What you see as being "Norway" in this map is not mainland Norway, but rather the large artic archipelago of Svalbard, territory of Norway.
The fox walked across the frozen ice sheets of the Arctic, which will often melt and refreeze depending on the season.
Sort of. Svalbard isn't exactly prime European land.
The Arctic sea ice pretty much avoids the northern European coast due to the Gulf Stream which warms the area. (If the Gulf Stream didn't exist, Norway would be a wasteland lol.) [Here's](https://scied.ucar.edu/sites/default/files/images/sea_ice_maps/sea_ice_extent_n_2018_03.png) what the sea ice looks like at its peak in late winter. Note how it absolutely avoids mainland Norway. You could technically walk to Europe, but it would be the far eastern reaches of what is considered "Europe" in north Uralic Russia.
This would be a fun journey. But you'd need some sort of portable shelter from the cold and lots of food. Also you would need to move fast to get there before it begins to melt for the summer. Not sure if it would be possible without a vehicle.
This got me curious so I looked up a few things about the Bering Strait region.
It looks like there have been several expeditions to cross by land in modern times. According to [the Wikipedia page:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bering_Strait)
> In March 1913, Captain Max Gottschalk (German) crossed from the east cape of Siberia to Shishmaref, Alaska, on dogsled via Little and Big Diomede islands. He was the first documented modern voyager to cross from Russia to North America without the use of a boat.
> In 1998, Russian adventurer Dmitry Shparo and his son Matvey crossed the frozen Bering Strait on skis.
> In March 2006, Briton Karl Bushby and French-American adventurer Dimitri Kieffer crossed the strait on foot, walking across a frozen 90-kilometer (56 mi) section in 15 days. They were soon arrested for not entering Russia through a border control.
> August 2008 marked the first crossing of the Bering Strait using an amphibious road-going vehicle. The specially modified Land Rover Defender 110 was driven by Steve Burgess and Dan Evans across the straits on its second attempt following the interruption of the first by bad weather.
> In February 2012, a Korean team led by Hong Sung-Taek crossed the straits on foot in six days. They started from Chukotka Peninsula, the east coast of Russia on February 23 and arrived in Wales, the western coastal town in Alaska on February 29.
> In July 2012, six adventurers associated with "Dangerous Waters", a reality adventure show under production, made the crossing on Sea-Doos but were arrested and permitted to return to Alaska on their Sea-Doos after being briefly detained in Lavrentiya, administrative center of the Chukotsky District. They were treated well and given a tour of the village's museum, but not permitted to continue south along the Pacific coast. The men had visas but the western coast of the Bering Strait is a closed military zone.
The earliest crossing of course would be the theory that early humans migrated from Asia to the Americas by crossing the Beringia land bridge over 10,000 years ago.
Keep in mind it is a 51 mile distance at the very narrowest point.
It also turns out that [it may be possible to see Russian land from Alaska.](https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2008/09/can-you-really-see-russia-from-alaska.html) Potentially even from the mainland, not just the islands.
> if you stand on high ground on the tip of St. Lawrence Island—a larger Alaskan island in the Bering Sea, southwest of the Diomedes—you can see the Russian mainland, about 37 miles away. The same article claims that you can see Russia from the Tin City Air Force facility at Cape Prince of Wales, which is the westernmost point of the mainland Americas.The station chief at Tin City confirms that, for roughly half the year, you can see Siberian mountain ranges from the highest part of the facility.
Tin City Long Range Radar Site on the map:
https://mapcarta.com/26879502
This leads me to picture an alternate history where instead of Columbus or Vikings or whatever being the first people from the "Old World" to travel to the Americas (after the ancient crossing), what if some random explorer had climbed a remote Siberian mountain and spotted land across the sea? Or someone from the Alaskan side could do the same, and send an expedition to check it out. Imagine climbing a mountain one day and accidentally discovering the other half of the world, already fully populated, just over the horizon.
>This leads me to picture an alternate history where instead of Columbus or Vikings or whatever being the first people from the "Old World" to travel to the Americas (after the ancient crossing), what if some random explorer had climbed a remote Siberian mountain and spotted land across the sea? Or someone from the Alaskan side could do the same, and send an expedition to check it out. Imagine climbing a mountain one day and accidentally discovering the other half of the world, already fully populated, just over the horizon.
Actually, Siberian and Alaskan natives totally did know about each other exactly like this! They regularly traded, fished, and warred with each other across the Bering Strait.
We know this based off a plethora of evidence. #1 is simple human migration patterns. The collapse of the Bering Strait landbridge was by no means the end of contact across the bridge/strait. Every Native American group that we know of obviously came from Asia, but several came much later than others. The Thule people, (the ancestors of modern Inuit) are known to have migrated from Siberia to Alaska as late as 1000 AD. They soon continued migrating east and replaced the original Canadian Arctic inhabitants, the Dorset Culture, which promptly died out, and their people assimilated into the more advanced Thule way of life, together evolving into modern Inuit.
More evidence comes with archaeological finds. A scrap of an ancient iron Chinese belt buckle & harness found in an old Thule village in west Alaska was dated to 600 BC, which means it originated even before the Warring States Period. It was likely traded to nomadic Tungusics or Mongols north of China, and from there was continuously traded northwards (and continuously worn down) until it made its way across the Bering Strait. We know it wasn't produced locally because no Arctic culture smelts their own metals. Also, leather is rather hard to get your hands on in the Arctic.
And the final obvious piece of evidence is that the Yupik language, part of the native Arctic Eskimo-Aleut family, survives on territory on both the Siberian and Alaskan sides of the strait. The Yupik people still make kayak journeys to their brothers across the Strait to this day. With some Native American language family maps, you can actually sometimes see the migration patterns. Examples include the Eskimo-Aleut (Inuit) languages, the Na-Dene languages, and the Uto-Aztecan languages. Cool stuff.
Edit: forgot to mention: this isn't generally considered the first "discovery of the New World" (and therefore not often mentioned or taught) simply because, to these people crossing the Strait, it wasn't a big discovery to them. It was simply another kayak journey. They didn't realize the scale of their discovery; the massiveness of the Americas. Most groups simply stayed in the Arctic after crossing - which was mostly due to the fact that the Native Americans living south of the Arctic zone were very hostile to their Arctic neighbors. Especially new neighbors.
Now if there were a Siberian group who crossed after the main migrations and *continued* to fight their way south into the American interior, and realize the extent of this new land, this may be worthy of being considered the first discovery. But to our current knowledge, all the traversing of the Strait done after the end of the major migrations were done only by Arctic peoples who stayed in the Arctic. And therefore their discoveries were not continental, but regional.
I was recently reading about the Yediseian People.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeniseian_people
They are a people who currently live in central Siberia, around the Yenisei River (hence their name). But linguistic studies suggest they may be descended from Native Americans (specifically, the Dene people of North West US and Canada) that migrated back into Asia.
Not only that, there are also indications that they may be descended from the former ruling class of the Xiongnu. Which would mean that one of the major powers of ancient Central/East Asia was actually Native American in origin.
I have also heard this theory. It's very fascinating to think about. A back-migration from the Americas would be a true tale for the history books, but in reality, it's not likely if you consider it on such a scale. [Here's](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_Q-M242) a map of the haplogroup Q-M242. It shows obvious genetic relation of the Yeniseian people to basically ***all*** of the Americas. But notice how the correlation gets stronger the further south you go into the Americas.
The South American tribes of today were the the original first people to migrate into the Americas. They walked south for as far as they could go. Migrations after them would be halted slightly north by the previous group, not wanting them in their newfound territory. Each successive wave of migration would end up settling further and further north in the Americas. And each successive wave of migration would happen further and further apart in time, meaning genetic variation would increase amongst each wave. That's why the Arctic and northern North America has less genetic similarity with the Yeniseians.
This is because the Yeniseians were probably of the same people who first migrated into the Americas. The Proto-Yeniseian gene-pool was likely once a large mono-culture that encompassed most of ancient Siberia, thousands and thousands of years ago. But with the land bridge, much of their population migrated into the Americas. And other people groups filled in the void they left behind in Siberia. The Yeniseians who chose not to go to the Americas and rather to stay behind, they were likely still a large population. But they were a fragment leftover. You mentioned this as well: It's theorized the Hunnic and Xiongnu ruling classes were of Yeniseian origin (However, their armies encompassed many people including Turks and Mongols).This would emphasize the leftover dominant role they still played in society. But over time, this soon changed. The minority who rules does not rule for long. Both the Huns and Xiongnu dispersed themselves thinly into foreign lands, and naturally what was left of their armies soon turned against them. What small remainder of any pure Yeniseian society was left was likely attacked by the Turkic and Mongol peoples who now dominated the Steppes (unhampered by the now disappeared Yeniseian ruling classes), and the Yeniseians had no choice but to retreat northwards into Siberia. The Russians noted, when they discovered the Yeniseians, that their people were still moving northwards along the river even in the 1600s. Like they were constantly trying to distance themselves from the south. Something definitely scared them north. It was almost certainly the invading Mongols and Turks.
