He also stresses that any study of human ecology presupposes context-dependence and provides case studies of context-dependent exploration of human ecology in the cases of an Arctic Inuit community in the Northwest Territories of Canada and the Inupiat community of Wainwright, Alaska, that demonstrate the theoretical and practical implications of human ecological research in terms of the key elements of biocultural diversity, ways of knowing, and community participation.

Steller's eiders are not sought by Inupiat hunters for meat, but they flock with the white-fronted geese, black brant and king and common eiders prized by hunters.

Alaska's melting permafrost and wave-eroded Inupiat settlements, Iceland's retreating glaciers, Holland's amphibious houses, vanished golden toads, northward-moving comma butterflies, and the shortening life cycle of mosquitoes are so compellingly described, it's possible to forget to be terrified by what these lessons portend.