Climate change brings lush lawns to Kuujjuaq

“Part and parcel of climate change.”

By JANE GEORGE

Kuujjuaq's landscape is changing as the grass, trees and shrubs grow taller every year. (PHOTO BY JANE GEORGE)


Kuujjuaq’s landscape is changing as the grass, trees and shrubs grow taller every year. (PHOTO BY JANE GEORGE)

KUUJJUAQ — If you want to see how the Arctic is heating up, come to Kuujjuaq where the temperature on Sept. 10 reached 22.1 C.

At the end of the afternoon, clouds moved in, and warm rain fell on the newly-mown grass around Kuujjuaq — sights and sounds which are more usually associated with warmer places than a community located on the 58th parallel.

Kuujjuaq’s two-day spell of warm weather on Sept. 9 and 10 followed a summer that many residents considered to be cool.

But average temperatures this past summer in Kuujjuaq actually registered about 1 C higher than the average normal temperatures recorded since 1947, providing the right environment for grass to grow abundantly and quickly around the community.

On Sept. 9, Jobie Airo and Qasadluak Augiak, Kativik Regional Government employees, went out, armed with a lawn mower and weed-whacker, to trim the grass and vegetation around KRG staff housing units.

Their supervisor, Dave Parsons, who has lived in Kuujjuaq for more than 30 years, said the growth of grass around the community seems to have accelerated over the past two years — “part and parcel of climate change,” in his opinion.

Other Kuujjuammiut point to the visible new growth of Arctic willow bushes, tamaracks and larch trees around town as signs of their warmer climate.

While changing weather conditions may favour the growth of some vegetation, people say it’s led to poor berry crops, with 2009 producing the second poor aqpik (cloudberry) season in a row.

New wildlife, from robins to the recent sighting of a lynx, an animal usually found far to the south, also continue to be spotted in the vicinity of Kuujjuaq.

Numerous examples of similar changes in wildlife and vegetation can be found around the Arctic, says an article published Sept. 11 in the journal Science.

Its authors review recent research on changes due to Arctic warming.

These changes include increases in the numbers of reindeer on the Svalbard Islands off northern Norway, more red foxes, and the presence of new insects like the winter moth, which eats the leaves of some Arctic trees and shrubs.

Researchers have also noted that the presence of more shrubs and trees lets more snow accumulate, increases winter soil temperatures, and makes the soil richer and more hospitable to vegetation in general— which appears to be the case now in Kuujjuaq.

“The Arctic as we know it may soon be a thing of the past,” said Eric Post, an associate professor of biology at Penn State University, and a lead author of the article in Science.

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