A long, loud howl
By Dave Shreffler, published August 14, 2007
June 2007 - Utukok River, Western Arctic, Alaska
The softness and saturation of arctic light is a photographer’s dreamscape. Photography here is like painting with light. The endless tundra is the canvas; the ever changing light the palette that conveys the mood of the landscape, bracketed by the serendipitous swishes of wildlife.
The tundra is a sprawling carpet of blooming wildflowers; the sky a 24-hour stage for dancing clouds. We’re immersed in a vast, undulating landscape, springing to life after nine months of smothering snow and ice. Lapland longspurs welcome the change with melodious rifts, as nesting plovers skitter about scolding us for coming too close.
For days on end I’ve reveled with new friends in the emerging splendor of the Utukok Uplands, a wildlife haven containing the core calving area of the 450,000 head western arctic caribou herd, the largest concentration of grizzly bears north of the Brooks Range, and healthy populations of wolves and wolverines.
Our little bend of the river is home to a rough-legged hawk nest patrolled by vocal, vigilant parents and several gaggles of honking Canada geese. Red-breasted mergansers zip by in a whir of wings and churlish croaks. Grizzly, wolf, fox, caribou, and ground squirrel tracks—notable for their delicate imprint—crisscross the muddy riverbanks. We leave behind post-hole size boot tracks three feet deep, impressive butt prints, and plenty of laughs.
We camp on a gravel bar of the Utukok River, hoping to observe a mass migration of cows and calves enroute to summer feeding grounds on the Lisburne Peninsula. We wait and watch.
Curious caribou stream by daily, including one group of 40 that follow our talented guides, Jim and Carol, like the Pied Pipers of Hamlin along the broad sweep of a gravel ridgeline.
Rainbows and rain squalls are bookends to the start and finish, respectively, of our mostly bug-free, wildlife-rich explorations. These daily wanderings provide us with ample time for solitude and gratitude. We gaze for hours through binocs and spotting scopes, and nap on luxurious beds of mossy tundra. We share tender stories and raucous jokes. We sit in hushed reverence.
On the eve of the Solstice, our final day in the Western Arctic, the shimmering sun had just begun its slow, upward arc when I drifted off to sleep around 3:00 am. After five days of nonstop reverie, I couldn’t force myself to stay awake any longer, no matter how glorious the brush strokes of light on tundra.
At approximately 6:30 am a lone wolf wandered through camp, stopping to sniff the tripod poised two feet from my tent door. It wasn’t until I heard Tom’s muffled cry, “Dave . . . wolf”, that I awakened, barely in time for a glimpse of the majestic silhouette. Perched atop the nearby ridge where we’d hung out most of the previous day, the wolf raised its head skyward and howled. Those 30 seconds of spine-tingling wonder made the trip complete for me.
The irony seems inescapable. For five days I toted multiple cameras and lenses everywhere I went, craving a photo of exactly this kind of a decisive moment. In the end, the wolf had the last laugh. Several hours later a massive grizzly appeared out of nowhere, sauntered along the same route to the same ridge, and disappeared. Pure magic.
On this trip, my fourth to the arctic, I learned to treasure the cumulative experiences over any one decisive photographic moment. What matters I now know is trying to fully embrace the wilderness rather than capture it on film. My mind and heart cannot adequately grasp the vastness and wildness of the Western Arctic, so why do I expect my photographs to?
Approximately two-thirds of the Western Arctic lie within the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A), the largest single unit of public land in the nation at 23.5 million acres. This name, of course, is unfortunate and misleading.
National Geographic (May 2006) aptly states, “Though National Petroleum Reserve sounds like a massive oil tank that the nation taps in times of need, in reality it contains the largest piece of unprotected wilderness in the nation.”
This “wilderness” –the size of the state of Indiana–is now threatened by Big Oil and industrial development underway in the NPR-A. With the nation’s attention diverted on Iraq and various domestic crises, the Bush Administration is rapidly moving forward with plans to open virtually the entire Western Arctic to drilling and mining.
