Abstract
This chapter analyzes the climate, landscape, flora, and fauna of the boreal forest in northern Ontario. It emphasizes facets of this ecosystem known to be of importance to humans. Its goal is to establish the context—the mix of physical and biotic factors, some patterned and some irregular in occurrence—in which human adaptation occurs. The boreal forest on first acquaintance can be deceptive. To the passing outsider it is nearly flat, without the vistas that give a landscape an immediate character. Its streams are mostly sluggish, its vegetation diminutive. It feigns monotony over space and time. Yet ecologically it is a habitat vibrant with activity. Although without strong relief, the landscape is strongly differentiated. The populations of plants and animals of the forest interact in a highly dynamic fashion. This chapter describes the forest in ways that illuminate that differentiation and activity, and attempts to capture its meaning as the context of the adaptation studies which make up the remainder of this volume (see also Kryuchkov, 1976; Pruitt, 1978; Winterhalder, 1977).
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Winterhalder, B. (1983). History and Ecology of the Boreal Zone in Ontario. In: Steegmann, A.T. (eds) Boreal Forest Adaptations. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-3649-5_2
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