Since at least 2001 Ken McGoogan has been claiming that in discovering Rae Strait in 1854 John Rae also discovered the final link in the northwest passage. This claim is false, in that a substantial section of the passage further north, some 240 km in length (between Bellot Strait and where James Clark Ross had found the north magnetic pole) was still undiscovered in 1854. On the basis of McGoogan's false claim Mr. Alistair Carmichael, MP for Orkney and Shetland, has been pursuing a campaign to have a corrective plaque installed near the Franklin cenotaph in Westminster Abbey to the effect that Rae, and not Franklin, discovered the northwest passage. The Dean of Westminster and the Abbey authorities have decided that a simple tablet with the words ‘John Rae; arctic explorer’ but with no further elaboration, will be installed in the Abbey near the Franklin cenotaph.

It may be taken as axiomatic that the northern lands and seas—Alaska, the Canadian north, Greenland, Svalbard, the ‘northern cap’ of Scandinavia, the Soviet north, and the seas adjoining these areas, including the Arctic Ocean which lies between them—will not escape the process of ‘development’, whatever that may be taken to mean. The pressure of population alone, considered globally, is certain to ensure that the resources of these areas, if not, at least initially, their living space, will be explored and exploited. The fact that each of the land areas is, as it happens, the sovereign territory of an industrialized country, will facilitate this process. The option, if it is thought to exist at all, of total preservation of the Arctic and sub-Arctic as some kind of world nature reserve may have attraction to some but must be seen to be wholly unrealistic. Development will occur. But it is sensible, as well as possible, to try to influence the type and course of that development. The objection may be made that such an exercise is pointless, because we cannot see far enough or clearly enough into the future, when new considerations, unguessed at now, may revolutionize our priorities. This ground for objection is of course true; but it is not a reason for giving no thought at all to the question, for all decisions about the future have to be taken on a basis of imperfect knowledge.

The extraction of oil from whales is a very ancient process, but no regular oil production existed until the Basques started the whaling industry in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. With their primitive equipment, they only made use of the blubber, the part of the whale richest in oil. The blubber was cut up into small pieces which were cooked in open iron cauldrons. This method was in use until the beginning of the present century, when less wasteful methods were introduced in order to utilise as much as possible of the carcass. Flesh, entrails and bones are now cooked in closed boilers under increased pressure and temperature, and since about 1925 a combined steam and mechanical treatment of the material, known as “apparatus cooking”, has resulted in still more efficient extraction.

The World Meteorological Organization International Ice Nomenclature, though it has not yet been officially published by the international agency, is in fact in general use in North America, and has been used by the Canadian ice reporting services since January 1962. As a result of this experience with the practical application of the terminology, and of a total of about ten years of operational ice reporting, Canadian users have compiled a list of proposed amendments, which has been officially submitted to WMO for consideration by the Maritime Commission. The proposal was co-ordinated through the Working Group on Ice Navigable Waters of the Canadian Committee on Oceanography, which represents virtually all Canadian agencies and individuals directly involved in ice operations and research. It thus reflects a fairly broad spectrum of Canadian opinion on the subject. The proposals are dealt with under four general headings: “Fast ice terms”, “Age categories”, “Topography”, and “Other amendments”. Many of these amendments are of a minor nature and it is not proposed to itemize them here. In view of the fact, however, that the processes of WMO are of necessity rather slow, it was felt that there might be some value in publishing the proposals in the age-category section, which are considered to be the most important, for the information and possibly discussion of those interested.

This article presents a model for the analysis of the domestic-international nexus of Arctic politics. It offers a preliminary attempt at mapping the domestic politics of Arctic boundary disputes in Canada. It explores the potential impact of domestic politics on such disputes by identifying the interests of domestic stakeholders in the Canadian Arctic. The paper views maritime boundary negotiations as a ‘two-level game’ in which negotiations occur internationally and domestically. The paper argues that the domestic level negotiation is contingent on how the issues are ‘framed’ between policymakers and their constituents. The paper identifies ways that domestic actors can reduce the number of acceptable outcomes in a two-level game, thereby impeding cooperation.

