Akimiski Island

Akimiski Iceland is a Canadian island, with an area of ​​approximately 86 × 32 km and an area of ​​3001 km ² the largest island in James Bay, the southern foothills of the Hudson Bay. It is marshy and relatively flat. The highest elevation is in the south at 31 m above the sea.

It is situated only 19 km east of the coast of Ontario, and is separated from it by the Strait Akimiski, but belongs to the region Qikiqtaaluk of the territory of Nunavut. The island is uninhabited, but is visited regularly by groups of scientists. The name comes from the Cree word a- ka- mas -ki, meaning the land against ', and this means the view from the mainland.

Flora and Fauna

The vegetation consists mostly of tundra -like vegetation. For a long time the bird populations from the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources will examine how the collections of the Canada goose, the American bar-tailed godwits (Limosa fedoa ) or Hudsonschnepfe (Limosa haemastica ). For them, the Akimiski Iceland Bird Sanctuary has been established in the eastern part of the island as part of the James Bay Preserve. 1991 laid here alone 250,000 individuals of the Little Snow Goose ( Anser caerulescens caerulescens ), about one- seventh of the total population in Canada, to the north of the island a snap.

In 2000, a detailed study of the island's flora was first made ​​after 1981. Here were found on the island of 276 native vascular plants and thus 76 taxa in 33 families more than known hitherto, and 5 exotic. Thus, a total of 281 taxa known in 55 families. 28 species are rare in the adjacent Ontario, two only exist on Akimiski or further north on Hudson Bay: Potentilla crantzii and Salicornia borealis.

The encountered especially in the summer polar bears represent the southernmost permanent occurrence of this species dar. 1997/98, some of them were fitted with transmitters to track their migrations. In addition, it was found that polar bears of James Bay genetically different from other groups and form a cluster.

Canada geese and other birds such as plovers, use the island as a stopover.

History

Until the mid-20th century it was common that trappers who traveled down from the coast to the carriage by Akimiski. They parted about ten days from their families and returned during the next several months back again and again. During the hunting season 1944-1945 and 1946-1947 hunting in this way, about 43 % of the Attawapiskat - men who went on trapping and hunting within 100 km. The other went on, which also earned more money. In the winter months the Indians moved from the north to Lake Ontario to the 19th century. Groups from the Great Whale River, from Fort George and Akimiski Iceland met in Moosonee, on the south end of Hudson Bay. From there we went through the Tabatibi Valley to Cochrane; it went on to Toronto via North Bay, Orillia. When the caribou herds not far enough in the summer attracted to the south, to graze and calve - Akimiski was the main hunting area - chased one more geese, as manifested itself in the sales figures in Fort Albany.

It is unclear whether the ship ran aground, took place under the direction of Thomas James, which occurred in September 1631 before Akimiski. In the oral tradition of the Cree of James Bay to memories found on shipwrecks, which, however, can not be safely identify with those in the European sources. To all appearances, the ship sailed around Akimiski and the men wintered on Charlton Iceland. 1674 named Thomas Bayly Akimiski in Viner 's to Iceland, probably after the governor of the HBC Sir Robert Viner.

Father Abanel, a Jesuit, was the first European who described the island 1671/72. He called them " Ouabaskou ". He told of a small bay of the island, in which one could survive the winter relatively comfortable. The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC ) employees called the island, however, Charlton Iceland or, as in 1674 Thomas Bayly, also Viner 's Iceland. He noted that numerous Omushkegowak - Cree who lived on the neighboring mainland, were starved, the present research assumes rather that they had fallen victim to an illness. The British believed that the region was uninhabited until the Hudson 's Bay Company Indians would have brought to the area. Current estimates suggest that in the Lowlands before the epidemics of 1782 and 1783 about 1500 to 2000 people lived. You probably around half of the population have fallen victim, but until 1829, the number seems to recover, and to have reached the level before the disaster again.

The oral tradition of white caribou on the island, where the herds not so far came in some years in the south, and the Cree had to follow them northward. 1948 were introduced by the HBC beaver again, which had previously disappeared due to excessive hunting. Thereafter, there was a rapid increase in the population, the number of dams built animals. This in turn damaged, so dependents of umwohnenden Attawapiskat First Nation, the fish populations around the island.

Similar to the Mushkegowuk, so too have the other Indian groups in the region today that their traditional territory, ie the necessary to survive tail space in which traditional rights and responsibilities, practices and rituals were exercise, extends the problem to neighboring provinces. Akimiski belongs to Nunavut, the area west of James Bay Ontario, the east to Quebec.

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