down a grocery “The part that blows my mind is the aisle.” He continues to say, “I think a lot variability. The weather can’t make of it has to do with what people grew up up its mind.” 1 adjusting to the variability. “Just last As far as averages go, there is a February both the Aishihik Caribou trend towards warmer, wetter weather Herd and the Aishihik Wood Bison Herd and increasing average temperature is had animals fall through thin ice. There the alleged culprit for much of the weren’t enough cold days in a row for changes. “Subtle changes to temperature ice to thicken enough to support their can cause a host of environmental weight.” responses. Everything is so closely Rogers claims that the estimated linked,” says Karen Chang of 25 caribou that fell into the Nisling Environment Yukon. River was a significant blow to the The story of climate in the SW population, but the over 100 bison that Yukon can hardly be told by averages. In fell into Kloo Lake was barely a dent in 2014 the Intergovernmental Panel on the population. Climate Change flagged the western Arctic rim of North America as the “As the southwest Yukon warms the “miner's canary.” The southwest Yukon spruce bark beetle becomes more and in particular has shown the rest of the more of a problem.” world that climate change means extreme, unpredictable events. Forester Jane Timber says that “The part that blows my mind is the severe weather and high levels of the variability,” says Carmacks resident industrial activity in the southwest Keith Steady. “One year there is record Yukon has made white spruce stands setting snowfall and the next year there more susceptible to pests such as the is a record low. There is rain one spruce bark beetle. summer, then drought. The weather According to Environment can’t make up its mind.” Yukon’s Karen Chang the warmer The great swings in temperature climate has helped some new pest from year to year have huge affects on insects move further north into the snowpack, permafrost, and ice. Flooding Yukon, such as the mountain pine beetle. has become the major concern across the More importantly, though, the time southwest Yukon. required for beetles to reach adulthood is Homeowner Dan Lenza says, shorter and more beetles are surviving “Water levels on my land change year- the winter. to-year it seems,” an observation that is A weakened host and not an exaggeration. New ponds and strengthened pest has been the recipe for wetlands appear suddenly as permafrost increased beetle outbreaks and large thaws, snowpack melts earlier and the swaths of beetle-killed forest throughout pace of glacial melt quickens. the SW Yukon. “Our river basins in the Yukon Kluane Region Wildlife are experiencing higher volumes of Biologist Leanne Rogers says, “As the water than ever before and it’s changing southwest Yukon warms the spruce bark everything,” says Kathy Streams from beetle becomes more and more of a the Department of Water Resources. problem. Beetle-killed spruce forest is Kluane Region Wildlife mostly dead habitat for several years Biologist Leanne Rogers says that until the wind breaks off enough of the wildlife is also having a hard time light blocking branchlets of the spruce 2 trees. Outbreaks have had tremendous Climate Change Action Plan (2009) fell impact on white spruce stands which short to spur the government into real provide good habitat for caribou and action. moose.” A main focus of the When a forest stand becomes the government’s agenda has been economic site of a beetle outbreak it is privately growth, largely through an increase of logged and sold as woodstove fuel. But natural resource extraction and this is not always the case. Several times exportation, as well as providing the in the past few years lightning has struck energy to power the growing economy. before contracts can be negotiated. “We know the climate is “We have always had forest fires, changing and that these changes but not with this frequency and with this manifest dramatically on the landscape. intensity,” says wildland firefighter Jeff But we will not allow it to affect the way Spark. With the thousands of hectares of companies in the Yukon do business,” beetle-killed forest, there is plenty of says Party spokesperson Brad Staunch. fuel once the lightning strikes. And And it hasn’t. The economy strike it does. Despite the SW Yukon continues to boom without concern for a being in St. Elias’s rain shadow, summer future that grows less certain and thunderstorms are 20% more likely than predictable. They invest and expect they were at the turn of the century, reward. meaning more opportunity for lightning. President and CEO of Rocky The Yukon Forest Management Mining, Ltd., Arthur Gold says, “It Branch reports that fires used to happen doesn’t matter if trees turn to shrubs or about once every hundred years in a shrubs turn to trees. Gold will still be given area. That cycle however is now a gold.” historical note. Some of the biggest changes in “From what we have seen in the the southwest Yukon in the past 20 years past 20 years, fires seem to be occurring have come from the industrial sector, at shorter, more irregular intervals. For particularly mining. More and more the landscape, this means that spruce mining claims are changing from trees may not have sufficient time exploration to production, and local between fires to repopulate areas. mineral claims have been increasingly Deciduous vegetation like willow and leased to out-of-territory or out-of- aspen are beginning to dominate the SW country companies. Yukon,” says Forester Jane Timber, Ten years ago today Rocky citing the Takhini burn as the most Mining, Ltd., an Alberta based company, mature example of the new trend. constructed the Killermun mine and began mining quartz claims west of “It doesn’t matter if trees turn to Killermun Lake within the Ruby Range. shrubs or shrubs turn to trees. Gold Residents of Haines Junction have will still be gold.” watched their small town and life, as they knew it, transform over the years. The Yukon’s response to a Helicopter blades chop the air as changing climate can be characterized as miners are trafficked to and from Haines slow at best. Commitments set forth by Junction 5-6 times daily. Quiet summer the Climate Change Strategy (2006) and sunsets are a thing of the past. 3 During time off, miners staying “People have said for years that in Haines Junction are often spotted moose, caribou, and especially sheep are racing speedboats on Pine Lake, beer sensitive species. Research was just coolers full and music blaring. For the never clear about how sensitive. Well, past nine summers, elders have not cast now we know,” says Alice Munroe, fishnets in the lake. Kluane Region Wildlife Technician. The fatal bear attack last year on Mining developments, though a miner at the Killermun Mine campsite invasive, seem to not have affected elk drove Rocky Mining, Ltd.

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