The Unexploited West / A Compilation of all of the authentic information available at the present time as to the Natural Resources of the Unexploited Regions of Northern Canada

by Ernest J. Chambers

[17]

A considerable portion of the wood buffalo range lies immediately beyond the northern boundary of Alberta and is consequently within the limits of the region particularly treated of in the later chapters especially devoted to the “Mackenzie country.” On reference to the map (and the map must necessarily be consulted frequently by the reader of these pages) it will be noticed, also, that much of the data quoted here really refers to those sections of the wood buffalo range within what is arbitrarily defined in this volume as the Mackenzie country; but as the southern part of the range is in northern Alberta, and as the wood buffalo, probably on account of its scientific designation, is associated in most people’s minds with the Athabaska region, it was considered advisable to treat the question of the wood buffalo, as a whole, in the present chapter. E. J. C.

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THE MACKENZIE RIVER REGION

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CHAPTER XV.

THE MACKENZIE RIVER REGION.

Topography, Agriculture and Arable Land.

Mackenzie River a King of Northern Waters.—Over Three Thousand Miles of Waterway.—Domestic Cattle have Succeeded.—Barley Always Ripens at Fort Simpson.—Potatoes and Other Vegetables have for Many Years Been Grown at Fort Good Hope, a few Miles from the Arctic Circle.—Wheat and Barley Grown at Liard for Many Years.—Interesting Comparison With the Russian Province of Tobolsk.—A Large Town as Far North as Fort Wrigley.—Why Better Results in Grain Growing May be Expected in the Future.

Northern Alberta, including the Athabaska and Peace countries treated of in the chapters immediately preceding, is generally considered, and properly, as forming part of the Great Mackenzie Basin, and that it has been in this volume considered as separate from the immense region on both sides of the Mackenzie, surrounding Great Slave lake, and on both sides of Slave river from Fort Smith to its mouth at the lake in question, is due to the purpose, previously expressed, of treating as separate geographical units regions possessing particular characteristics either of location, soil, climate or natural resources.