Judging Captured Moments

I felt in over my head as I sat down at the Canadian Geographic executive boardroom table. Across from me was Mike Beedell, a photographer whose work has appeared in magazines ranging from Time to National Geographic. To my right was Laura Stanley, Canadian Geographic‘s photo editor. I was there to round out the three-person judging panel for the 2012 Canadian Wildlife Photography of the Year competition.

Jumping Spider
Winner—Category: On the Prowl
Macro photography comes with its challenges, especially focus and depth of field. In this photo, Alain Fréchette captured the subject in sharp focus. Shiny black spider eyes draw the viewer’s attention immediately. The unlucky fly’s wing is also in focus and enriches the image with its pattern and shine. Image: Alain Fréchette © Alain Fréchette

What would I bring to this expert table? My day-to-day duties have me coordinating the Canadian Museum of Nature’s DNA research lab. Would my opinions be of use in narrowing down 500 images to the 15 winning photographs?

As a young kid, I pleaded with my mother to let me take photos with her camera. Eventually she deemed my arms strong enough to hold up the heavy thing, my finger nimble enough to press the shutter release button. I have enjoyed taking photos ever since.

With a camera in my hands, I can become transfixed by seeing the world through the viewfinder. And then snap, snap, snap, snap. I have to remind myself to come up for air, to see the “full picture” sometimes and not just that limited little view.

Rookie photo-contest judge Roger Bull in the Barron River Canyon, Algonquin Park, Ontario. Image: Rafael Texidor © Rafael Texidor

The museum releases me from the DNA lab sometimes to dabble in other things. I’ve ventured North to help collect and photo-document Arctic plants. And the exhibits team seconds me now and then to help develop photo-based exhibitions that showcase the museum’s research.

But, I have never been more than an enthusiastic amateur photographer. For my co-judges, the evaluation of images is central to their every day. In Mike and Laura, critical reasoning and intuition were at the ready as the first of the 500 candidate photos flashed onto a large wall-mounted screen. I had to make it up as I went along.

Blood Star
Winner—Category: What’s in the Water
Colour, contrast and composition work together to make this an excellent image. With the arms of the blood star and the jumble of eelgrass underneath, there is a vivid sense of movement even though the subject was static. Image: Iain Reid © Iain Reid

Grizzly bears, eider ducks, hemlock trees, swimming salmon seen from under water: image after image flicked by, each one needing a decision. Should this one go to the next round, yes or no? With three judges, each with one vote, no tie results were possible. Hands were wrung whenever the last judge to vote was forced to break a tie, either eliminating a photo or letting it continue.

Bohemian Waxwing
Winner—Category: Junior Photographers (15 years old and younger)
Patience paid off for 15-year-old Jenaya Launstein: the berry poised in the bird’s beak adds something magic to the scene. The composition’s use of the branches and berries is exceptional.
Image: Jenaya Launstein © Jenaya Launstein

Intuition ruled this first elimination round. Four hundred and fifty images rejected by gut reaction. After two hours we were down to 50 photos, 10 for each of five contest categories.

For the final voting round, we switched from intuition to reasoning. Aspiring contest winners, take note! Visual impact, composition, technical quality, content and originality: these are the final criteria used to pick the best of the best. Over a quiet hour, we privately considered each photo, deconstructing overall impact into the four criteria. The combined scores gave us the three winners for each category, which are now on display in the museum’s Stone Wall Gallery until July 7, 2013.

Bulrush
Winner—Category: From the Ground Up
Form and light give life to this photo. The composition—with the sun behind—demonstrates a mastery of the light. The depth of field is also used to advantage: the curve of the bulrush is emphasized by the way it stands out sharply against the background. Image: Victor Liu © Victor Liu

A photo is a fleeting moment captured. A small peek at the world through someone else’s eyes. Deconstructing these personal views of nature felt a bit cold-hearted. But it wouldn’t be a contest without winners! And the process gave me insight into the elements of an exceptional photo, one that turns heads, making us stop and look: “I’ve never seen that before! Amazing…”.

