<div><a href="http://www.cbc.ca/canada/north/story/2010/12/21/north-warm-nunavut-climate-change.html">http://www.cbc.ca/canada/north/story/2010/12/21/north-warm-nunavut-climate-change.html</a></div>
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<h1 class="headline">Climate change blamed for warm Nunavut weather</h1>
<h3 class="deck">Temperatures 10 to 12 degrees higher than normal</h3>
<h4 class="lastupdated clearfix"><em>Last Updated: Tuesday, December 21, 2010 | 12:36 PM CST </em></h4>
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<p>Climate change is contributing to unusually warm weather in Nunavut and Nunavik, according to a senior climatologist with Environment Canada.</p>
<p>"I often say you don't see climate change when you look out the window. The exception is Nunavut," said David Phillips.</p>
<p>Temperatures are 10 to 12 degrees warmer than usual in many places, Phillips said, resulting in fall-like weather in many places in the region on Tuesday, the first official day of winter.</p>
<p>A high-pressure system stuck over western Greenland is causing warmer weather to move over Nunavut, but the warming climate is contributing, as well, Phillips said.</p>
<p>The temperature on Tuesday morning in Iqaluit was –9 C and in Baker Lake –3 C, far above normal.</p>
<h3>'Warmest year on record'</h3>
<p>"We clearly know this is going to be, in Iqaluit, for example, the warmest year on record," Phillips said.</p>
<p>Temperatures should be between –19 and –28 C over southern Baffin Island, Phillips said. But on Frobisher Bay, some hunters are still travelling by boat because the bay has open water at a time when they're usually crossing it on snowmobiles.</p>
<p>Some people in Nunavut would prefer normal winter temperatures.</p>
<p>"It's kind of crappy for snowmobiling, I guess. Makes it hard to get out on the land," Iqaluit resident Chris Lewis said.</p>
<p>Even those who enjoy the warmer weather are concerned.</p>
<p>"It's wonderful for us humans, but I don't think it's very good for the animals," said Monica Ell, also from Iqaluit.</p>
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Mitch Campbell, regional wildlife officer for the Kivillaq region, said the see-sawing temperatures make it especially hard for herbivores such as caribou.</p>
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When snow melts and it rains, a subsequent freeze-up makes it hard for them to get food, he explained.</p>
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"The vegetation is locked into ice, so in order to eat the vegetation, they'd have to eat the ice and that is not something … that the animals would even be able to do, so that can, in severe cases, cause starvation," Campbell said.</p>
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It's still too early to tell if the current warm weather has hurt wildlife, but the conditions have proved harmful in the past, Campbell said.</p>
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The unusual and unpredictable weather is expected to continue for the foreseeable future, Phillips said, with the long-range forecast showing rising and falling temperatures for some time to come.</p>
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"In many ways, what we see this year in Nunavut is about as strange as it gets," he said.</p>
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