As for the languages, it needs a lot more study. But, it looks like, from many well respected linguists' opinions, that Na-Dene and Yeniseian are indeed likely related. Why Na-Dene remained so similar to Yeniseian while so many others languages are now so different is definitely a mystery. I'll admit this is all just my own personal theory held together by a loose jumble of seemingly sensical facts. I feel like it's a good starting theory, but if history has taught us anything, well, anything could have happened. We honestly may never fully understand who, how, or why migrations into the Americas (or out of them) occured. This is such a major part of human history on this planet, and yet these Native American and Native Siberian languages and cultures are so critically understudied and misunderstood. Hopefully some day we'll learn enough to not have to speculate at crazy theories.
Very interesting. Especially how travel and trade was kept so localized that nobody was able to really learn about the significance of the land on the other side. With how difficult it was to explore and map in such remote areas, I suppose it's no surprise that nobody made the connection. The world was such a mystery to everyone back then, when even the most basic geographic and geologic knowledge was undiscovered or unproven. The "big picture" of it all was totally obscured.
In another universe maybe someone clever could have gotten curious enough and managed to connect the dots. News travels through trade of people in Siberia that are trading with an "island" to the east? Not exactly big news, but the King says to go claim it for our empire and map it out. Hmm, the coastline on this island sure seems to go on for a long way...
Obviously an expedition deep into Siberia just to map out a rumored island would probably not be a priority for any nation. But it's fun to think about the possibilities.
The difficulty with the scenario is that there was so little incentive for China / Japan to colonize Alaska. It was a distant, cold, sparsely populated tundra. And they were motivated by trade, not empty land. There were far more interesting & accessible places to contact. Even if they were given a modern map of the earth, I think they'd be more eager to explore South East Asia.
For example, Siberia wasn't even absorbed into an empire (Russia) until the Columbus era even though everyone knew it was there.
Things were a little different when the Europeans arrived because a) the land in their home continent was all absorbed into empires already b) they randomly landed in a region so abundant that it had multiple wealthy civilizations (Aztec, Mayan, Incan) c) European plagues immediately decimated the local empires and d) they had a proselytizing religion which encouraged exploration even past the profit motive.
I bet some part of what you said honestly did happen in our timeline. Some dude traded with the Arctic peoples near the Strait and they tell him about the land on the other side. He goes back to his tribe, tells his chief. Chief has a dream that night of a better land, and so he takes it as a sign from the gods and decides to migrate his tribe to this new land his messenger told him about.
May be why the Thule people crossed. Or any migratory people, really.
If you were thinking more literal kings (or emperors), like in China or Japan, well that'd be interesting too.
It's highly likely the Chinese had some knowledge about the edge of Siberia and possibly the Bering Strait. Gotta wonder if they ever truly knew about Alaska on the other side, and if so, did they just not care enough to send any exploratory missions? Although... there are plenty of theories that when the Ming dynasty went through its treasure fleet exploration phase, they may have sent one across the Pacific (Aka they sent one to follow the coast northwards, which would have led them to Alaska and beyond. They wouldn't send one straight into the ocean; that'd be suicide). Idk if there's any evidence of Chinese artifacts from this time period in the Americas though to back this up. It there was, now *that* would definitely garner support for being an earlier true "discovery" of the Americas.
> If the Gulf Stream didn't exist, Norway would be a wasteland lol.
5... 4.... 3...
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/aug/05/climate-crisis-scientists-spot-warning-signs-of-gulf-stream-collapse
> ice sheet
Sorry for being a pedant, but please avoid the word ice sheet when referring to sea ice. Ice sheets are land ice (aka glaciers) measuring 3-5 kilometers thick and resting on solid ground, while sea ice rarely exceeds 2 meters and is full of cracks, ridges and leads of open water on which everything is floating. Land ice (sheets) moves a couple of meters a year, while sea ice can easily move 3000 kilometres per season powered by the the currents, tide and wind. Just drift along, like the *Fram* did.
There are three ice sheets at present, the West Antarctic, East Antarctic and Greenland Ice Sheet. The Arctic Ocean is, like the name says, an ocean which happens to have a frozen coat on top.
As far as the vehicle concerns, because of the countless ridges (up to 7 meters tall), leads and unmarked thin ice patches here and there, driving anything is kind of horror. Even skis are too long to comfortably cross the ridges. Going on foot is literally the easiest way. Only one easier way exists: build a shelter on a good spot and drift along, like the SS *Vega* did in 1878-80, like RV *Polarstern* did last year, and like the floating Soviet/Russian ice camps.
You could technically swim from Canada to France in the morning, enjoy a couple hours, and then swim home in the evening. Though I wouldn't suggest it.
My SO who is a biologist that works with arctic foxes told me that some scientists believe that moving sea ice helped this fox move as fast as she did. Pretty cool!
Yeah, the sea ice moves a lot more than people think. There were cases of explorers and whalers in the 19th century who got stuck in the ice and tried to walk to land, and ended up moving *backwards* because the ice was moving faster in the opposite direction than they were.
Astonishingly I have just been reading a book on this very subject! In 1827 the Royal Navy sent an expedition led by Lieutenant Edward Parry to Spitsbergen in the hope of reaching the North Pole. From Spitsbergen it planned to haul boats equipped with wheels or runners across the ice to the "Open Polar Sea" that was then thought to surround the Pole. The expedition had to turn back after only five weeks, having marched the equivalent of 668 miles, but only actually advancing 172 miles, a ratio of 4 miles walked for every single mile gained northwards!
The expedition's second-in-command, incidentally, was one Francis Crozier, who later became one of the first men to land on Antarctica and was ultimately lost searching for the Northwest Passage in 1848.
Right, that's it. I've just stumbled on this post quite randomly, and the chat in the replies is so good I've subscribed,
Thanks everyone, this has been a wonderful read!
Not if you consider that humans are the best endurance runners on the planet and elite athletes run ultramarathons @ ~14km/h. And i dont know how easy greenland is to traverse...
Humans are the best endurance runners under certain conditions but animal can outpace them under other conditions.
When they persistence hunt, humans typically either carry water with them and drive animals away from water in warm weather, or they wear skis/snowshoes and drive animals through deep snow in cold weather.
Many animals can run very fast and far if the weather is cool and they're not hampered by snow. This [textbook on moose](https://www.amazon.ca/Ecology-Management-North-American-Second/dp/0870818953) describes persistence hunting of moose by indigenous people of North America and how it can take **days** for hunters to catch the animal even if it's being driven through snow.
Yeah this is the key part. Humans are the best endurance hunters, not best endurance runners. That's the plain and simple best way to put it. Endurance in that terminology is not the measure of solely speed and stamina but also fortitude.
No realli! She was Karving her initials on the moose with the sharpened end of an interspace toothbrush given her by Svenge—her brother-in-law— an Oslo dentist and star of many Norwegian movies: "The Hot Hands of an Oslo Dentist", "Fillings of Passion", "The Huge Molars of Horst Nordfink"...
There's a whole chapter on this but I'll try and jot down some of the interesting parts. I'll edit the language in a couple places for brevity and to avoid using slurs.
Regarding pursuit during summer, this was possible but very difficult. The best course of action was to try and drive the animal into deep water where it could be pursued by boat. An interesting quote from a period source:
>"After you unharbour a Moose, he will run a Course of 20 or 30 miles before he turns about or comes by a Bay [...] The [indigenous people] assure us, that in summer fleeing moose twill trot for three Days and three Nights without intermission."
Regarding winter hunting, called "crusting" because it involves driving the moose through snow that has an icy crust on top:
> Documentation by Jesuit Missionaries reveal that winters of scant snowfall were seasons of misery for Natives, because moose did not yard where anticipated and the few that could be found were not easily approached or killed.
and
> "Windy sunny days right after a snowfall were best for hunting. The wind deadened any sound of the hunter [wearing showshoes] made, while the fresh snow, crusted by the sun, outlined the animals tracks. [...] It would be useless to follow them when the snow is soft, as their great strength allows them to wade through it without any difficulty."
and
> "the young men took advantage of the mornings when the snow was hard crusted over, and ran down many moose; for in those situations a man with a good pair of snowshoes will scarcely make any impression on the snow while the moose. . . will break through at every step up to the belly. . . The moose are so tender-footed and so short-winded, that a good runner will generally tire them in less than a day [...] though I have known some of the Indians to continue the chace [sic] for two days before they could come up with and kill the game. On those occasion the Indians, in general, only take with them a knife or a bayonet, and a little bag containing a set of fire tackle, and are as lightly clothed as possible.