Blue Jay
Winner—Category: Things with Wings
The bird’s movement took but a split second, so a fast shutter speed, patience and a bit of luck to press the button at the right moment were needed. Snowy scenes can be tricky to shoot, but Monique Lavoie balanced the lights and darks. Image: Monique Lavoie © Monique Lavoie

Beneath the Arctic Ice: The Big, the Small and the “Ugh, I Thought Those Were Maggots!”

No, not maggots, just a sample of krill—a small euphausiid shrimp.

Euphausiids, along with copepods (another small crustacean), are the major food source for bowhead whales in the Arctic. Assuming that a krill weighs about a gram, a bowhead whale would need to eat about 100 million krill each year.

The krill looked more appetizing than the mixture of mud, crustaceans and molluscs that grey whales scoop up from the sea bottom and then sieve through their baleen to keep only the tasty bits.

These were just a couple of the fun examples of the Arctic mammal lunchbox items that were displayed by museum zoologists Kathy Conlan, Ed Hendrycks, André Martel, Noel Alfonso and Jackie Madill on April 27 and 28, 2013, the last weekend of the Extraordinary Arctic Festival. As a museum volunteer, I assisted the researchers in this activity and learned a lot of interesting facts while doing so.

Do you know how walruses find clams, one of their major lunch items? They patrol the sea floor with their snout and find the clams with their moustache-like vibrissae. They dislodge the clams by fanning the mud with their big front flippers, aided by jets of water from their mouth, and suck the flesh right out of the shells. Yum!?

Visitors had a closer look at some bottom-dwelling marine organisms like those found beneath the ice cover in the Arctic. These included a leather starfish (Dermasterias imbricata) fondly named Harold by an enthusiastic young visitor. The critters were safely returned to their aquarium. Image: Jackie Madill © Canadian Museum of Nature.

There were lots of smiles from both the young and older on seeing some marine creatures up close.

Many had a go at drawing various shells with the aid of a microscope and a camera lucida. A camera lucida allows you to see the image of what is under the microscope and your drawing page at the same time. You can then reproduce what you see using a combination of tracing and shading. This technique is used by museum scientists to make detailed drawings of tiny organisms.

Judging by the efforts we saw at the weekend, there were some budding artists and biological illustrators among the visitors!

Showing excellent attention to detail, a young visitor draws a shell using the camera lucida. Image: Jackie Madill © Canadian Museum of Nature.

The Canadian Museum of Nature has thousands of samples in its research and collections facility (in Gatineau, Quebec) that represent an invaluable record of diverse Arctic vertebrate and invertebrate species. Judith Price, Assistant Collection Manager of invertebrates, is an expert at looking after these specimens.

Judith Price in the belly of the whale. Image: © CWClark

At the weekend activity in the museum, Judith was appropriately located in the belly of the blue-whale skeleton in the RBC Blue Water Gallery, having fun showing visitors various types of parasites that can be found in Arctic marine and terrestrial mammals. Whales can be infested with tapeworms that are several metres long, and nematodes (round worms) also come in size XXL when found in whales.

To add to the creep factor, Judith also showed larvae of caribou bot flies, including some in a skin sample, and liver worms contracted by sled dogs that were fed raw fish, a cheap and available food in Canada’s North.

I admit it: my gut reaction to lampreys is “ugh!” Considering the teeth of lampreys and how they feed, this is understandable perhaps…? There was an interesting display about research being conducted by museum scientists on Arctic lampreys in rivers around Great Slave Lake, Northwest Territories. Interestingly, these lampreys don’t latch onto humans.

As learned more, I found that my “ugh” reaction decreased and my curiosity and interest increased. I had no idea that some lampreys are not parasitic, and that perhaps both parasitic and non-parasitic forms of lampreys may exist within one species. Why and how? How important are lampreys in the dynamics of Lake Trout populations?

A visitor contemplates the rows of teeth on a lamprey. No evidence of an “ugh!” reaction here. Image: Jackie Madill © Canadian Museum of Nature.

