The National Park Service is extending the Arctic version of an olive branch -- a dried salmon -- to the citizens of remote Eagle and a handful of people still struggling to survive at homesteads along the Yukon River downstream from the Canadian border.
The latest proposed rules for the Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve will exempt those folks from requirements they store all their food in bear-resistant containers (BRC) while in the preserve.
No one, it seems, makes a bear-resistant container big enough to contain fish-drying racks and the salmon splayed across them. "NPS received feedback from local residents suggesting this provision be modified to better accommodate local practices in a manner that also protects wildlife," says the agency's "compendium" of proposed regulatory changes. Suggested changes include:
• Making the food storage requirements apply only when bears are out of hibernation;
• Accommodating other types of food storage containers and caches such as fish-drying racks, game bags, fish nets, and tarps;
• Allowing for "circumstances where complying with the requirements would be overly burdensome or impossible, such as when transporting/storing food supplies for an extended period of time."
Because of the seasonal change, no one will be expected to carry bear-resistant containers from Nov. 14 to April 1 when the bears are hibernating. It was 40 to 50 degrees below zero along the Yukon last week, and there was nary the hint of a bear to be found.
The Park Service and Yukon River residents have been sparring since 70-year-old Central resident Jim Wilde was chased down at gunpoint by park rangers in the fall of 2010, handcuffed and hauled off to jail a day away, in Fairbanks, because he didn't have a state registration sticker on his riverboat. Protests broke out in the Interior when Wilde was charged and then convicted on minor charges by a federal magistrate who refused to grant Wilde a jury trial.
The court ruling was a hollow victory for federal officials, and the case is now on appeal. Since the Wilde case, the Park Service has worked to improve relations in the Interior, but it is now locked in a lawsuit with the state and a moose hunter forbidden from running his hovercraft on the rivers in the preserve.
The state contends the Alaska Statehood Act transferred authority for those waters to the state, which is fine with hovercraft use. Park Service officials say hovercraft -- boats that ride on a cushion of air instead of water -- upset the natural order of things.
Park Service officials this week sounded hopeful that the relaxation in preserve regulations will show Eagle residents and others that federal managers are making a good faith effort to work with them.
The proposed rule changes do not apply to visitors who decide to float the Yukon. Summer floats were popular decades ago, but no longer. Visitors who float the river will still be expected to store their food in bear-resistant containers or hang it at least 10 feet high and at least 100 yards from camp when ashore.
Even better, though, might be making use of the public-use cabins the Park Service has built along the rivers. Those have locking metal lockers in which to safely store food.
Contact Craig Medred at craig(at)alaskadispatch.com