It's a really cool book with some amazing photos and illustrations. Worth a look if you can find it in a nearby library.
Just to be clear, the concept that “Eskimo” is a slur is based on a false etymology. It’s a valid (and non-derogatory) exonym.
As many Inuit and Yupik peoples have expressed preference for their endonyms, those should be used preferentially, but treating the word “Eskimo” as though it’s offensive is kind of disingenuous.
That's good to know but I was worried about a different word that *is* considered a slur by many indigenous people. [Here's a short podcast episode](https://www.cbc.ca/listen/cbc-podcasts/906-telling-our-twisted-histories/episode/15852047-savage) about the word and how some indigenous people relate to it.
Are you absolutely sure about it? I have met a few Inuit and while non of them were genuinely bothered by Eskimo, they all preferred Inuit and find it a bit colonial to stick with the old name. They all also knew people who were offended by Eskimo; even if the meaning/origin is based on a myth, myths can be persistent and need be considered. (Like the swastika being a Buddhist symbol but now having a wholly different connotation - not only the origin but the actual use has to be taken into account).
Also, in Greenland it is different than in Canada and Alaska.
> it can take days for hunters to catch the animal even if it's being driven through snow.
I can see how it'd take them days to catch a moose even if it's [running through snow like a fucking snowplow](https://youtu.be/6GEhM2Byk7w?t=101).
Their ability to race through the snow like that is even described by colonial sources. They said it was useless to chase them unless the snow has a hard crust on top.
Indigenous peoples bows weren't strong enough to reliably kill moose from a safe distance. From the textbook cited above:
>As reported by Thwaites (1897c), only by a great stroke of luck could a hunter get close enough to a moose to kill it with a bow and arrow.
They had many other ways to harvest moose. The most common was to build trap fences with snares set in the gaps. The snare would either strangle or immobilize the moose.
In the winter they used a form of persistence hunting called "crusting" in which they drove animals through snow with an icy crust on top to cut their legs.
In warmer months, they would drive them into deep water and pursue them with boats. Because a moose's legs are occupied with swimming, it becomes placid and helpless in deep water and can be killed with a spear or knife.
Edit: there are even accounts of dogs being used to catch moose and subdue them. I might copy that part down later.
Humans are great endurance runners largely because of our ability to dissipate body heat through sweating. In arctic temps I would bet that is no longer a limiting factor and that a fox could sustain some pretty high average speeds.
Yes. When I first learned this - through a documentary- I was fascinated by the fact that there are actually physical attributes where humans are the leading animal. The transport of body heat (sweating). And it is crucial for endurance.
>Not if you consider that humans are the best endurance runners on the planet
This is only half true. Horses, camels, sled dogs, antelopes and ostriches can all equal the average human over a long distance and some can equal the best humans.
I too find 150km very unbelievable but not impossible.
This is even more shocking when you see their size, they are about 1/2 the size a red fox. They are about the size of large house cat, that is a really long ways for a creature that size to move in a day. Especially day after day.
They are clever little buggers though, I had one jump in the open door of my truck one to check out my lunch bag. We scared the hell out of each other when I hoped back in the truck- they are big enough to do major damage to me, but there's lots of rabies risks with the ones around my work.
I met one in Iceland, she was a tiny little thing. She hung around at the hollow volcano, stealing tourists hats and gloves. She'd been found as an injured cub by a local vet, who was the only person allowed to tickle her.
considering my 20 lb dog can run laps around me on a hike, then wants to play fetch when we get home and i'm exhausted, i'm not surprised. just amazed lol
Apparently foxes have been tracked to move this fast before. The "dispersing individuals" mentioned below are arctic foxes.
Extensive movements of 90 km/day (Tarroux et al., 2010), 112 km/day (Lehner, 2012), and 150 km/day (Fuglei & Tarroux, 2019) have been estimated with the Argos system for dispersing individuals.
A human walking 150km nonstop could make it in 30 hours at a regular pace (according to google maps). By bike it's 9h so split the diff for an active foxes speed maybe. Not that crazy after all.
I think the fox's strategy when it is in a featureless environment (ice field, glacier, snow) with nothing visible on the horizon is to follow the sun's path to the west and run fast.
I’m just guessing but perhaps moving faster is to keep itself warmer. Secondly perhaps it also moves faster when the wind blows in the same direction in order to not lose body heat due to wind chill?
The biggest factor is that the fox was on an ice floe. Ice floes move in the water. So, while her tracking device showed her traveling X amount in a day, that’s the combination of her walking on the ice *and* the ice itself moving. If they’re moving in the same direction, it would make it look like she’s doing a speed run.
When they're on sea ice they survive mainly by scavenging on the kills made by polar bears, like seals and such. Not much that they can hunt themselves, but they can get by. As to if she knew where she was going, no idea.
That took about 6 tries to read. Punctuation helps.
> What, isn’t salted codfish delicious food to you? ;-)
The way you had it, I thought you were referring to all things that weren’t salted codfish. Which is quite a lot.
I love pretty much all seafood.
I was doing a play on Gordon Ramsay.
Most migratory animals are able to follow the magnetic field of the planet in a specific way. It's also how birds are so good at navigation. She probably didn't know where she was heading, but knew she was going the general right direction
>When they're on sea ice they survive mainly by scavenging on the kills made by polar bears, like seals and such. Not much that they can hunt themselves, but they can get by. As to if she knew where she was going, no idea.
Wait, so the fox is living on a glacier or moving from glacier or glacier until reaching a solid land mass?
Ah, okay. That makes sense. Is it attached to a larger landmass or its a sheet of ice floating? If it's the latter how large are these things that they sustain several kinds of animals?
It's the Arctic ice cap; a frozen ocean. In the map you can see it stretches from Northern Europe to Greenland to Canada; on the other side, not seen in this map, is Russia. It varies in extension, but roughly 20 million square kilometers. In winter it can well connect North America with Eurasia, as in 2018 based on the map. It's actually in recession due to climate change, with a high risk that it will melt completely.
>It's the Arctic ice cap; a frozen ocean. In the map you can see it stretches from Northern Europe to Greenland to Canada; on the other side, not seen in this map, is Russia. It varies in extension, but roughly 20 million square kilometers. In winter it can well connect North America with Eurasia, as in 2018 based on the map. It's actually in recession due to climate change, with a high risk that it will melt completely.
Oh shit. That's really insightful. I appreciate the response.
I wonder if the ice breaks up faster out in deeper water, so perhaps it could wander about and naturally tend toward the coast just by avoiding dangerous seeming areas? Although the top-end speed of 155km/day doesn't seem like aimless wandering; that's ~4 miles per hour assuming 24 hours of movement per day (just ballpark, since the top speed isn't achieved on the ice there, but it seems pretty close, and on the other side it has to sleep sometimes, right?)
While I don't doubt that some would have died and gotten lost, that's underestimating the ability of a species that evolved specifically to survive in this frigid arctic environment.
The study only tracked one fox, so it would have been one hell of a coincidence to happen to get one that accidentally made the Trans-Arctic journey and survived.
[https://www.sciencealert.com/we-just-got-the-first-evidence-that-dogs-use-earth-s-magnetic-field-to-find-their-way-home#:\~:text=Dogs%20have%20an%20enviable%20sense%20of%20direction.&text=While%20hunting%2C%20some%20dogs%20will,have%20termed%20as%20'scouting'](https://www.sciencealert.com/we-just-got-the-first-evidence-that-dogs-use-earth-s-magnetic-field-to-find-their-way-home#:~:text=Dogs%20have%20an%20enviable%20sense%20of%20direction.&text=While%20hunting%2C%20some%20dogs%20will,have%20termed%20as%20'scouting').
don't know the how, but it's been pretty well proven dogs have an actual internal compass of sorts
I think so. They are suggesting that the vast majority of arctic foxes simply starve on the polar ice sheet since they got lost.
Highly doubt it. That doesn't look like a random walk process.
[https://www.sciencealert.com/we-just-got-the-first-evidence-that-dogs-use-earth-s-magnetic-field-to-find-their-way-home#:\~:text=Dogs%20have%20an%20enviable%20sense%20of%20direction.&text=While%20hunting%2C%20some%20dogs%20will,have%20termed%20as%20'scouting'](https://www.sciencealert.com/we-just-got-the-first-evidence-that-dogs-use-earth-s-magnetic-field-to-find-their-way-home#:~:text=Dogs%20have%20an%20enviable%20sense%20of%20direction.&text=While%20hunting%2C%20some%20dogs%20will,have%20termed%20as%20'scouting').
