The lack of congruency with the trail use model and the location of Sahtu land claims might be reflective of the purpose behind designating particular land claim boundaries. As opposed to reflecting interests in hunting and trapping rights, land claim agreements might be more designed towards ensuring a Sahtu claim to the natural resources within the region. The majority of Sahtu land on the map is representative of surficial geological rights, though some areas (not pictured) also establish claims to sub-surficial rights. Consequently, certain areas of Sahtu land claim might be indicative of an interest in holding rights to the natural resources available. If the Sahtu land was meant to ensure access to traditional hunting and trapping rights, they would be much more dispersed and much less discrete, irrespective of slope or other features of the terrain. 

 

The southeast corner of the study area exhibits very little suitable land identified for trail use, yet examination of the Hunting Area Map and Trapping Area Map

clearly indicate overlapping habitats of both hunted and trapped species. This area also exhibits a discrepancy in classification between the weighted and equally weighted multicriteria analysis, as can be seen on the Sensitivity Map: Hunting Areas page, suggesting discontinuity in the weighting of the input variables. This might be attributed to an overly strong emphasis placed on areas of low slope, or the influence of the proximity to Tulit'a. Regardless, different choices in the weighting of the criteria might result in an alternative selection of high trail use areas.  

 

Another section of the final map that deserves recognition is the large corridor of suitable trail landscape surrounding either side of Sahtu De (Bear River), outlined in green within figure 10. Areas of Sahtu land claim alternate on either side of the river. Historically, Sahtu De was an important method of transportation for people travelling from Great Bear Lake to Tulit'a. During the fur trade families would travel downriver by canoe with their furs to sell at the major post in Tulit'a. The trip from Great Bear Lake to Tulit'a often took several days, necessitating stops and rests along the way. Frequently, people would hunt moose within the area nearby the river. In the methodology for this project, no areas of moose habitat were identified near Sahtu De, yet the corridor encompassing it is classified as an area of high trail suitability. For an area of such traditional and economic importance, greater consideration for protection and special management is merited. This also highlights the fact that this study did not take into account the importance of waterways in accessing trails, but was instead terrestrially based. 

 

Though the sites of importance in oral tradition were relevant and used in this study, they are not accurate depictions of the breadth of stories and personal histories that exist within the landscape. The sites featured in the maps originate from narratives about a single cultural figure, and do not represent other stories existing within the oral tradition of the Dene people or any of the family histories that also exist on the landscape. A future project would require a more informed selection of stories important to navigation in hunting and trapping and from more varied sources of oral material. 

 

An additionally limiting factor are the bounded areas by which animal habitat had been designated prior to analysis. Although the areas were identified as important by the Sahtu Dene, this does not imply that animals would be restricted to inhabiting those outlined territories. While animals might be more likely to inhabit particular areas, they are not limited in their ability to migrate. The methodology used in this analysis did not reflect the widespread presence of animal species as it might otherwise have done. 

 

The methodology for this project also considers high slope to be a limiting factor in the mobility of people, and therefore was chosen to refine the output of results. However, slope might not be a limiting factor for those individuals who actually hunt and trap across the landscape. There are many records of families and individuals who take excursions to the mountains to hunt within familial territories. The results of this study are, in many ways, artificial without input from the people whose perspective is ultimately being represented. 

 

The data for this project was collected at a coarse resolution, such that each pixel represents approximately one square kilometer of land. Although this is unlikely to significantly affect the methodology and results of this particular project, an analysis requiring finer insight would be ill suited to the data used here. 

 

The ability of this analysis to reflect individual trail use is limited by a bias in landuse analyses to identify classified areas (polygons) of land. This is consistent with other tendencies in landuse negotiations from federal and industrial perspectives to favour the authority of territories as opposed to intersecting pathways. Such institutional conventions of thinking manifest as disconnects in modes of spatial conception when designing agreements for land use management with aboriginal parties. This project attempted to identify areas where trails were most likely to be, but creating a functional would be a much larger challenge considering the intricate latticework of trails extending throughout the landscape of the Northwest Territories.