Wildlife and Tourism, by Shannon Donahue

One of the concepts that Chuck Jonkel stresses about the Great Bear Foundation trip to Churchill to learn more about arctic ecology is that we go to Churchill as travelers, not tourists. What does this mean? The word, "tourist," has developed some negative connotations, summed up by the statement that people leave their brains at home when they go on vacation. The popular image of the American tourist is a loud, ignorant, brightly clad yahoo with an expensive camera and a fat wallet. While this is a stereotype, it is an image that prevails around the world, even if it truly speaks only of an obnoxious minority. When we journey as travelers, rather than tourists, we explore a place quietly, with open minds, eyes, ears, and hearts. We spend time getting to know the place, rather than making sure the place knows all about us. We practice humility.

While the polar bears and other wildlife were sensational, some of the most enjoyable moments of our trip to Churchill this year were quiet times when we got out of the bus to explore the landscape. We sauntered through the boreal forest, and Chuck taught us how to make "caribou craters," clearing away snow to pick sweet, frozen low bush cranberries. We marveled at the lichens and let the arctic air flush our cheeks with color.

Tourism is a double-edged sword. Communities need the economic stimulus that tourism provides, but the monetary benefits come with their own drawbacks. Tourism fundamentally changes the character of a place and the community that lives there, as well as the wildlife and the ecosystem itself. In northern regions, such as Canada and Alaska, communities that long thrived on a subsistence basis have now become part of the integrated market economy, a relatively recent change that has altered lifestyles and made people dependent on resources outside of the community. Many of us love to explore new places and get to know other cultures, but it is vital that we consider the impacts of our travels.

Part of the experience of traveling with the Great Bear Foundation is that we travel overland. It would be alot easier to fly into Churchill, but most of us began our journey as a group in Missoula, traveling for two days by bus across Montana, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and then boarding a train in The Pas, Manitoba for the last 24 (or more) hour leg of the trip, along with group members who traveled from Winnipeg. Traveling overland, we established a firm connection with our continent. Chuck pointed out evidence of the last ice age, and of course he pointed out water molecules that had traveled from Montana all the way to Manitoba and ultimately, Hudson Bay, where they nourish the polar bears. Sitting in the parked bus at the Montana/Alberta border as we waited for some cranky bureaucrats to waive us across the border, we watched a flock of snow geese fly across the border into Canada, backlit by a gorgeous prairie sunset that illuminated both sides of the border.

Traveling through northern Manitoba by train is slow going. The railroad was built on permafrost, which is now melting unevenly below the tracks, making for a train ride that feels more like a boat on the open seas. The train must travel very slowly because of the uneven tracks, and somewhere along the way we passed the wreckage of a freight train that had derailed over the summer. For those who still doubt the reality of global warming, take a trip up north.

Towards the end of our journey, we started spotting caribou. An hour later, we had seen two to three thousand caribou, a sight that people who have been traveling to Churchill for decades swore they had never seen in that area. It was a magnificent experience in all, but one couldn't help but wonder what the herd was doing in this place where they have rarely been seen before?

Within an hour or so of arriving in Churchill, we saw our first bear. It is always thrilling to see a bear in the wild, but a polar bear inspires its own sense of wonder and amazement. Over the course of our five days in Churchill, we saw numerous bears, an arctic fox, some red fox, an arctic hare, and a beautiful northern hawk owl. After a few days of watching wildlife, we realized that we kept seeing bears licking the ground in a certain spot.

One day, a tour bus conveniently parked in that area, and then we saw a polar bear walk directly over to the spot in question and start licking the ground intently. We thought something fishy was going on, so the next morning we visited the spot, where we found a substance that we took to be fryer grease poured all over a rock and the ground next to it. Somebody was obviously baiting the bears to "improve" the bear viewing opportunities. We took some photos and reported the incident to the Department of Natural Resources, but it's not likely that anything will come of it, because the authorities are apparently afraid to make waves in the community.

More than once, we parked the bus at a respectful distance from a polar bear, and the bear approached the bus to check us out. One bear walked all the way around the bus, and when it got near the back of the bus, where our lunches were stored, it took obvious notice of the scent. At another point, a bear actually stood up and put its nose right up to the bus. Bears are known to be very curious animals, but they should not be looking to humans for food. Bears are very intelligent and learn quickly about easy food sources. Every time a human makes food available for bears, the bears in question lose a bit of their wild integrity, and they become more likely to get in trouble with humans, which often means death for the bear. Stories abound in Churchill about tour operators feeding bears bits of cheese and helicopter pilots flying too close to the bears and harassing them. Certainly not all tour operators are behaving this way, but even if the culprits are few in numbers, their impact is serious.

Meanwhile, at the "bear jail," bears that come into town are confined without food or social interaction until they can be transported by helicopter to the edge of the sea ice, where they can hunt for ringed seals, their staple food source. The day that we visited the bear jail, a "bear lift" was scheduled to transport a female and cub away from town. The bears were conscious, but immobilized, and they were confined in separate nets that looked like fishing nets and suspended from the helicopter to be transported to more appropriate habitat. Several buses in addition to our own and town folks turned out for the spectacle. The bear lift could be an effective, although unpleasant, management technique, except that it does not address the root of the problem: the humans who are deliberately food-conditioning bears to improve their tourism business in the short term. Authorities are turning a blind eye to the real problem and then punishing the bears when they learn to associate humans with food. Bears are learning to adapt to life among humans, but the humans refuse to adapt their own behavior so that bears and humans can safely share the same habitat.

Every species of bear around the world has had to adapt to humans expanding into their habitat. Bears are intelligent, adaptable animals, and, as opportunistic feeders, they can quickly learn to find new food sources from humans when human development limits natural food resources. When humans provide food for bears, whether it be intentionally or through negligence, bears can become dangerous, and they lose some of their wild integrity. If we want bears to follow our rules, we need to play by the rules ourselves. How are bears to learn to avoid town settlements and keep their distance from people, when the people break the rules all the time?

Wildlife tourism is a relatively new and growing industry. It can benefit wildlife as a whole by increasing awareness of wildlife and conservation, but wildlife tourism must be conducted in a careful and respectful manner. Designated wildlife viewing facilities manage human activity with the safety of both humans and wildlife in mind. People who wish to view wildlife must always be conscious that they are visitors in the animals' habitat, and they must do everything they can to have as little impact on the wildlife and the ecosystem possible.

Wildlife viewing is about the wildlife, not the human. It is never acceptable to approach wildlife or to allow access to human foods, whether intentionally or by accident. Wildlife should be observed from a safe and respectful distance, and visitors should never attempt to interact with the wildlife, which includes making noises to get the animal to look toward the camera. Although the animal may not appear to be affected by human presence, there is typically an internal response, such as elevated heart rate, that costs the animal energy despite a lack of observable response.

Currently, media coverage of wildlife is dominated by people who harass the wildlife and test the limits of wild animals' tolerance of humans. This conveys a harmful message that encourages people to interact with wildlife in an unsafe and disrespectful manner. We must be mindful of the effects of our actions and realize that the animals are not there for our entertainment. We must maintain a sense of humility in the natural world. We are only one species, interconnected with all the others.