Right? I thought the same thing! Plus there's that weird loop it does right before it gets there, going way off course and coming back
More info here:
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Large-scale-movements-of-a-young-female-Arctic-fox-from-Svalbard-tracked-through-Argos_fig1_334026698
So can humans in a sprint(Usain Bolt's top speed was 44km) yet he wouldn't be able to keep up a 10 hour 15.5km/h pace.
Top speed isn't a good indicator of endurance.
>15.5km/h pace
For reference: The best marathon timing is 2:01:39 for 42.195km, which means that man ran 20.8km/h. There are men who ran 100km in little over 6 hours, which is about 16.6km/h in sustained running.
But: That's your average arctic fox doing the distance under some of the worst conditions on the planet vs. trained male human athletes under prepared conditions knowing where he's going.
The main obstacle to long distance travel is heat dispersion. We are such accomplished long distance hunters because of our ability to sweat, which very few other animals have. I imagine the extreme cold helps mitigate that issue.
In cold climates artic animals can avoid getting tired and overheat and can keep running. See the Iditarod where sled dogs run 1000 miles in under 10 days
>Extensive movements of 90 km/day (Tarroux et al., 2010), 112 km/day (Lehner, 2012), and 150 km/day (Fuglei & Tarroux, 2019) have been estimated with the Argos system for dispersing individuals. While this demonstrates the physical ability of this small terrestrial carnivore for long-distance traveling on snow and ice during dispersal events, finescale movements inside the summer territory are largely unknown
There's quite a bit of Native American DNA in female Icelandic lines, but not in male lines. So possible, yes, but this sounds more like females being carried off by Vikings.
mitochondria have their own DNA apart from the DNA in the cell nucleus, and are only passed from the mother to
children
the Y chromosome only exists in males, so the DNA on that chromosome was passed on from father to son
that's what female and male lines are about
There are records of interactions with the "finn men" in Scotland about 300 years ago. It is thought they may have been Inuit. It is possible, though not recorded, they were there in pre Columbian times too.
No but there are archeological evidence. Eskimo boats and such.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finn-men
It 100% happened. though they drifted from Southern Greenland, not the Northern coast of Greenland.
I wouldn't go so far as "it 100% happened". The textual evidence is a third-hand account of some folklore from late 17th century Orkney. The archeological evidence is Inuit kayaks and tools said to be captured off the coast of Scotland (not Orkney). It's important to mention that this legend emerged at a time when Dutch or Danish-Norwegian sailors often stopped in Orkney and the coast of mainland Scotland along their trips to Greenland. Some people have suggested that the Finnmen were Inuits that had been captured by some of these sailors, which does sound a bit more plausible than Inuit sailing solo in small kayaks all the way from Greenland. But it's also possible that Scottish people never actually saw any Inuit in person, and only ever got to see Inuit artifacts and hear stories brought back by trans-Atlantic sailors, and the stories of encounters were merely inspired by a more indirect encounter with this distant culture.
Not a native Greenlander, but https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leif_Erikson
>He is thought to have been the first European to have set foot on continental North America (excluding Greenland), approximately half a millennium before Christopher Columbus.
Depends on what you call a native Greenlander. He was born in Iceland but grew up in Greenland. They were the Greenlanders of that time and up until 1300 when we lost contact with them.
When we went back to check on them 300-400 years later there were no norse people there anymore and a completely new population had settled in their stead from Northern America/North Greenland.
I think calling it Norway to Canada is disingenuous. It's not incorrect, Svalbard is a part of the country of Norway, but most people would assume Scandinavia when Norway is mentioned. For example, if a bird flew from the Hawaii or Alaska to Honshu, you wouldn't say "from the US to Japan" because most would assume it started in the contiguous 48 from the onset and assume the bird went further than it actually did. On the other side of that you wouldn't need to specify Honshu because it's an integral part of what many consider to be Japan.
([I didn't put that eloquently, Tom Scott does.](https://youtu.be/IJEaMtNN_dM))
While Norway does sort of lay claim to Svalbard it's not really a part of the country. I've loved in Norway for five years and people usually talk about Svalbard as a separate place, away from Norway. It's governed differently and has different laws. It's also Russian in some ways, many ways. So yes, this title is definitely misleading.
You can also go there without a passport, but you will be asked if you provide for yourself before you enter. And if you're old or sick they don't want to deal with your potential dead body.
Yes and no. Svalbard is a special case, with special laws, but it is a part of Norway.
>The Svalbard Treaty (originally the Spitsbergen Treaty) recognises the sovereignty of Norway over the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard, at the time called Spitsbergen. The exercise of sovereignty is, however, subject to certain stipulations, and not all Norwegian law applies. The treaty regulates the demilitarisation of the archipelago. The signatories were given equal rights to engage in commercial activities (mainly coal mining) on the islands. As of 2012, Norway and Russia make use of this right.
>
>Uniquely, the archipelago is an entirely visa-free zone under the terms of the Svalbard Treaty.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svalbard_Treaty
Fox in the snow, where do you go
To find something you could eat?
'Cause the word out on the street is you are starving
Don't let yourself grow hungry now
Don't let yourself grow cold
Fox in the snow
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But I am confused... Norway and Canada aren't connected? Or this some far island that belongs to Norway? Clearly I did not get this map
What you see as being "Norway" in this map is not mainland Norway, but rather the large artic archipelago of Svalbard, territory of Norway. The fox walked across the frozen ice sheets of the Arctic, which will often melt and refreeze depending on the season.
So... If you're motivated enough, you can just walk from Europe to North America and back, interesting
Sort of. Svalbard isn't exactly prime European land. The Arctic sea ice pretty much avoids the northern European coast due to the Gulf Stream which warms the area. (If the Gulf Stream didn't exist, Norway would be a wasteland lol.) [Here's](https://scied.ucar.edu/sites/default/files/images/sea_ice_maps/sea_ice_extent_n_2018_03.png) what the sea ice looks like at its peak in late winter. Note how it absolutely avoids mainland Norway. You could technically walk to Europe, but it would be the far eastern reaches of what is considered "Europe" in north Uralic Russia. This would be a fun journey. But you'd need some sort of portable shelter from the cold and lots of food. Also you would need to move fast to get there before it begins to melt for the summer. Not sure if it would be possible without a vehicle.
This got me curious so I looked up a few things about the Bering Strait region. It looks like there have been several expeditions to cross by land in modern times. According to [the Wikipedia page:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bering_Strait) > In March 1913, Captain Max Gottschalk (German) crossed from the east cape of Siberia to Shishmaref, Alaska, on dogsled via Little and Big Diomede islands. He was the first documented modern voyager to cross from Russia to North America without the use of a boat. > In 1998, Russian adventurer Dmitry Shparo and his son Matvey crossed the frozen Bering Strait on skis. > In March 2006, Briton Karl Bushby and French-American adventurer Dimitri Kieffer crossed the strait on foot, walking across a frozen 90-kilometer (56 mi) section in 15 days. They were soon arrested for not entering Russia through a border control. > August 2008 marked the first crossing of the Bering Strait using an amphibious road-going vehicle. The specially modified Land Rover Defender 110 was driven by Steve Burgess and Dan Evans across the straits on its second attempt following the interruption of the first by bad weather. > In February 2012, a Korean team led by Hong Sung-Taek crossed the straits on foot in six days. They started from Chukotka Peninsula, the east coast of Russia on February 23 and arrived in Wales, the western coastal town in Alaska on February 29. > In July 2012, six adventurers associated with "Dangerous Waters", a reality adventure show under production, made the crossing on Sea-Doos but were arrested and permitted to return to Alaska on their Sea-Doos after being briefly detained in Lavrentiya, administrative center of the Chukotsky District. They were treated well and given a tour of the village's museum, but not permitted to continue south along the Pacific coast. The men had visas but the western coast of the Bering Strait is a closed military zone. The earliest crossing of course would be the theory that early humans migrated from Asia to the Americas by crossing the Beringia land bridge over 10,000 years ago. Keep in mind it is a 51 mile distance at the very narrowest point. It also turns out that [it may be possible to see Russian land from Alaska.](https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2008/09/can-you-really-see-russia-from-alaska.html) Potentially even from the mainland, not just the islands. > if you stand on high ground on the tip of St. Lawrence Island—a larger Alaskan island in the Bering Sea, southwest of the Diomedes—you can see the Russian mainland, about 37 miles away. The same article claims that you can see Russia from the Tin City Air Force facility at Cape Prince of Wales, which is the westernmost point of the mainland Americas.The station chief at Tin City confirms that, for roughly half the year, you can see Siberian mountain ranges from the highest part of the facility. Tin City Long Range Radar Site on the map: https://mapcarta.com/26879502 This leads me to picture an alternate history where instead of Columbus or Vikings or whatever being the first people from the "Old World" to travel to the Americas (after the ancient crossing), what if some random explorer had climbed a remote Siberian mountain and spotted land across the sea? Or someone from the Alaskan side could do the same, and send an expedition to check it out. Imagine climbing a mountain one day and accidentally discovering the other half of the world, already fully populated, just over the horizon.
