Grants and Contributions

Leveraging onjoing moose and wolf research through the collaborative Porcupine Caribou Knowledge Hub, the project combines western-scientific and Gwich'in Knowledge to: estimate moose abundance, demographics, and predation; and, collect Gwich'in Knowledge and community perspectives on contemporary and historic trends in moose populations, harvest, and drivers of change. We will support on-the-land knowledge sharing through community moose hunts and gatherings to facilitate knowledge exchange, and analysis and dissemination of VGFN elders' knowledge recording within the local government's Traditional Knowledge database. Knowledge will inform planning for enhanced community resilience and food security, and will provide necessary and current information about moose ecology in a changing climate within Vuntut Gwitchin Traditional Territory while informing partners of changes occurring within the Porcupine Caribou summer range.

NYCS will be an Indigenous-led think tank or “circle of experts” located in Northern Yukon where the most pressing impacts of climate change in
North Yukon are discussed; solutions are studied and developed; and knowledge is consolidated and governed by the Nations. NYCS aims to build true full-life sustainability, climate resilience, and self-determination for First Nations in Northern Yukon by creating a space where climate solutions rooted in Indigenous science and ways of being are developed.

This collaborative initiative will provide and facilitate strategic direction, leadership, and funding to help address knowledge gaps surrounding what is driving the changes in barren-ground caribou abundance and what the future holds. The team sets out to publish a collaborative special report comparing the barren-ground caribou herds to support decision-making in the NWT and beyond. This will be achieved through funding research and monitoring projects that are traditional knowledge-based, science-based and/or projects that combine approaches, including community-led monitoring projects, focusing on barren-ground caribou herds that are entirely or partially within the NWT.

We propose new research on forest management near Teslin, Yukon to design and test timber harvest and revegetation treatments to direct trajectories of forest recovery from disturbance towards desirable ecological outcomes that support community resilience and well-being. Teslin is at an ideal stage to serve as a model system for community adaptation to climate change and fire risk in northern boreal forests, and the learning that results from this project will be of great value to other northern communities facing similar challenges

Expanding on recent water quality monitoring work by the First Nation of Nacho-Nyak Dun (FNNND) in collaboration with researchers at Carleton University, the project aimst to further develop FNNND’s capacity for continuous (automated) monitoring of key water quality parameters to ensure extreme conditions are observed, such as large pulses of sediment in streamwater following rain events over disturbed watersheds and during breaches of settling ponds from placer mine sites. The focus of continuous water quality monitoring will be on total suspended solids and water temperature, which are critical indicators of Chinook Salmon and Arctic Grayling habitat. Additional objectives include analysis and mapping of the cumulative impacts of landscape disturbances on water quality across the southern traditional territory of the FNNND as confirmed within our modern-day treaty agreement.

This project aims to build climate change decision-making capacity within the Kluane First Nation (KFN) community with a researcher-led and community supported participatory approach. In the short term, the project will engage KFN citizens to express how their livelihoods and relationships with the land are currently impacted by climate change, and to foster partnerships and co-learning opportunities between KFN and climate change researchers to empower KFN citizens in environmental stewardship. Longer term, the project will generate accessible, high resolution climate change scenarios for the Kluane region.

The project will provide the scientific evidence base to quantify the impacts of changes in the nature, extent, seasonality, and character of all things snow and ice and provide plans and strategies for Nunatsiavummiut and Nunavimmiut to manage future change.The project will undertake research co-created with Inuit investigators and partners, to understand changes in the ice, water, ecosystems, and animal habitats in the Torngat Mountains National Park.

Earth’s Barren-ground Caribou Education Program will engage youth across Canada to learn more about the importance of caribou to Indigenous peoples in the North. The project will advance knowledge of the Arctic to improve environmental stewardship related to barren ground caribou and the intersectional impacts of climate change and community wellness.

This project will provide training in the Traditional Territory of the Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation (VGFN) near Crow Flats, north and east of Old Crow, Yukon, in March of 2023. This field-based activity will allow students to complete a course-based requirement for their programming.
The training will be comprised of credit-based coursework that will see Yukon University students travel to Crow Flats by snowmobile to a campsite used by the community for cultural engagement. In concert with First Nation citizen knowledge holders and Elders, students will conduct snow and ice science activities, do baseline assessments of available flora and fauna and local geomorphology, and buttress that data with learning and traditional environmental knowledge provided by around seven VGFN citizens.

The project will provide professional development for its Inuvik-based Special Projects Coordinator for one-week of in-person training (followed by remote learning) in watershed delineation, terrain characterization, and thermokarst mapping from the Northwest Territories Geological Survey (NTGS). The project also includes the acquisition of a high-performance workstation and monitor to support remote training, and future hydrology and water monitoring programs undertaken at the Arctic Research Institute.