This was my first time being a volunteer at the museum. It was a fun and educational experience—the questions that people ask, the enthusiasm and curiosity of the young visitors, and the smiles and laughs!!! It was also a great opportunity to learn more about the wide range of research that is being done by scientists at the Canadian Museum of Nature. Where’s the sign-up sheet for next time? ☺

Case Closed: Suitcase Exhibitions

While completing an internship at the Canadian Museum of Nature in Exhibits, I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to participate in a wide variety of projects. However, the main focus of my internship was to provide support for the Travelling Exhibitions programme.

This is the standard case that is used for the suitcase exhibitions. They are shipped to dozens of locations across Canada each year. Image: Lyndsey Sullivan

With a background in Museum Studies, I have experience with the various formats in which exhibitions can be presented. Initially, my knowledge of suitcase-sized travelling exhibitions was somewhat limited. Prior to beginning my internship, I conducted some online research and studied the nine suitcase exhibitions offered by the museum. I could not conceive how all the components listed could possibly fit into a single case!

Throughout the course of my internship, I have been responsible for shipping and receiving the suitcase exhibitions from host venues across Canada. While reporting on the condition of the contents of these exhibitions during the first week of my internship, I quickly began to realize exactly how much could really be packed into this 76 cm × 45 cm × 28 cm Pelican case!

Lindsey Sullivan unpacks the From Dinosaurs to Mammals suitcase exhibition. One table is almost not enough to display it all! Images: Rachel Gervais (left), Lyndsey Sullivan (right) © Canadian Museum of Nature

There is so much to discover in each exhibition; it often takes me quite a while to verify the contents of each suitcase because I get wrapped up in all of the amazing specimens, books and activities.

I’ve now had the opportunity to explore all of the suitcase exhibitions that the museum has to offer. Opening each case was a new experience. Imagine opening a suitcase and removing the top layer, only to discover several animal skulls, casts of dinosaur jaws and real fossils!

The From Dinosaurs to Mammals suitcase exhibition. Left: The first layer in the case contains graphic panels, illustrated books and other interpretive materials. Right: The bottom layer of the case holds 10 mounted specimens and casts. Images: Lyndsey Sullivan © Canadian Museum of Nature

Even with a background in Biology, I have learned so many new things, like what a whale’s baleen looks and feels like, and that fossilized feces (coprolite) exists.

In addition to all of the amazing things in each case, I was really pleased to see the number of suitcase exhibitions that are a representation of the museum’s full-sized exhibitions and galleries. This translation is wonderful because some people are not able to visit the museum regularly. The real specimens and realistic replicas are normally only found within the museum’s full sized exhibitions, and are not generally items one might anticipate viewing at a community centre or in a classroom.

I am extremely grateful to have been given the opportunity to explore the depths of what can be found in these cases.

Preparing for the Unexpected When Disaster Strikes

Nature Unleashed is about to end its seven-month run at the museum. One lesson everyone can take away from this exhibition about natural disasters is to plan and prepare—before the next disaster hits!. Learn more from Amy Jarrette with Public Safety Canada, which partnered with the museum during the show’s stay in Ottawa.

If you haven’t yet checked out the Nature Unleashed exhibition at the Canadian Museum of Nature, do it this week before it closes! My kids and I had a great time on our recent visit. They loved the hurricane simulator, and we all had a blast (pun intended) creating different types of volcanoes at the push of a button.

Simulating volcano explosions is one of the interactive activities in Nature Unleashed.
Image: Martin Lipman © Canadian Museum of Nature

While Sunday marks the last day of the exhibition, it also marks the start of the 18^th annual Emergency Preparedness Week across Canada. Both remind us of the power of Mother Nature, the importance of being prepared for severe weather and other emergencies…if you needed a reminder after winter in Ottawa! That’s why the theme of this year’s Emergency Preparedness Week is ‘Make a Plan’.