The Administration’s drill-it-all strategy is based on greed and the arrogant pretense that the Western Arctic is too remote, and the voting populace too preoccupied, to care about protecting it. Time and again the American public has proven the drill-it-all cabal wrong regarding the Arctic Refuge. The next battleground will be the Western Arctic. None of it is currently protected.
This brings me back to the wolf howling from the ridge. The temptation to anthropomorphize is powerful. Was the wolf’s howl a lament, a warning, or perhaps even a plea for us to leave …? It’s unknowable. And I like the mystery and ambiguity of not knowing.
There is, however, no doubt this clarion call of the wild signaled that our presence was known.
Man is coming to the Western Arctic. The question that remains unanswered is whether man is coming to exploit the petroleum resources or to help protect the ancestral home of the Inupiat people and some of the largest intact ecosystems left in North America. My vote and my passionate commitment are for protection.
I was privileged to be a part of a remarkable trip with remarkable people. I’m humbled by the accomplished company I kept. My inclusion as “trip photographer” was a gift I cannot repay. What I can do, what all AWL members can do, is to lend our support to protection of some of the most wild and remote public lands left in North America. “Your land, your voice” isn’t just a catchy slogan – it’s a call to action.
We should demand that Congress strike a balance in the Western Arctic between industrial development and conservation. With 23.5 million acres at stake, there’s room for compromise. Let’s focus our conservation efforts on permanent protection of the known areas of highest biological and cultural value.
If we howl long enough and loud enough, maybe Congress will eventually listen.
August 16th, 2007 at 7:29 pm
My trip to the Arctic Refuge, June, 2002, was similar in the reverence and grace of such a magical place. It is up to us, the few who see it, the majority of us who believe it is important to preserve, to continue to put the Arctic at the top of the list for wilderness protection. Thank you for sharing your trip!
August 16th, 2007 at 7:57 pm
I have been to Alaska 20 times and the Arctic Refuge 3 times and my conclusion is that we can only protect these special places is to develop alternative fuels to make the oil in these places so expensive that the oil corporations will not go there. I talk to groups about these special places and the need to develop sustainable alternative energy. Done right this would solve two problems, global warming and the fuels we need. If we don’t do this we are going to deliver a devastated, plundered world to our children and grandchilren. I primarily talk to college students since the adults still don’t want to face up to the future.
August 16th, 2007 at 11:29 pm
Dave,
You are so fortunate to have had this opportunity to truly experience the wildness of the western Arctic. As a young photographer in the company of such illustrious individuals you have sketched out in essay and images the essence of what this wild country is and the choices we will need to make in the near future if we are to protect even a small portion of it from development. Balance is such a difficult concept for those of us who want to keep it all wild, yet as time goes on those tough decisions will fall to newer and younger generations such as yours. Hopefully the best and most critical habitats can be saved and the technologies used by industry will be refined so as to cause a minimum of damage to the areas that must inevitably be developed.
Thanks for sharing the beauty, the serinity, and the images of a land so few of us will ever have the opportunity to see and experience for ourselves. Seeing it through your eyes and through your words can help all of us to understand the importance of saving as much of it as possible!
Sincerely,
Vance Carruth
Jackson Hole, Wyoming
August 17th, 2007 at 8:12 am
Loved reading about your trip!! During the same time I was backpacking along the Atigun River. Before that I spent 12 days on a Sierra Club outing at Demarcation Point–Caribou Pass, Kongakute River, Baseline Creek area. Saw thousands of Porcupine Caribou migrating. Calves had alredy been born. A grizzley circled one of our campsites too. Relived my experience just reading about yours. Some of my pictures are posted on the Sierra club, Iowa Chapter website. I have made a DVD of my adventures and am taking it all over Iowa to get support for saving Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. I met Tom Campion in Wester WA when I worked on the Wild Sky Wilderness bill. Phyllis Mains