Maxwell John Dunbar (1914-1995)

Max Dunbar died on 14 February 1995, in his 81st year. A Scot, born in Edinburgh, he spent the first three or four years of his life there. ... In 1933, Max entered Trinity College, Oxford, to read Zoology. There he soon came under the influence of the pioneer ecologist, Charles Elton. This led to participation in the Oxford University Exploration Club, exposure to the fascination of Greenland, and an invitation to join a group set up to map a section of the western Greenland coast. The expedition reached Greenland in August 1935, and so began Max's lifelong involvement with the Arctic. A second visit in 1936 confirmed his interest in marine biology, the main thrust of his later career. ... The advent of the war caused Canada and others to recognize the strategic importance of Greenland. As a result, the first Canadian consulate in Greenland was opened in 1940. In 1942, Max became Canada's third consular representative there. He remained in Greenland until 1943, and returned later for two further postings, which ended in 1946. Along with consular duties, Max was able to accomplish considerable work on the oceanography of western Greenland fjords. ... On his return from Greenland to Montreal, Max joined the Department of Zoology at McGill. He was almost immediately approached by the Fisheries Research Board of Canada to begin a marine study in the Canadian eastern Arctic. With a graduate student from McGill, Max started in Ungava Bay in 1947 what was to become a continuing program of oceanographic study extending throughout the Canadian Arctic. ... Max taught in the Department of Zoology at McGill from 1946 until 1963. He directed the Marine Sciences Centre at McGill from 1963 until 1977, and its successor, the Institute of Oceanography, from 1978 until his official retirement and appointment as Professor Emeritus in 1982. Evidence that "retirement" did not signify the end of his working life is given by the appearance of at least 32 publications dated 1983 and later, and by his role as a founding member and an active participant in the Centre for Climate and Global Change Research at McGill from 1990 until only months before his death. ... Max's career in research spanned nearly 60 years and was mainly related to the sea. He developed a classification of ecological zonation in northern seas which has stood well the tests of time. He advanced study of the structure of polar marine ecosystems, and added much to our understanding of marine climatic change. He pioneered work on the probable importance of natural selection at the ecosystem level, that is, on a scale above the level of species selection, and this was not without controversy. He engaged in many studies on marine biogeography in northern seas, often with emphasis on the importance of dispersal routes of the past. ... He was a man whose influence was felt far and wide and will long remain

The M.V. Calanus

One night in Hudson Strait the Calanus lay in the midst of an ice field. It was dark, the ice floes swirled and ground together, and open water was nowhere to be seen. Some hours after the vessel was caught and rendered largely powerless by the ice, an immense floe with a high overhang struck; it pressed against the port quarter, hooked itself over the gunwale, and forced the boat downward. At the same time, another floe moved against the starboard bow near the water line and lifted that side of the vessel. As the starboard bow rose and the Calanus heeled farther and farther to port, there appeared to be no way to prevent her loss. But just at that moment a patch of open water appeared directly astern. Reverse power slipped the vessel back off the starboard ice and out from under the port ice to the open water, where she again floated and regained her stability. She traversed the rest of the ice field by daylight the next morning. Most vessels would not have survived that 1953 night in Hudson Strait. The Calanus, however, is no ordinary vessel; had it been, the story above might have had a different ending. ... [This history of the Calanus describes her design and construction and service in the eastern Canadian arctic waters and makes a plea for her reconstruction and preservation.

The Sea Ice Fauna of Frobisher Bay Arctic Canada

The fauna of the lower few centimetres of the sea ice in Frobisher Bay, Arctic Canada, consists mainly of meroplanktonic young of benthic adults and holoplanktonic representatives of generally benthic groups. The major arctic zooplankton species are not included. The ice fauna comprises nematodes, harpacticoid copepods, polychaete larvae, ciliates, various benethic larvae, young gammaridean amphipods, and others. Some species occur in the ice as young animals only, others in all stages of development. Adaptation to the ice is shown best by the copepods, some of which occur there in all stages from egg to adult. The most abundant ice inhabitants reach high concentrations in the ice (nematodes more than 100 000, Cyclopina nearly 10 000/sq m). Others appear to show only accidental presence in the ice, and are found in small numbers only, often at times when great numbers of the same species are present in the water below the ice. Probable feeding of the ice fauna and the food chain linking the ice flora to vertebrate predators are discussed.Key words: arctic waters, sea ice, ice fauna, food chain, zooplanktonMots clés: eaux de l'Arctique, glace marine, faune de la glace, chaîne alimentaire, zooplancto

On the biology of the Arctic char.

The object of this work is to record some of the facta known on the biology of the Arctic Char, Salvelinus alplnus (Linn.), found in the waters of the eastern Canadian Arctic. Data presented werecollected by the writer during the suramer of 1948, when Operations were conducted off the Baffin Island coast for connaercial fishing of this char. Observations were made on habits of Salvelinus, recordscompiled of length and sex from random samples of the catch, and collections made of stomach Contents, from which something of local planktonic types was learned, and of otollths and scales, for thedetermination of age in the char. [...