Ray Ruben Sr.

Other National Parks are geared towards visitation but Tuktut Nogait is established especially for the protection of the caribou habitat, calving grounds, and the caribou itself. That’s why I like how they negotiated this one; it’s unique in the way that they set up the Tuktut Nogait Agreement. It’s the first in Canada, as far as I understand. It’s under a co-management setup involving representatives from various groups and government agencies. We work under a consensus management system where, during our meetings, if there are any concerns about developments, programs or activities within the park, we can veto. Once that happens, what we bring it back to our respective organizations in a roundabout way through discussions—liaison back and forth. That’s the good thing about it—we’re open. Nobody is left out of any decision. Our Chair, during our decision process, would go around to each one of us and ask: “Are you okay? And are you okay?” Once he goes around the table, it’s by consensus, it’s agreed. And that makes it unique.

We’re not bound by any government agency; we’re not bound by Parks. It’s us as a Management Board that decides, and we get a lot of our feelings, decisions, and thoughts from the community through the representatives we have. The Park agencies or the staff are a part of the programs, but they don’t run it.

The Lifeline Of Tuktut Nogait

For me, it’s around the river system. It’s pretty much the only place I’ve gone in personally. This time of year, after the melt we don’t usually go up there, not like our parents and grandparents—they’d be walking up! The Hornaday River is the lifeline of that park. All the creeks and everything that runs down through it feed into the river. If the park didn’t have the river, it would have been less of an attraction or beauty.

When people come up for canoeing, we tell them we don’t want any contamination. When they talk about bathing, washing, and shampooing, we tell them you gotta do it away—no inflow into any of the river systems. It means a lot, those rivers. The Hornaday, especially. It doesn’t only give beauty to the park itself, but it sustains us with char, whitefish, and graylings along the river. That’s the most attractive in my mind about the park—it provides so much.

You talk about the canyons, the falls, and all the fish, and then all along the river you got these raptors (eagles, hawks, and even ravens) nesting around in the canyons and riversides. It’s like the Southern states where they got all these plateaus and high, flat hills. There’s a lot of ravines, up and down, and rough ground; if you don’t know the right trails this time of year it’s hard to travel.

The first time I went to Tuktut Nogait—the only time I went up—I’d mentioned to the Board that I didn’t feel comfortable there; I let them know right away that it’s like I was invading somebody else’s space. It’s the caribou’s place, not ours. I didn’t feel 100% comfortable.

The beauty is something, just like any of our coastal camps and regions. What really hits you is just how beautiful—how nice—the lakes, the hills and tundra are. No wonder when people go into Parks, they want to come back. They remember it so well. And that’s the thing we try to do—I want it to remain that way so that for anybody who has a chance to go, it’s what we’ve seen 20 years ago, 30 years ago and is not changed.

Storybook Come To Life

I go back to the first meeting, and I’ll never forget. We had our little tents to sleep in, all spread out. The second last day we were up there, I was reaching the end of a book where it was telling the story of this village. They have an angatkuq, a shaman or medicine man. And they were starving. They were telling that medicine man: “You have to do something; you have to find a way to get food to our people.” He said he went out walking or did something and caribou walked right to the people—like offering itself, you know? They got caribou.

That same day, we were in the kitchen camp just finishing up, and I saw something behind our sleeping tents. “Hey, there’s a caribou!” By that time around August all the caribou should have been migrating South, ah? And I saw that caribou! I told Robert, our monitor (only he had a gun), and it kept coming. One caribou. So, I asked our chairman: “Hey, is there anything in our rules that say I can’t get the caribou?”

And he said, “There’s nothing; you’re Inuvialuk. As long as you can get a gun.”

“Okay!” I talked to Joe. I went to that tent with my gun. I had to hide because that caribou kept coming, and just like that—boom. I read this just hours before! It came right up.

In there, if we harvest something, we’re supposed to teach the parks staff. I told them while I was skinning it up and cutting it up (they were there watching and taking pictures and all). Once in a while, I stopped to show them: “Hey, I took the skin, the stomach fat, and everything—as much as I could take out.”

There was only four of us in the camp then; everyone else had gone out canoeing and hiking. I told them: “Don’t say nothing to the guys when they come back!” And I hung that stomach fat, right where they had fish. Some of them said nothing, never see it; I think it was Sadie Lester who finally said: “Who got caribou?!”

On top of that, what made it even more special was: the next morning when we were loading and getting ready, right on top behind us—a bull, big horns, walking by the top of the hill! It stayed for maybe 45 minutes, taking its time. I thought: “Boy! Last night I got a small caribou!” But you never forget that. It offered itself to us. It was amazing. I told them the story of how I read that book and how that caribou came by right after.

The Future Of Tuktut Nogait

Some talk of using different areas because the park is so huge, but my priority is not to see any more manmade developments: runways, ports, lakeside houses, or anything like that. If we’re able to maintain the way it is, with as little imprint and visual additions as we can, and just leave it all for the wildlife, that would be my preference. I like the way it’s set up now with just the one camp so that if visitors (and especially our youth and Elders) have the opportunity to go out, they have a safe camp that provides for them all around in that one place.

Priorities could change with the young people; they might want more people to come up here. Who knows? They might put on big mansions or whatever it is to attract people… but our priority now—and I think I am speaking pretty much for our other local representatives—is we’d like it to be as pristine as we can.

Noel and I keep talking about mentoring young people, so that they continue the minds of the community, and not be influenced by others outside. We stay strong. That place is for the caribou first, and we want to keep it that way. I’m not saying that it’s gonna be that way all the time—people’s priorities are going to change sometime— but right now, we depend on caribou and that’s part of us. We gotta pass on that value to the next people so that they can keep fighting the pressures that keep getting put on us.

The southern mentality is that: Parks are everybody’s, Parks are for people. It’s not a right, it’s a privilege that they can visit any Park in Canada. I want to keep saying it’s unique because it was there developed for the protection of the calving grounds, the environment, and the caribou.

What we always try to do is remind ourselves: why are we here? What created us? That park—we’re here because we created that for the protection of the caribou. I want to see that continue: the protection of the habitat, the caribou, the calving, and the young caribou. That’s what I want to pass on by mentoring the young people properly. The way things are going, the young people are losing that one-on-one connection with the caribou and the environment. More and more, we’re seeing it. Anyone not in direct contact with the wildlife and on the land loses that part of the connection. We always say we are one with the caribou.

TUKTUT NURRAIT TANMAAQTARVIKTIGUN UQALIAQSAQ NAITTUARAALUK

TUKTUT NOGAIT IN ONE WORD

Piqpagiyapkin. Ilove you . That feeling with the caribou, you have in you. That’s the feeling I have for that.

If I was to say one Inuvialuktun word, it would be how you love that little caribou.

—Ray Ruben Sr.