Life Above the 60th Parallel
This week I took a long drive to my new home in the Northwest Territories, Canada. Now, I’m living on a small farm above the 60th parallel, tending a garden and taking care of a small flock of chickens and some rabbits — and already concerned about keeping them alive through a subarctic winter.
There will be a lot to say in the months to come as I learn beyond my first impressions here and build relationships with my neighbors — people, animals, river, land. But first I’ll start with the drive.
For the better part of 1,300 miles from Vancouver, my wife and I, with our dog in tow, followed a two-lane highway through a dense forest of paper birch, black spruce, and the occasional Jack pine. We passed by muddy rivers, burn scars, wetlands, moose, and black bears (three, right by the highway). We were mesmerized by dramatic thunderheads and the long daylight hours.
This is the boreal — a place I had only read about so far and still barely comprehend, though it is a place of profound significance. The Canadian boreal contains a quarter of Earth’s remaining intact forest, and, as journalist Jimmy Thomson wrote in The Narwhal, “the effects of the forest reach out to the surrounding areas and the entire globe.” Whooping cranes, for instance, are my new summer neighbors, nesting here after their journey from the Texas Gulf Coast, close to where I grew up. The boreal provides sanctuary for many other species of birds and animals, and its soils and trees also take in carbon.
Of course, the boreal hasn’t escaped the impacts of climate change and industry. Intensifying forest fires, melting permafrost, logging, mining, and oil and gas production have all brought exploit-or-protect discussions to a heated crossroads as the North grows increasingly warmer. Just last week, the Arctic Council confirmed that the Arctic is warming three times faster than the rest of the planet.
I’m fortunate to have the opportunity to live in this magical place for a year. Even on first impressions I know that the boreal will have a profound impact on me — just as the future of this place will have an impact on all of us.
Austin Price
Contributing Editor, Earth Island Journal
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Photo by: Nacho Arenas
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