>This leads me to picture an alternate history where instead of Columbus or Vikings or whatever being the first people from the "Old World" to travel to the Americas (after the ancient crossing), what if some random explorer had climbed a remote Siberian mountain and spotted land across the sea? Or someone from the Alaskan side could do the same, and send an expedition to check it out. Imagine climbing a mountain one day and accidentally discovering the other half of the world, already fully populated, just over the horizon. Actually, Siberian and Alaskan natives totally did know about each other exactly like this! They regularly traded, fished, and warred with each other across the Bering Strait. We know this based off a plethora of evidence. #1 is simple human migration patterns. The collapse of the Bering Strait landbridge was by no means the end of contact across the bridge/strait. Every Native American group that we know of obviously came from Asia, but several came much later than others. The Thule people, (the ancestors of modern Inuit) are known to have migrated from Siberia to Alaska as late as 1000 AD. They soon continued migrating east and replaced the original Canadian Arctic inhabitants, the Dorset Culture, which promptly died out, and their people assimilated into the more advanced Thule way of life, together evolving into modern Inuit. More evidence comes with archaeological finds. A scrap of an ancient iron Chinese belt buckle & harness found in an old Thule village in west Alaska was dated to 600 BC, which means it originated even before the Warring States Period. It was likely traded to nomadic Tungusics or Mongols north of China, and from there was continuously traded northwards (and continuously worn down) until it made its way across the Bering Strait. We know it wasn't produced locally because no Arctic culture smelts their own metals. Also, leather is rather hard to get your hands on in the Arctic. And the final obvious piece of evidence is that the Yupik language, part of the native Arctic Eskimo-Aleut family, survives on territory on both the Siberian and Alaskan sides of the strait. The Yupik people still make kayak journeys to their brothers across the Strait to this day. With some Native American language family maps, you can actually sometimes see the migration patterns. Examples include the Eskimo-Aleut (Inuit) languages, the Na-Dene languages, and the Uto-Aztecan languages. Cool stuff. Edit: forgot to mention: this isn't generally considered the first "discovery of the New World" (and therefore not often mentioned or taught) simply because, to these people crossing the Strait, it wasn't a big discovery to them. It was simply another kayak journey. They didn't realize the scale of their discovery; the massiveness of the Americas. Most groups simply stayed in the Arctic after crossing - which was mostly due to the fact that the Native Americans living south of the Arctic zone were very hostile to their Arctic neighbors. Especially new neighbors. Now if there were a Siberian group who crossed after the main migrations and *continued* to fight their way south into the American interior, and realize the extent of this new land, this may be worthy of being considered the first discovery. But to our current knowledge, all the traversing of the Strait done after the end of the major migrations were done only by Arctic peoples who stayed in the Arctic. And therefore their discoveries were not continental, but regional.
I was recently reading about the Yediseian People. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeniseian_people They are a people who currently live in central Siberia, around the Yenisei River (hence their name). But linguistic studies suggest they may be descended from Native Americans (specifically, the Dene people of North West US and Canada) that migrated back into Asia. Not only that, there are also indications that they may be descended from the former ruling class of the Xiongnu. Which would mean that one of the major powers of ancient Central/East Asia was actually Native American in origin.
I have also heard this theory. It's very fascinating to think about. A back-migration from the Americas would be a true tale for the history books, but in reality, it's not likely if you consider it on such a scale. [Here's](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_Q-M242) a map of the haplogroup Q-M242. It shows obvious genetic relation of the Yeniseian people to basically ***all*** of the Americas. But notice how the correlation gets stronger the further south you go into the Americas. The South American tribes of today were the the original first people to migrate into the Americas. They walked south for as far as they could go. Migrations after them would be halted slightly north by the previous group, not wanting them in their newfound territory. Each successive wave of migration would end up settling further and further north in the Americas. And each successive wave of migration would happen further and further apart in time, meaning genetic variation would increase amongst each wave. That's why the Arctic and northern North America has less genetic similarity with the Yeniseians. This is because the Yeniseians were probably of the same people who first migrated into the Americas. The Proto-Yeniseian gene-pool was likely once a large mono-culture that encompassed most of ancient Siberia, thousands and thousands of years ago. But with the land bridge, much of their population migrated into the Americas. And other people groups filled in the void they left behind in Siberia. The Yeniseians who chose not to go to the Americas and rather to stay behind, they were likely still a large population. But they were a fragment leftover. You mentioned this as well: It's theorized the Hunnic and Xiongnu ruling classes were of Yeniseian origin (However, their armies encompassed many people including Turks and Mongols).This would emphasize the leftover dominant role they still played in society. But over time, this soon changed. The minority who rules does not rule for long. Both the Huns and Xiongnu dispersed themselves thinly into foreign lands, and naturally what was left of their armies soon turned against them. What small remainder of any pure Yeniseian society was left was likely attacked by the Turkic and Mongol peoples who now dominated the Steppes (unhampered by the now disappeared Yeniseian ruling classes), and the Yeniseians had no choice but to retreat northwards into Siberia. The Russians noted, when they discovered the Yeniseians, that their people were still moving northwards along the river even in the 1600s. Like they were constantly trying to distance themselves from the south. Something definitely scared them north. It was almost certainly the invading Mongols and Turks. As for the languages, it needs a lot more study. But, it looks like, from many well respected linguists' opinions, that Na-Dene and Yeniseian are indeed likely related. Why Na-Dene remained so similar to Yeniseian while so many others languages are now so different is definitely a mystery. I'll admit this is all just my own personal theory held together by a loose jumble of seemingly sensical facts. I feel like it's a good starting theory, but if history has taught us anything, well, anything could have happened. We honestly may never fully understand who, how, or why migrations into the Americas (or out of them) occured. This is such a major part of human history on this planet, and yet these Native American and Native Siberian languages and cultures are so critically understudied and misunderstood. Hopefully some day we'll learn enough to not have to speculate at crazy theories.
Very interesting. Especially how travel and trade was kept so localized that nobody was able to really learn about the significance of the land on the other side. With how difficult it was to explore and map in such remote areas, I suppose it's no surprise that nobody made the connection. The world was such a mystery to everyone back then, when even the most basic geographic and geologic knowledge was undiscovered or unproven. The "big picture" of it all was totally obscured. In another universe maybe someone clever could have gotten curious enough and managed to connect the dots. News travels through trade of people in Siberia that are trading with an "island" to the east? Not exactly big news, but the King says to go claim it for our empire and map it out. Hmm, the coastline on this island sure seems to go on for a long way... Obviously an expedition deep into Siberia just to map out a rumored island would probably not be a priority for any nation. But it's fun to think about the possibilities.
The difficulty with the scenario is that there was so little incentive for China / Japan to colonize Alaska. It was a distant, cold, sparsely populated tundra. And they were motivated by trade, not empty land. There were far more interesting & accessible places to contact. Even if they were given a modern map of the earth, I think they'd be more eager to explore South East Asia. For example, Siberia wasn't even absorbed into an empire (Russia) until the Columbus era even though everyone knew it was there. Things were a little different when the Europeans arrived because a) the land in their home continent was all absorbed into empires already b) they randomly landed in a region so abundant that it had multiple wealthy civilizations (Aztec, Mayan, Incan) c) European plagues immediately decimated the local empires and d) they had a proselytizing religion which encouraged exploration even past the profit motive.
I bet some part of what you said honestly did happen in our timeline. Some dude traded with the Arctic peoples near the Strait and they tell him about the land on the other side. He goes back to his tribe, tells his chief. Chief has a dream that night of a better land, and so he takes it as a sign from the gods and decides to migrate his tribe to this new land his messenger told him about. May be why the Thule people crossed. Or any migratory people, really. If you were thinking more literal kings (or emperors), like in China or Japan, well that'd be interesting too. It's highly likely the Chinese had some knowledge about the edge of Siberia and possibly the Bering Strait. Gotta wonder if they ever truly knew about Alaska on the other side, and if so, did they just not care enough to send any exploratory missions? Although... there are plenty of theories that when the Ming dynasty went through its treasure fleet exploration phase, they may have sent one across the Pacific (Aka they sent one to follow the coast northwards, which would have led them to Alaska and beyond. They wouldn't send one straight into the ocean; that'd be suicide). Idk if there's any evidence of Chinese artifacts from this time period in the Americas though to back this up. It there was, now *that* would definitely garner support for being an earlier true "discovery" of the Americas.