As the manager of the Get Prepared campaign at Public Safety Canada, I work with a team that partners with the Canadian Red Cross and other first responder organizations to spread the word about emergency preparedness. And as a mother of two young kids, I know firsthand how useful it is to have an emergency plan.

A lightning bolt flashes across the night sky over Kelowna, B.C during a series of forest fires in 2009.
Image: Dennis Dudley © Environment Canada

A plan will help you and your family know what to do in case of an emergency. For example, your family may not be together when an emergency occurs. A plan will help you identify, in advance, where to meet if you can’t get home or need to evacuate. Consider a safe place to meet, such as a community centre, library, or school. Having a plan, and discussing it with loved ones, will save time and make real situations less stressful.

Showing my family this video on GetPrepared.ca helped to get the conversation going —it’s only three minutes long, so it was able to hold my kids attention. Afterwards, we checked out GetPrepared’s mobile website. This is a great resource that focusses on the key steps to take during various emergencies, like the simple advice to “drop, cover, hold on!” during an earthquake.

While it’s less likely my family and I will experience a major emergency like those featured in Nature Unleashed, it’s almost certain we’ll be affected by severe weather at some point. For this reason, it’s a good idea to assemble a basic emergency kit using the list on GetPrepared.ca.

Get some peace of mind for your family with an emergency kit.
Image: © Public Safety Canada

Items such as a flashlight, radio and non-perishable food can make a world of difference in an emergency. Enlist your kids or other family members in making your kit. And as a side benefit, these kits, or a related gadget like a weather radio, make great gift ideas for those who have (almost) everything.

This Emergency Preparedness Week, take a few minutes to check out GetPrepared.ca. It may not be quite as fun as a hurricane simulator, but hopefully it will help you face the unexpected, and provide a little peace of mind.

Snapshots at a Museum

“Can I have your autograph? Please”. The questioner was a little blonde-haired girl, about 10 or 12, pink jacket wrapped around her like a security blanket. This was not, as you might think, backstage at a Justin Bieber concert; rather, it happened in the fossil gallery of the Canadian Museum of Nature. The young visitor wanted an autograph from palaeontologist Natalia Rybczynski, a museum researcher.

Natalia Rybczynski collects a piece of the High Arctic camel on Ellesmere Island, Nunavut. She uses toilet paper to gently wrap the bone for transport to her field camp. Image: Martin Lipman © Martin Lipman

This girl had brought her own fossils—collected on a vacation in California—and she even knew what they were (sand dollars) and how old (about 2 million years). She was eager to share her new-found knowledge with a professional researcher like Natalia, who had spent the last three field seasons collecting fossils (including a 3.5 million-year-old camel) on Ellesmere Island, Nunavut.

Throughout April, the museum has been holding an Arctic festival, during which researchers like Natalia—geologists, palaeontologists, botanists and zoologists—have been spending the weekends in the galleries with temporary exhibits. They have been sharing their latest research in a direct way, hands-on. I spent the last three weekends with them and the visitors they have been interacting with. Here are a few snapshots of what I witnessed.

That’s me on the right, answering visitors’ questions about the High Arctic camel fossil. Image: Chuck Clark © Canadian Museum of Nature

“I found this rock on my property and wanted to know what it is”. This time the questioner was an elderly man, peering over his glasses. He was quite willing to hobnob with geologists who could tell him what he found (schist) and how such rocks are formed. Children are not the only hobbyists who collect fossils and rocks! Even so, some children were more impressed, or grossed out, by touching minerals from the Arctic that were formed from 100 million-year-old fish doo doo.

Many visitors enjoyed and were impressed by the unique specimens. Nothing like Natalia’s 3.5 million-year-old camel-fossil shin bone has ever been found that far north before. And mineralogical researcher Ralph Rowe brought samples of a newly discovered mineral: qaqarssukite. “Yes new minerals are discovered every year”, he explained to a mother pushing her son forward. “About forty-five-hundred minerals are known, and every year we find new ones like qaqarssukite.” He helped them adjust the microscope: “It’s the orange crystals embedded in the white stuff”. (Qaqarssukite is a good word to remember for Scrabble. And bonus points if you can figure out how to pronounce it).