The Svalbard archipelago is a centre of global research on climate change and also an example of a rapidly changing Arctic area with tourism replacing the traditional mining industry. We compared the different development paths of the Norwegian (Longyearbyen and Ny-Ålesund) and Russian settlements (Barentsburg and Pyramida) on Spitsbergen as part of the Svalbard archipelago using demographic and socio-economic data until 2022 when available, but not focusing on the impacts of COVID-19 and changing geopolitics after 2022. We analysed strategy documents produced by Norway and Russia and by organisations connected to Svalbard. The analysis continued by scrutinising the statistical data available to ascertain if this supported the strategic goals outlined in the documents. Data collection was by direct enquiry to national statistical bureaus, agencies and institutions in Norway and Russia. Secondary data were collected from media publications and social media accounts. Statistics Norway provided very detailed data on demographics and industrial structure, turnover, investments and comprehensive statistics on employees by industry on Norwegian settlements on Svalbard. The results revealed disparities in socio-economic development, striking differences in data availability and in transparency between the Norwegian and Russian settlements. The population in the Norwegian settlements continued to grow during the period 1990–2022 with an increasing number of foreign nationals, and the population in the Russian settlements decreased by 85% at the same time period. The Norwegian settlements exemplify a diversified economy with a growing private sector, and the Russian settlements continued to rely on the town-forming Russian state unitary coal mining enterprise, Trust Arktikugol. While Svalbard presented a prime example of open data and transparency in the environmental sciences, the socio-economic and demographic statistics were lagging behind. Several practical proposals are presented for improved data collection on the Svalbard settlements.

The Australian Museum, with the assistance of the Australian Antarctic Division, supported a team of four biologists during the 1977–78 summer season at Macquarie Island (54°30'S 158°57'E). An extensive survey of marine algae and invertebrates from the intertidal zone, and down to depths of 20 m along the coastline, was a major objective of the marine programme. The terrestrial ecology programme included studies of microscopic terrestrial invertebrates, especially tardigrades or water bears, cryptogam (particularly hepatics, lichens and mosses) and vascular plant collections, and the recovery of sea-bird ectoparasites. The biologists and their interests were Dr D. S. Horning, marine biology and terrestrial ecology (Salem, Oregon); Dr J. K. Lowry, marine biology (Australian Museum, co-ordinator); Dr G. C. B. Poore, marine biology (National Museum of Victoria); and Mr R. W. Ricker, botany (University of Melbourne).

An ongoing programme of tourist survey research, conducted since the 1990/91 summer season, is summarised. While focusing initially on the nature reserves of the New Zealand sub-Antarctic islands, the programme was subsequently extended to encompass related tourist visits to Macquarie Island (Australia) and the Ross Sea region of Antarctica. In accordance with expressed management information needs, the research objectives and the methodology, based on questionnaires distributed by national representatives aboard tour vessels, have evolved from general descriptive visitor surveys to more site-specific visitor assessments. Research findings emphasised that these tourists constitute a distinctive activity group. The impact issues they reported were mainly related to trampling and some site-specific wildlife disturbance, with other impact issues not being prominent. No notable dissatisfactions were apparent or visit improvements demanded, and strong support was indicated for most of the management restrictions applied to onshore visits. Methodological lessons from conducting this survey programme are briefly summarised, and suggestions for future research directions are made, with more emphasis on post-voyage evaluation surveys and assessments of physical impacts related to tourist visits.

In February 1902, members of Scott's Discovery expedition found the remains of a fish 18 in. long on the surface of the “pinnacled ice” near the ice front of the Ross Ice Shelf in McMurdo Sound. In 1903, a party under Wilson found three Nototheniid fishes, sponges, shells, and seaweeds among similar ice on the floating section of the Koettlitz Glacier. The fishes, which were up to 48 in. in length, were all headless. They resembled a specimen caught in a seal blow-hole near the Discovery winter quarters, whose head was bitten off by a seal before it could be landed, but whose body weighed 40 Ib. and was 46 in. long. This fish was a Notothenia, close to N. colbecki Boulenger. In 1911, a party under Taylor found another large headless fish, which may have been as much as 4 ft. long, embedded in the ice of the Lower Koettlitz Glacier some 5 miles from its seaward end, and among the pinnacled ice near the Dailey Islands the same party found corals, shells, sponges, patches of sediment, and about a dozen small fish. The ice in this region was so rich in sponges that it was difficult to get spicule-free ice for cooking.

