IQALUIT, (The Arctic): And so it has come to be, the elders say, a time when icebergs are melting, tides have changed and polar bears have thinned. Scattered clouds blowing in a wind no longer speak to the hunters. Daily weather markers are becoming less predictable in the fragile Arctic as its climate changes.

The Inuit, who depend on the land, say they are disturbed by what they are seeing swept in by the changes: deformed fish, caribou with bad livers, baby seals left by their mothers to starve. Just the other year, a robin appeared where no robin had been seen before. There is no word for robin in Inuktitut — the Inuit language.

Inuit elder David Audlakiak is walking on a thick layer of ice frozen over the arctic waters. The hills behind him should still be covered in snow, but are mostly bare. As this winter ends, he says that it has been warmer than winters past. The bald spots showing the tundra are disturbing.

There is increasing evidence that the Arctic, this desert of snow, ice and cold wind, is thawing. Glaciers are receding. Coastlines are eroding. Fall freezes are coming later. The winters are not as cold. The sky seems to be clapping as thunderstorms roll where it was once too cold for them.

While scientists debate the causes of climate change and politicians debate whether to ratify the Kyoto accord to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that many scientists believe cause global warming, the Inuit who live in Canada’s Far North say they are watching their world melt before their eyes.

For years, the wisdom of Inuit hunters and elders about climate in the Arctic, known as the “traditional knowledge,” was largely disregarded. Sometimes it was called merely anecdotal and unreliable by scientists who travelled here with their recording devices, measuring sticks and theories about the North. Some viewed the Inuit as ignorant about a land in which they and their ancestors have lived for thousands of years.

But in the last few years, scientists have begun paying more attention to what the Inuit are documenting, and incorporating it into their research about changes in the climate.

In 1997, the Canadian government mandated that government agencies incorporate traditional knowledge into land-use decisions and consult the aboriginal people about the environment.

“Traditional knowledge is very useful,” said George Hobson, a geophysicist.—Dawn/LAT-WP News Service (c) The Washington Post