Another visitor wanted to know if it was really true, about the healing power of minerals. “Well the body does need some minerals like copper—but too much copper can be toxic. And most minerals are chemically inert. They would just pass right through you”.

A man, somewhat bemused, looked around at other visitors. He turned out to be an investment banker. Coming to the museum, he explained to me, was his way to unwind after a tiring and busy week at work. Looking at rocks was equivalent to spending a day at the spa with cucumbers on your eyes.

Herbarium researchers and technicians demonstrate plant mounting. Image: Chuck Clark © Canadian Museum of Nature

Plant mounting proved to be a similarly refreshing Zen-like activity (or non-activity). Botanists from the herbarium brought many Arctic plant specimens and they demonstrated how such specimens are preserved and mounted on paper for future scientific research.

Visitors were invited to “feed” Velcro-backed mosquitoes to this common butterwort (Pinguicula vulgaris)—the only carnivorous plant known from the Arctic. Image: Paul Sokoloff © Canadian Museum of Nature

These herbarium researchers also brought a mascot: one of their number dressed up as a common butterwort (Pinguicula vulgaris)—the only carnivorous plant known from the Arctic—to entertain children.

Showing the next generation of palaeontologists how to use an air scribe. Image: Chuck Clark © Canadian Museum of Nature

If mounting plants is relaxing, children and the grown-ups they brought with them also learned how loud, active and exciting using an air scribe can be. This tool looks and sounds like a dental drill, but is really a miniature hammer. It is used by palaeontologists to gently remove fossils from the rocks they are embedded in. Children couldn’t line up fast enough to get their turn.

Among adults, the High Arctic camel fossil exhibit turned into a social event, sparking debate and conversation. For example, I overheard a visitor comment about how it was clear evidence of the dangers of human-caused climate change: if you raise the average temperature of Earth by just two degrees, the northernmost Canadian islands turn into boreal forest with camels. Another visitor riposted: if there were no people around 3.5 million years ago, and the climate still changed, we can hardly be responsible for it. The debate continued as they moved out of earshot.

It is a commonplace lament that there is a lot of scientific illiteracy in our society. Every so often, the press contains reports of the latest test scores in science and math, and how poor a showing we make. But science is more than just a collection of facts. It is not a means of conversational one-upmanship: I know what you don’t. It is a way of looking at the world with curiosity and scepticism, and this is just what I saw over the last couple of weekends. Lots of curiosity, enthusiasm and a thirst for knowledge.

If you missed the Arctic festival so far, not to worry. This weekend, museum zoologists will be on hand. I’m hoping they bring some nose bot flies to gross out children of all ages, like me. See you there…

The Big Reveal—Canadian Club Sees the Light of Day

I had the opportunity this week to witness a unique behind-the-scenes event—the opening of a sealed plaster field jacket, containing dinosaur bones about 75 million-years-old. No one had laid eyes on the fossils since they were collected almost 100 years ago in Alberta. Now that was all about to change.

According to the original field notes, the jacket contains parts of an armoured dinosaur known as an ankylosaur. The jacket was getting this special treatment because it’s the winner in the museum’s recent Dino Idol contest.

The opened field jacket of Canadian Club. Two days of work revealed the rock and fossil that had been encased since 1915. Image: Dan Smythe © Canadian Museum of Nature.

It was now time to see what’s really inside, so that our dinosaur researcher Jordan Mallon can study the bones and senior technician Clayton Kennedy can prepare them for eventual display a year or so from now.

Collections technician Alan McDonald moves the plaster field jacket containing the remains of Canadian Club from the collections area to the Heavy Prep lab. Image: Kieran Shepherd © Canadian Museum of Nature.

But before any of that can happen, the plaster encasing the rock and bone inside needs to be carefully removed. Clayton brings the required skill to this process, with about 30 years of experience working with fossils.