The first sea-ice forecast for waters north of the U.S.S.R. was issued in 1923, and since about 1935 more than a dozen Soviet scientists have been studying the question. Before any method of forecasting could be evolved, meteorological and oceanographical observations, and information on the state of the sea ice had to be available. This information was collected by polar stations, merchant ships, icebreakers, vessels on patrol duty at the ice edge and aircraft on ice reconnaissance. In the late 'thirties, however, forecasters were still complaining of lack of data; not necessarily because they thought the system of collecting information was inefficient, but because there were so few observations for the preceding period. Nevertheless, a number of correlations were advanced and tested. As time went on and the volume of observations grew, it became possible to elaborate principles of more general application. This was done for instance by V. Yu. Vize, one of the earliest investigators of the subject, in a monograph called Osnovy dolgosrochnykh ledovykh prognozov [Principles of long-term ice forecasting]. The work was awarded a Stalin prize in 1946, but apparently no copy has come out of the U.S.S.R. It is not possible, therefore, to examine the methods which have been developed by Soviet scientists on the basis of ten to fifteen years' observations, but the earlier ideas which are considered below no doubt form the basis of the later system.

Kolbeinsey is a tiny volcanic island to the north of Iceland within the Arctic Circle. It has been much reduced in size in historic times due to erosion. It has considerable geopolitical importance with regard to fishery zones and the exploitation of other natural resources. It is, therefore, in Iceland's interests to ensure that it continues to exist, and measures have been taken to ensure this.

Buildings were constructed and artefacts left behind on sub-Antarctic Heard Island, associated with Antarctic research expeditions since 1926. Both bryophytes and vascular plants are colonising many parts of the now derelict buildings. On these structures and artefacts, the authors recorded four species of vascular plants out of the 11 that occur on Heard Island and nine species of mosses out of the 37 recorded from Heard Island. The vascular plant species most frequently recorded colonising structures and artefacts was Pringlea antiscorbutica (288 occurrences), with the area colonised varying from 0.3 cm2 to 430.0 cm2. Muelleriella crassifolia was the moss species that was most frequently recorded (14 occurrences), colonising areas from 2.1 cm2 to 12.9 cm2. The highest number of bryophyte species (seven) was recorded on the stone and cement of the ‘water tank.’ Pringlea antiscorbutica, Poa cookii, Azorella selago, Muelleriella crassifolia, Bryum dichotomum, Dicranoweisia brevipes and Schistidium apocarpum are all expected to continue to colonise the ANARE ruins, as well as areas that have become available since building removal and also possibly areas bared by further deglaciation.

Some Arctic scholars believe that modern reindeer herding on the Kola Peninsula has cultural continuity with the traditional period of such activity in the late 19th century. Others believe that by World War II, Soviet repression of Saami leaders, collectivisation of herding villages, and relocation of families had eliminated many traditional behaviours, especially in the Lake Imandra watershed. This study utilises informant interviews with survivors of the Babinski and Ekostrovski Saami reindeer herding villages and archival materials to understand how their families used land and water to fish, hunt, and obtain other resources including cash labour. As part of the United States National Science Foundation's human dimensions of the Arctic system (HARC) programme to examine how humans are both shaped by, and shape, the Arctic environment, the authors document how lands and waters formed traditional resource territories for Saami herding families. The results reveal that prior to their destruction, western Kola reindeer herding villages were integrated along family lines, with villages sharing mates, resource territories, and economic activities. This paper argues that there was, in fact, no cultural continuity between traditional Saami reindeer herding villages and modern herding structures such as the post-Soviet brigade on the western Kola Peninsula.