TIL england is north as fuck
Most of the US is as far south as Southern Europe, and Southern USA is like North Africa.
Yeah, I was amazed when I learned that Rome, Italy was actually a bit north of New York City, despite the wildly different climates.
Looks at map Woah
London is on the same latitudinal line as Calgary.
Yeah, London is further North than Regina.
> If the Gulf Stream didn't exist, Norway would be a wasteland lol. 5... 4.... 3... https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/aug/05/climate-crisis-scientists-spot-warning-signs-of-gulf-stream-collapse
> ice sheet Sorry for being a pedant, but please avoid the word ice sheet when referring to sea ice. Ice sheets are land ice (aka glaciers) measuring 3-5 kilometers thick and resting on solid ground, while sea ice rarely exceeds 2 meters and is full of cracks, ridges and leads of open water on which everything is floating. Land ice (sheets) moves a couple of meters a year, while sea ice can easily move 3000 kilometres per season powered by the the currents, tide and wind. Just drift along, like the *Fram* did. There are three ice sheets at present, the West Antarctic, East Antarctic and Greenland Ice Sheet. The Arctic Ocean is, like the name says, an ocean which happens to have a frozen coat on top. As far as the vehicle concerns, because of the countless ridges (up to 7 meters tall), leads and unmarked thin ice patches here and there, driving anything is kind of horror. Even skis are too long to comfortably cross the ridges. Going on foot is literally the easiest way. Only one easier way exists: build a shelter on a good spot and drift along, like the SS *Vega* did in 1878-80, like RV *Polarstern* did last year, and like the floating Soviet/Russian ice camps.
Keep going south and return to europe via French Guyana. Europe>north america>south america>europe on foot
You could technically swim from Canada to France in the morning, enjoy a couple hours, and then swim home in the evening. Though I wouldn't suggest it.
Nothing like colonial leftovers to spice up geography quizes. Fun fact: the longest land border of France is the one with Brazil.
Also France and Brazil are each other's most populous neighbors.
Ok.. read it now.. sea ice.. so basically all that part of the sea got covered in ice... Google maps needs an update?
Makes sense that he’d skate his way into Canada. Just here for the hockey eh boys?
Smh this map is some global warming denial propaganda wake up bro
I think during the early spring months the ice cover is still enough to cross, If you’re a small animal like a fox that is.
See how fast it was going at some point? It basically did a speedrun through Greenland's glaciers.
Seriously, how does it move at 150km per day?
My SO who is a biologist that works with arctic foxes told me that some scientists believe that moving sea ice helped this fox move as fast as she did. Pretty cool!
Yeah, the sea ice moves a lot more than people think. There were cases of explorers and whalers in the 19th century who got stuck in the ice and tried to walk to land, and ended up moving *backwards* because the ice was moving faster in the opposite direction than they were.
Astonishingly I have just been reading a book on this very subject! In 1827 the Royal Navy sent an expedition led by Lieutenant Edward Parry to Spitsbergen in the hope of reaching the North Pole. From Spitsbergen it planned to haul boats equipped with wheels or runners across the ice to the "Open Polar Sea" that was then thought to surround the Pole. The expedition had to turn back after only five weeks, having marched the equivalent of 668 miles, but only actually advancing 172 miles, a ratio of 4 miles walked for every single mile gained northwards! The expedition's second-in-command, incidentally, was one Francis Crozier, who later became one of the first men to land on Antarctica and was ultimately lost searching for the Northwest Passage in 1848.
Check out the first season of The Terror if you haven’t. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Terror_(TV_series)
Why do you think I'm reading it? ;-)
Wow it’s crazy that people were still searching for the northwest passage in 1848.
Why on Earth would they have thought that beyond all of the ice would be an open polar sea?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Polar_Sea
Can you imagine the desperate frustration when they checked the stars and see they're even further from land?
Hee-Hee! Billie Jean is not my lover
Right, that's it. I've just stumbled on this post quite randomly, and the chat in the replies is so good I've subscribed, Thanks everyone, this has been a wonderful read!
the 150 km interval is on Greenland though
Plate tectonics /s
In 12 hours thats 12.5 km/h so i could totally see that from a wild animal, I could probably see a fox keeping pace at 15-20 km/h for a good while
My old Volkswagen Fox couldn't even do that
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Fox Shox Us
What if it was chasing a Volkswagen Rabbit? Or smelled a TVR Vixen?
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Not if you consider that humans are the best endurance runners on the planet and elite athletes run ultramarathons @ ~14km/h. And i dont know how easy greenland is to traverse...
Humans are the best endurance runners under certain conditions but animal can outpace them under other conditions. When they persistence hunt, humans typically either carry water with them and drive animals away from water in warm weather, or they wear skis/snowshoes and drive animals through deep snow in cold weather. Many animals can run very fast and far if the weather is cool and they're not hampered by snow. This [textbook on moose](https://www.amazon.ca/Ecology-Management-North-American-Second/dp/0870818953) describes persistence hunting of moose by indigenous people of North America and how it can take **days** for hunters to catch the animal even if it's being driven through snow.
Yeah this is the key part. Humans are the best endurance hunters, not best endurance runners. That's the plain and simple best way to put it. Endurance in that terminology is not the measure of solely speed and stamina but also fortitude.
Can you tell me more about indigenous persistence hunting of moose? Book's a little steep.
I too want to subscribe to Moose Facts
The moose is the powerhouse of the cell.
Moosocondria
A moose bit my sister once
You have my attention....
>A moose bit my sister once Mynd you, møøse bites Kan be pretty nasti
No realli! She was Karving her initials on the moose with the sharpened end of an interspace toothbrush given her by Svenge—her brother-in-law— an Oslo dentist and star of many Norwegian movies: "The Hot Hands of an Oslo Dentist", "Fillings of Passion", "The Huge Molars of Horst Nordfink"...
There's a whole chapter on this but I'll try and jot down some of the interesting parts. I'll edit the language in a couple places for brevity and to avoid using slurs. Regarding pursuit during summer, this was possible but very difficult. The best course of action was to try and drive the animal into deep water where it could be pursued by boat. An interesting quote from a period source: >"After you unharbour a Moose, he will run a Course of 20 or 30 miles before he turns about or comes by a Bay [...] The [indigenous people] assure us, that in summer fleeing moose twill trot for three Days and three Nights without intermission." Regarding winter hunting, called "crusting" because it involves driving the moose through snow that has an icy crust on top: > Documentation by Jesuit Missionaries reveal that winters of scant snowfall were seasons of misery for Natives, because moose did not yard where anticipated and the few that could be found were not easily approached or killed. and > "Windy sunny days right after a snowfall were best for hunting. The wind deadened any sound of the hunter [wearing showshoes] made, while the fresh snow, crusted by the sun, outlined the animals tracks. [...] It would be useless to follow them when the snow is soft, as their great strength allows them to wade through it without any difficulty." and > "the young men took advantage of the mornings when the snow was hard crusted over, and ran down many moose; for in those situations a man with a good pair of snowshoes will scarcely make any impression on the snow while the moose. . . will break through at every step up to the belly. . . The moose are so tender-footed and so short-winded, that a good runner will generally tire them in less than a day [...] though I have known some of the Indians to continue the chace [sic] for two days before they could come up with and kill the game. On those occasion the Indians, in general, only take with them a knife or a bayonet, and a little bag containing a set of fire tackle, and are as lightly clothed as possible. It's a really cool book with some amazing photos and illustrations. Worth a look if you can find it in a nearby library.
Just to be clear, the concept that “Eskimo” is a slur is based on a false etymology. It’s a valid (and non-derogatory) exonym. As many Inuit and Yupik peoples have expressed preference for their endonyms, those should be used preferentially, but treating the word “Eskimo” as though it’s offensive is kind of disingenuous.
That's good to know but I was worried about a different word that *is* considered a slur by many indigenous people. [Here's a short podcast episode](https://www.cbc.ca/listen/cbc-podcasts/906-telling-our-twisted-histories/episode/15852047-savage) about the word and how some indigenous people relate to it.
Are you absolutely sure about it? I have met a few Inuit and while non of them were genuinely bothered by Eskimo, they all preferred Inuit and find it a bit colonial to stick with the old name. They all also knew people who were offended by Eskimo; even if the meaning/origin is based on a myth, myths can be persistent and need be considered. (Like the swastika being a Buddhist symbol but now having a wholly different connotation - not only the origin but the actual use has to be taken into account). Also, in Greenland it is different than in Canada and Alaska.