The fossil was set up on a pedestal in the museum’s Heavy Prep Lab. Clayton had his tools ready—a large set of pliers, a small brush, a needle-like device called an air scribe and a small bottle of “glue” called Acryloid.

He began by pulling at the exposed, frayed ends of some burlap. As the burlap popped out, pieces of plaster fell to the floor, a smattering of dust accumulating from the effort. Pliers were then used to pull away pieces of plaster.

At one point, he used a pneumatic saw—think of a cast-cutter that surgeons use to remove a cast from a broken leg and you have the idea.

Top left: Clayton Kennedy uses pliers to remove the plaster. This farrier’s tool, used to put shoes on horses, may have been used by the Sternbergs during fieldwork. Top right: Use of a saw aids in the removal of the plaster shell. Bottom: Pieces of wood used to reinforce the jacket’s structure are revealed after a day’s work. Images: Dan Smythe © Canadian Museum of Nature.

Two hours on and the upper layer of plaster is more-or-less gone. A small history lesson is revealed. There is a dark, brownish-gray layer of plaster and burlap that was underneath the outer layer. It crumbles between the fingers. Turns out this was the original layer applied by Charles H. Sternberg and his team in 1915. It’s a bit mouldy – likely the result of some water damage from decades ago, after which the newer layer of plaster would have been added to protect the contents.

By the end of Day One, some rock and even fossil is popping out. A few pieces of wood rest on top. According to Clayton, the Sternbergs would gather wood from the field and use it to reinforce the jacket for safe transport to the museum in Ottawa.

Day Two—the unveiling process moves along. Within a few hours, the plaster is all gone, and the upper half of the jacket is now exposed revealing gray-brown rock…and fossil. Much of it appears fractured and crumbling, but I am assured this is not unusual.

An airscribe is used to chip away at small pieces of rock, revealing the exposed fossil. The vacuum clears away the debris. Image: Pierre Poirier © Canadian Museum of Nature.

Over time, moisture would seep in, with the resulting freeze-thaw process leading to cracking. All in a day’s work for Clayton as he pulls out the Acryloid, a glue-like substance, and applies it in the cracks. When this sets, it will bond the fossil parts together.

Consolidating loose bones is a common step in preparing fossils. Here, Clayton uses Acryloid to bond parts of the ankylosaur bones. This will ensure the fossil remains intact as the rock around it is carefully removed. Image: Pierre Poirier © Canadian Museum of Nature.

Jordan is excited because with the matrix revealed, he knows that the fossil includes the hips of an anyklosaur. This will be something new to the museum’s collections and also allows for better identification of the species. But there’s a hitch—the field notes suggested there might be a tail and its end club so characteristic of an ankylosaur. They do not seem to be in this field jacket. Are they somewhere else? Stay tuned, as more investigation is needed.

So, what’s next? Well, only the surface has been scratched…no pun intended! At least a few months of steady work are now required to remove the rock substrate, consolidate and extract the fossils, and prepare them for study. Then, the bones can be prepared for temporary display.

More blogs to come as the process unfolds!

100 Years of Arctic Fieldwork

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the Canadian Arctic Expedition—the Canadian government’s first effort to survey, map and establish a sovereign foothold in the 40% of Canada that occurs above the tree line. Two survey parties, a northern mapping team lead by Arctic adventurer Vilhjalmur Stefansson, and a southern science team lead by Rudolph Anderson (a future Head of Biology here at the museum), steamed out of Victoria, BC, in June 1913.

The very well dressed Canadian Arctic Expedition science team in 1913 in Nome, Alaska, USA, prior to their departure for the western Canadian Arctic. Image: © Canadian Museum of Civilization

Anderson’s southern party arrived at their destination in the Mackenzie District that autumn, and spent the next three years (that means three cold Arctic winters) conducting research into the Arctic landscape, its flora and fauna, and the Inuit and Inuvialuit people living there.

