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44 NARF Legal Rev. 1 (2019)

handle is hein.journals/narf44 and id is 1 raw text is: GWICH'IN TRIBES & ARCTIC NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE UNDER SIEGE The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is an American treasure that is internationally known for its ecological importance, beauty, and wildlife. It is a breathtaking, untouched landscape-one of very few remaining in the world-and home to 37 species of land mammals, 8 marine mammals, 42 fish species, and more than 200 migratory bird species. Inhabitants include polar bears, caribou, muskox, wolf, moose, mountain sheep, and bow- head whales While the Refuge is viewed as a vast and remote wilderness to some, the Gwich'in know it only as The Sacred Place Where Life Begins. The Refuge is part of the ancestral range of the Gwitch'in people. The fifteen Gwich'in villages are some of the most northern indigenous peo- ples of North America. Set back from the coast, the Gwich'in are interior mountain people who depend heavily on caribou for every aspect of life. The Gwich'in people enjoy a close and lasting relationship with the caribou, which are a main source of subsistence as well as a spiritual and cultural treasure for local communities. Their culture relies on and honors the caribou and the ancestral homelands that have provided for them for thousands of years. That culture is under threat. The Migration & The Coastal Plain Specifically, Gwich'in communities look to the Porcupine Caribou herd, which migrates annual- ly into and out of the Refuge. The herd of about 170,000 animals travels each spring from their winter range along the Gwich'in lands to the Coastal Plain where they have spring calving and nursery grounds. It is because of the caribou's Credit: National Park Service migration that the Refuge is sometimes called the American Serengeti. Nine thousand Gwich'in people live near the Porcupine Caribou herd's migratory path. As they have always done, each year, the people await the herd's return. The cari- bou hunt is central to their way of life. The Gwich'in have worked tirelessly to ensure that the Porcupine Caribou are harvested in a sustain- able way and that balance is maintained. Injury to the caribou is injury to the Gwich'in. WINTER/SPRING 2019 VOLUME 44, NO. 1

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