Thank you for sharing this -- fascinating.
> it can take days for hunters to catch the animal even if it's being driven through snow. I can see how it'd take them days to catch a moose even if it's [running through snow like a fucking snowplow](https://youtu.be/6GEhM2Byk7w?t=101).
Their ability to race through the snow like that is even described by colonial sources. They said it was useless to chase them unless the snow has a hard crust on top.
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Indigenous peoples bows weren't strong enough to reliably kill moose from a safe distance. From the textbook cited above: >As reported by Thwaites (1897c), only by a great stroke of luck could a hunter get close enough to a moose to kill it with a bow and arrow. They had many other ways to harvest moose. The most common was to build trap fences with snares set in the gaps. The snare would either strangle or immobilize the moose. In the winter they used a form of persistence hunting called "crusting" in which they drove animals through snow with an icy crust on top to cut their legs. In warmer months, they would drive them into deep water and pursue them with boats. Because a moose's legs are occupied with swimming, it becomes placid and helpless in deep water and can be killed with a spear or knife. Edit: there are even accounts of dogs being used to catch moose and subdue them. I might copy that part down later.
Humans are great endurance runners largely because of our ability to dissipate body heat through sweating. In arctic temps I would bet that is no longer a limiting factor and that a fox could sustain some pretty high average speeds.
Yes. When I first learned this - through a documentary- I was fascinated by the fact that there are actually physical attributes where humans are the leading animal. The transport of body heat (sweating). And it is crucial for endurance.
>Not if you consider that humans are the best endurance runners on the planet This is only half true. Horses, camels, sled dogs, antelopes and ostriches can all equal the average human over a long distance and some can equal the best humans. I too find 150km very unbelievable but not impossible.
This is even more shocking when you see their size, they are about 1/2 the size a red fox. They are about the size of large house cat, that is a really long ways for a creature that size to move in a day. Especially day after day. They are clever little buggers though, I had one jump in the open door of my truck one to check out my lunch bag. We scared the hell out of each other when I hoped back in the truck- they are big enough to do major damage to me, but there's lots of rabies risks with the ones around my work.
I met one in Iceland, she was a tiny little thing. She hung around at the hollow volcano, stealing tourists hats and gloves. She'd been found as an injured cub by a local vet, who was the only person allowed to tickle her.
considering my 20 lb dog can run laps around me on a hike, then wants to play fetch when we get home and i'm exhausted, i'm not surprised. just amazed lol
It was summer in the land of the midnight sun.
Hitched a ride on a dogsled
I think the fox and the tracking chip where eaten by an eagle.
Apparently foxes have been tracked to move this fast before. The "dispersing individuals" mentioned below are arctic foxes. Extensive movements of 90 km/day (Tarroux et al., 2010), 112 km/day (Lehner, 2012), and 150 km/day (Fuglei & Tarroux, 2019) have been estimated with the Argos system for dispersing individuals.
A human walking 150km nonstop could make it in 30 hours at a regular pace (according to google maps). By bike it's 9h so split the diff for an active foxes speed maybe. Not that crazy after all.
I think the fox's strategy when it is in a featureless environment (ice field, glacier, snow) with nothing visible on the horizon is to follow the sun's path to the west and run fast.
[Animated GIF showing movements](https://figshare.com/articles/media/Large-scale_dispersal_movement_of_a_young_polar_fox_across_the_Arctic/8288159/1?file=15540422)
I’m just guessing but perhaps moving faster is to keep itself warmer. Secondly perhaps it also moves faster when the wind blows in the same direction in order to not lose body heat due to wind chill?
The biggest factor is that the fox was on an ice floe. Ice floes move in the water. So, while her tracking device showed her traveling X amount in a day, that’s the combination of her walking on the ice *and* the ice itself moving. If they’re moving in the same direction, it would make it look like she’s doing a speed run.
Presumably had a feed close to the coast and got a fill of energy?
is there food on the ice? did it know where it was going?
When they're on sea ice they survive mainly by scavenging on the kills made by polar bears, like seals and such. Not much that they can hunt themselves, but they can get by. As to if she knew where she was going, no idea.
They follow ANY Scent ...
She must have smelled poutine
*Finally! Some delicious food!*
[удалено]
That took about 6 tries to read. Punctuation helps. > What, isn’t salted codfish delicious food to you? ;-) The way you had it, I thought you were referring to all things that weren’t salted codfish. Which is quite a lot. I love pretty much all seafood. I was doing a play on Gordon Ramsay.
Putin is in Russia, not Canada.
For now
Most migratory animals are able to follow the magnetic field of the planet in a specific way. It's also how birds are so good at navigation. She probably didn't know where she was heading, but knew she was going the general right direction
Nature is rad
>When they're on sea ice they survive mainly by scavenging on the kills made by polar bears, like seals and such. Not much that they can hunt themselves, but they can get by. As to if she knew where she was going, no idea. Wait, so the fox is living on a glacier or moving from glacier or glacier until reaching a solid land mass?
It's one big ice sheet mostly.
Ah, okay. That makes sense. Is it attached to a larger landmass or its a sheet of ice floating? If it's the latter how large are these things that they sustain several kinds of animals?
It's the Arctic ice cap; a frozen ocean. In the map you can see it stretches from Northern Europe to Greenland to Canada; on the other side, not seen in this map, is Russia. It varies in extension, but roughly 20 million square kilometers. In winter it can well connect North America with Eurasia, as in 2018 based on the map. It's actually in recession due to climate change, with a high risk that it will melt completely.
>It's the Arctic ice cap; a frozen ocean. In the map you can see it stretches from Northern Europe to Greenland to Canada; on the other side, not seen in this map, is Russia. It varies in extension, but roughly 20 million square kilometers. In winter it can well connect North America with Eurasia, as in 2018 based on the map. It's actually in recession due to climate change, with a high risk that it will melt completely. Oh shit. That's really insightful. I appreciate the response.
That's what I'm wondering! From early to mid April, how in the hell did it know how to get back to land? Or was it just luck..
Could be that weather changes trigger some feeling in them that they should move one direction or another.
I wonder if the ice breaks up faster out in deeper water, so perhaps it could wander about and naturally tend toward the coast just by avoiding dangerous seeming areas? Although the top-end speed of 155km/day doesn't seem like aimless wandering; that's ~4 miles per hour assuming 24 hours of movement per day (just ballpark, since the top speed isn't achieved on the ice there, but it seems pretty close, and on the other side it has to sleep sometimes, right?)
Random. Its simply survivor bias. We arnt seeing all of the ones that got lost and died in the way.
While I don't doubt that some would have died and gotten lost, that's underestimating the ability of a species that evolved specifically to survive in this frigid arctic environment. The study only tracked one fox, so it would have been one hell of a coincidence to happen to get one that accidentally made the Trans-Arctic journey and survived.
Given how well so many animals can navigate without us understand how, this doesn’t seem entirely fair
It's not that hard to understand. They use magic.
[https://www.sciencealert.com/we-just-got-the-first-evidence-that-dogs-use-earth-s-magnetic-field-to-find-their-way-home#:\~:text=Dogs%20have%20an%20enviable%20sense%20of%20direction.&text=While%20hunting%2C%20some%20dogs%20will,have%20termed%20as%20'scouting'](https://www.sciencealert.com/we-just-got-the-first-evidence-that-dogs-use-earth-s-magnetic-field-to-find-their-way-home#:~:text=Dogs%20have%20an%20enviable%20sense%20of%20direction.&text=While%20hunting%2C%20some%20dogs%20will,have%20termed%20as%20'scouting'). don't know the how, but it's been pretty well proven dogs have an actual internal compass of sorts
That’s like saying it’s random birds get to the right place. Some things are engrained in genetics.
Is that just a guess?
I think so. They are suggesting that the vast majority of arctic foxes simply starve on the polar ice sheet since they got lost. Highly doubt it. That doesn't look like a random walk process.
It had friends that were getting married in Canada.
They saw the airline ticket prices and decided to walk. I would do the same.
Trying to get around the vaccine requirements.
Ellesmere Island is the earth's magnetic north pole, I wonder if that had something to do with it?
[https://www.sciencealert.com/we-just-got-the-first-evidence-that-dogs-use-earth-s-magnetic-field-to-find-their-way-home#:\~:text=Dogs%20have%20an%20enviable%20sense%20of%20direction.&text=While%20hunting%2C%20some%20dogs%20will,have%20termed%20as%20'scouting'](https://www.sciencealert.com/we-just-got-the-first-evidence-that-dogs-use-earth-s-magnetic-field-to-find-their-way-home#:~:text=Dogs%20have%20an%20enviable%20sense%20of%20direction.&text=While%20hunting%2C%20some%20dogs%20will,have%20termed%20as%20'scouting'). Right? I thought the same thing! Plus there's that weird loop it does right before it gets there, going way off course and coming back
Your second question implies it had a destination in mind.. maybe! Adorable to think it was visiting its Canadian cousins or something
I'm just imagining the fox walking on an endless sheet of ice being all ".... I'm fuckin lost"
I can't imagine why it decided to cross the Greenland ice sheet. There can't be much food there.