Canadian Arctic Expedition biologists, such as Frits Johansen (pictured here), used dogsleds to travel during the winters they spent up north. Image: © Library and Archives Canada

Stefansson’s northern group quickly met with trouble. While en route to their mustering point at Herschel Island, Yukon, their vessel, the Karluk, became trapped in the advancing winter ice. After it drifted towards Russia for four months, Stefansson disembarked the boat, informing the captain he would hunt to supplement their dwindling food supplies. While he was away, the Karluk sank, and during the ordeal that followed, 11 crew members died before the rescue could come.

The circumstances surrounding the sinking remain controversial to this day, but the southern party continued autonomously, and Stefansson carried on, mapping the western Canadian Arctic until 1918.

Prior to photography, and even today, sketching a plant before pressing it preserves the look of the plant in the field and captures petal and leaf colour, which fade on old specimens. This sketch by Frits Johansen, done in the field during the Canadian Arctic Expedition, shows how a 100-year-old specimen in our collection looked when freshly picked. Image: Frits Johansen © Canadian Museum of Nature

A century later, we look back on the expedition with pride in its accomplishments and solemnly remember its tragedies and stories of heroism. Of course, it’s easy to be introspective when looking over some of the actual plant and animal specimens they collected: in 1956, the Canadian Museum of Nature retained many of the CAE scientists and their collections when the museum was formed out of the body that funded the CAE—the Geological Survey of Canada.

Nowadays, the museum still organizes Arctic expeditions, and I have had the great privilege of embarking on a few of them, but they’ve yet to ask me to go for three years! And, while the Arctic is still relatively remote, with trips to the field sometimes involving several days’ worth of flying and helicoptering into camp, think of how it must have felt to the men traveling to the western Arctic in four small boats!

The comparisons don’t end there, and I thought that, in honour of the CAE’s centennial, it would be fun to see how Arctic fieldwork differs in the age of Gore-Tex from the early 20th century.

Nowadays, helicopters provide much of the transportation to museum biologists in the field, such as this team on Victoria Island, NWT, in 2010. Image: Paul Sokoloff © Canadian Museum of Nature

As I am often thinking with my stomach, I thought first of one of any trip’s primary considerations: the food. I have blogged before about the dehydrated and very tasty meals that we bring North nowadays. In 1913, canned provisions, and lots of them, were brought along by ship, and fishing and hunting brought very welcome fresh food to the expedition’s dinner tables. Interestingly, on expedition manifests I noticed that the CAE brought a large chocolate ration—this certainly hasn’t changed in modern times.

Canadian Museum of Nature botanists and our local wildlife monitor, Gary Okheena, on Victoria Island, NWT, in 2010. No three-piece suits here! Image: Roger Bull © Canadian Museum of Nature

In 1913, Inuit and Inuvialuit guides and employees to the expedition were vital to the success of the expedition, providing food, expedition services and enough anthropological data to fill three books. We are proud to continue this tradition of local engagement, and have gotten to know some interesting people on our trips. Memorably, Gary Okheena, a young man from Ulukhaktok, accompanied us for a week during our trip to Victoria Island, NWT, in 2010. Possessing an offbeat sense of humor, he was always up for a long walk with us botanists, and always willing to share a good story, or some delicious dried fish.

Ultimately, the reason we go is the same: we seek understanding and knowledge. While some things have advanced (GPS navigation, airplanes, digital cameras, lightweight tents, etc.), some things have remained exactly the same (plant presses, field notes and journals, the mosquitoes, isolation and the inspirational vastness of the tundra). As long as there are new discoveries to be made, we will still mount expeditions, building strong on our century-old tradition of Arctic exploration.

With the advent of digital photography and large-capacity memory cards, we now document a large portion of our collections using cameras in the field. Using a macro lens, we can zoom in on structures that are difficult to draw, and the colours stay true to life—so there’s no longer any need to bring pencil crayons into the field! Image: Jeffery Saarela © Canadian Museum of Nature

Want to know more about the CAE? Northern People, Northern Knowledge: The Story of the Canadian Arctic Expedition 1913–1918 was developed in partnership with the Canadian Museum of Nature.