17 Sep 2007 - My name
is Olav Mathis Eira and I am a reindeer
herder from Northern Norway. I am 50 years
old and have worked with reindeer my whole
life. I have around 500 reindeer. My family
has had this as a livelihood since the 1400s.
I am married and have three sons.
During the last 20 years I have observed
various changes in the climate. The most
urgent change for us, the Sámi people
who live of the reindeer, has been the winter
rains. Rain in the winter is normally very
rare this far North. In the old days this
used to happen only every 30 years and we
had ancient methods of foretelling the weather.
Now this is no longer possible.
The number of storms and the amount of
precipitation is increasing. It rains when
it should not rain and that makes the ice
on lakes and rivers unstable. This has made
traditional roads over the ice dangerous,
causing accidents when we try to get to
the herds. Two of my nephews went through
the ice where it usually should have been
safe at that time of year. One of them nearly
drowned, but luckily they both came from
it unharmed.
Ice covers the reindeer food
The weather changes make the conditions
for reindeer herding difficult. The snow
gets icy from the rain so that the reindeer
cannot get through down to the food, the
reindeer lichens, which they depend on to
survive in the winter. We can no longer
predict the weather like we could before.
In the beginning of the 11000’s this was
part of the reason why reindeer owners lost
90 per cent of their herds.
Now we have to feed the reindeers in the
winter. It is a long way to go to bring
the food to them, and it is, of course,
very expensive. However, it is the only
choice we have if we want to keep herding.
Still, reindeer numbers are going down.
We don’t know why but believe the climate
changes to be the most probable cause.
Where we previously used to get snow in
early October, we now sometimes have to
wait until Christmas. The snow also disappears
earlier every year. I used to hang out reindeer
meat to dry in April and now I have to do
it in February to avoid the flies.
These are some of the reasons the climate
changes have become an important topic to
the Sámi people. With the warmer
climate comes more insects, especially mosquitoes
and flies. The reindeers do not like insects,
which is pushing them further up in the
mountains where food is scarcer.
Higher tree line
The tree line climbs higher year by year.
I believe the forests increase more year
by year, and the forest down here gets thicker
and thicker.
We observe new birds and insects which
do not have a name in Sámi. Parasites
that normally die during winter, survive.
My neighbour lost 70 reindeers this way.
We have seen years with poor grazing before,
but from the mid-eighties there were several
years of inadequate grazing, something which
happened again in the beginning of the 11000’s,
when we lost so much of the stock.
Since the start of the 11000’s, reindeer
owners have pretty much agreed that what
we see now is completely unnatural. There
are no long periods of frost anymore. This
also makes the big migration of the reindeers
in spring more difficult. The number of
losses during this period are increasing.
In the beginning the weather changes caused
enormous problems for us. We were thinking
about how we should survive in this business.
Where would we move? It causes instability
in our lifestyle. But we are adjusting by
moving the reindeers earlier, and no longer
keep to the old traditions of when this
is to be done. We have taught our reindeer
to eat pellets in spite of how expensive
they are. After all, we have ascertained
that the climate changes are inevitable.
They are already upon us.
Now a research project, Ealat, a co-operation
between several organisations and research
institutes, amongst them the World Reindeer
Herders Union, is trying to map out how
the climate change will affect the reindeer
herding.
Maybe we have to turn the whole cycle around
in the future? If it rains when it is not
supposed to rain we might have to stay by
the coast during spring and summer instead
of on the plains.
I have three sons. One of them will hopefully
keep to the family tradition of reindeer
herding. But it is no longer a good life.
It is an insecure future.
Comment from Senior Scientist Lars R. Hole,
Norwegian Institute for Air Research
Dept. Atmosphere and Climate
These observations are consistent with
the general warming and increasing precipitation
that been observed in Norway since the late
1800s. Climate models also indicate more
variability in the weather in Northern Norway
which makes it less predictable. More information
about future climate can be obtained from
the RegClim project (http://regclim.met.no/).
However, looking at climate trends (temperature
and precipitation) in Norway since the late
1800s, there are large differences in different
regions and trends are different in different
seasons. There are also are variations from
year to year and from decade to decade.
For example the 1930s were particularly
warm in Northern Norway and in the Troms
county where Lavangen is located. Winter
temperatures were just as high as in the
90s. On the other hand, winters in the 1960s
and 1980s were particularly cold in this
region. As a result, trends in winter temperatures
in the last 100 years are not so strong,
only about +0.04 oC per decade.
Similarly, over the last century there
is only a few percent increase in winter
precipitation in Troms and large decadal
variability. But in the last two decade
there has been a much stronger increase.
However, all climate research indicate
that there will be higher temperatures and
more precipitation, particularly in winter,
in Northern Norway. Icing but also deeper
snow cover in mid winter will probably cause
problems for reindeer herding. Onset of
spring will be earlier and traditional reindeer
herding will have to adjust to these changes.