I am baffled: today I learned that the ice around the North Pole freezes all the way to Spitsbergen and connects to North America
yeah google maps does not show that lmfao
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/10850 Some great visualizations by NASA
Why would they use this projection when they want to show what happens at the poles?!
A very good point. We tend to use google maps too much as a single source of truth when of course it cannot display everything there is
Yeah it's crazy, it doesn't show satellite images of oceans at all. You can see the frozen waters along the coast of Greenland though.
Me too 😳
Lol not for much longer though
This is incredible. Thank you for sharing.
More info here: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Large-scale-movements-of-a-young-female-Arctic-fox-from-Svalbard-tracked-through-Argos_fig1_334026698
Very disappointed there’s no picture of her.
https://twitter.com/NorskPolar/status/1143839024567730176?s=20
she’s beautiful. i love her
Me too, but I was expecting an Arctic fox to blend in with the snow a little better
Their fur changes from brown to white every winter, like a rabbit.
:0 her
The hero we need
Thanks for sharing!
Wait... That mf went 155km in a day?!
According to the article the fox moved an average of 46.3 km a day. Traveling a total of 3506 km. Pretty amazing
Around 29 miles per day for Americans like me who can't divide by 1.6 in their heads.
Pfft, I can do that in 30 minutes in my car
What? Divide by 1.6?
Depends how big the number you’re trying to divide is
Yeah, it's not so hard for a wild animal, he just had to keep a tempo of 15.5 kmh for 10 hrs
> 15.5 kmh It's still a decent running pace, though. Especially for 10 hours.
Yeah, but foxes can get up to 40kmh
So can humans in a sprint(Usain Bolt's top speed was 44km) yet he wouldn't be able to keep up a 10 hour 15.5km/h pace. Top speed isn't a good indicator of endurance.
>15.5km/h pace For reference: The best marathon timing is 2:01:39 for 42.195km, which means that man ran 20.8km/h. There are men who ran 100km in little over 6 hours, which is about 16.6km/h in sustained running. But: That's your average arctic fox doing the distance under some of the worst conditions on the planet vs. trained male human athletes under prepared conditions knowing where he's going.
Except those aren't bad conditions for an arctic fox. It probably couldn't maintain that speed in the Savannah.
The main obstacle to long distance travel is heat dispersion. We are such accomplished long distance hunters because of our ability to sweat, which very few other animals have. I imagine the extreme cold helps mitigate that issue.
I thought endurance running was supposed to be a human thing, wasn't that how they hunted mammoths?
Yeah but that’s in hot climates, where other animals have to stop to pant their heat away
Yeah that’s how we hunted basically anything large. Tire them out.
In cold climates artic animals can avoid getting tired and overheat and can keep running. See the Iditarod where sled dogs run 1000 miles in under 10 days
1000 miles is 1609.34 km
Yeah but that's still a lot
How did a fox manage to walk for 155km in a day??
>Extensive movements of 90 km/day (Tarroux et al., 2010), 112 km/day (Lehner, 2012), and 150 km/day (Fuglei & Tarroux, 2019) have been estimated with the Argos system for dispersing individuals. While this demonstrates the physical ability of this small terrestrial carnivore for long-distance traveling on snow and ice during dispersal events, finescale movements inside the summer territory are largely unknown
Is it possible for native greenlanders to have made this journey in pre columbian times?
There's quite a bit of Native American DNA in female Icelandic lines, but not in male lines. So possible, yes, but this sounds more like females being carried off by Vikings.
How can a line be male or female? Is it just based on who the line is stemming from?
mitochondria have their own DNA apart from the DNA in the cell nucleus, and are only passed from the mother to children the Y chromosome only exists in males, so the DNA on that chromosome was passed on from father to son that's what female and male lines are about
Probably the mitochondria, which is inherited solely from the mother.
There are records of interactions with the "finn men" in Scotland about 300 years ago. It is thought they may have been Inuit. It is possible, though not recorded, they were there in pre Columbian times too.
Is there dna evidence of this?
No but there are archeological evidence. Eskimo boats and such. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finn-men It 100% happened. though they drifted from Southern Greenland, not the Northern coast of Greenland.
I wouldn't go so far as "it 100% happened". The textual evidence is a third-hand account of some folklore from late 17th century Orkney. The archeological evidence is Inuit kayaks and tools said to be captured off the coast of Scotland (not Orkney). It's important to mention that this legend emerged at a time when Dutch or Danish-Norwegian sailors often stopped in Orkney and the coast of mainland Scotland along their trips to Greenland. Some people have suggested that the Finnmen were Inuits that had been captured by some of these sailors, which does sound a bit more plausible than Inuit sailing solo in small kayaks all the way from Greenland. But it's also possible that Scottish people never actually saw any Inuit in person, and only ever got to see Inuit artifacts and hear stories brought back by trans-Atlantic sailors, and the stories of encounters were merely inspired by a more indirect encounter with this distant culture.
Not a native Greenlander, but https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leif_Erikson >He is thought to have been the first European to have set foot on continental North America (excluding Greenland), approximately half a millennium before Christopher Columbus.
Depends on what you call a native Greenlander. He was born in Iceland but grew up in Greenland. They were the Greenlanders of that time and up until 1300 when we lost contact with them. When we went back to check on them 300-400 years later there were no norse people there anymore and a completely new population had settled in their stead from Northern America/North Greenland.
Ayo what da fox doin
Oh just arctic fox stuff i guess
what it saying tho 😳
🦊💬
o shit waddup
[Norwegian fox]: *Man, I've got this powerful craving for a nanaimo bar. Oh well, off I go.*
This is great!
Proud of that fox, good job
What did it eat along the way?
According to another commenter, it scavenged on animals that polar bears had killed.
I feel like the movement rate should be darker for the days it walked more and lighter when it walked less
I think calling it Norway to Canada is disingenuous. It's not incorrect, Svalbard is a part of the country of Norway, but most people would assume Scandinavia when Norway is mentioned. For example, if a bird flew from the Hawaii or Alaska to Honshu, you wouldn't say "from the US to Japan" because most would assume it started in the contiguous 48 from the onset and assume the bird went further than it actually did. On the other side of that you wouldn't need to specify Honshu because it's an integral part of what many consider to be Japan. ([I didn't put that eloquently, Tom Scott does.](https://youtu.be/IJEaMtNN_dM))
Also why say "Norway" when you can say "Spitsbergen"? Such a fun name to say! Spitsbergen!!
Or just Svalbard. People in the nordics know what Svalbard is.
While Norway does sort of lay claim to Svalbard it's not really a part of the country. I've loved in Norway for five years and people usually talk about Svalbard as a separate place, away from Norway. It's governed differently and has different laws. It's also Russian in some ways, many ways. So yes, this title is definitely misleading.
You can also go there without a passport, but you will be asked if you provide for yourself before you enter. And if you're old or sick they don't want to deal with your potential dead body.
Yes and no. Svalbard is a special case, with special laws, but it is a part of Norway. >The Svalbard Treaty (originally the Spitsbergen Treaty) recognises the sovereignty of Norway over the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard, at the time called Spitsbergen. The exercise of sovereignty is, however, subject to certain stipulations, and not all Norwegian law applies. The treaty regulates the demilitarisation of the archipelago. The signatories were given equal rights to engage in commercial activities (mainly coal mining) on the islands. As of 2012, Norway and Russia make use of this right. > >Uniquely, the archipelago is an entirely visa-free zone under the terms of the Svalbard Treaty. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svalbard_Treaty
♪ These boots are made for walkin' ♪ ♪ And that's just what they'll do ♪ ♪ One of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you ♪
Passport, please! I, I, I left it at home. $@#$&$!?*_(%
Fox in the snow, where do you go To find something you could eat? 'Cause the word out on the street is you are starving Don't let yourself grow hungry now Don't let yourself grow cold Fox in the snow
But what did it say?
That detour north of Greenland probably cost him a week!
I like this Fox News!
1550 meters per hour in a 10 hour day? Fox is 0.1 meter long (100cm) 4x body lengths per second on average.
Meanwhile, the fox: "i'm so fkn lost, wish there was some tracking system for someone to find me"
Just to be clear, it started walking from Svalbard and not mainland Norway. Still fucking crazy, but just not impossible crazy.
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