Photo: Arviat harvesters off to get an arvik

Arviat’s main whaling crew makes final preparations Aug. 11 before heading out to sea in search of a bowhead whale. This will be the first modern bowhead harvest for Arviat, locals say. Nunavummiut are permitted to hunt only five bowhead whales because bowhead populations had been decimated by four centuries of commercial harvesting, from the 1500s to the mid-1900s. The Baffin and Kivalliq regions are permitted two whales each annually and the Kitikmeot region gets one. Coral Harbour was granted the other Kivalliq licence this year. Pangnirtung and Igloolik are the two Baffin communities planning bowhead hunts this summer and Kugaaruk got the licence for the Kitikmeot. Read more later on nunatsiaqonline.ca. (PHOTO BY GORDY KIDLAPIK)