Peel watershed

Peel Watershed
Map of the Yukon
Etymology	Peel, for Sir Robert Peel, British Home Secretary, 1822-1827
Location
Country	Canada
Region	Yukon, Northwest Territory
Physical characteristics
Source	Blackstone/Ogilvie confluence
• location	Yukon
• coordinates	61°51′15″N 137°15′13″W / 61.85417°N 137.25361°W / 61.85417; -137.25361
• elevation	1,366 ft (416 m)
Mouth	Mackenzie River
• location	Northwest Territory
• coordinates	61°41′50″N 134°32′21″W / 61.69722°N 134.53917°W / 61.69722; -134.53917
• elevation	32 ft (9.8 m)
Basin features
River system	Peel River

The Peel watershed drains 14% of the Yukon Territory Canada and flows into the Beaufort Sea via the Peel and then Mackenzie Rivers. While the lower part of the Peel River and its confluence with the Mackenzie River are in the North West Territories, most of the watershed, 68,000 km² out of 77,000 km² is in the Yukon. Six major tributaries and numerous smaller streams feed the Peel.^[1] The Yukon portion of the watershed is undergoing land use planning, a process laid out in Chapter 11 of the Yukon Land Claims Agreement and is called the Peel Watershed Planning Region (PWPR). This article is confined to the PWPR.

There are no communities within the Yukon's PWPR although it is within the Traditional Territories of, and extensively utilized by, four First Nations: The Na-cho Nyak Dun, the Tetlit Gwich'in, the Vuntut Gwitchin and the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in. These people, along with the now gone Tukudh Gwich’in, have lived and travelled in the region for millennia; some of the earliest evidence of humanity in Canada is within Vuntut Gwitchin territory at Bluefish Caves. For the Tetlit Gwich’in, the Peel is the centre of their world; the name Tetlit Gwich’in means “people who live at the head of the waters”.^[2] They and the Vuntut Gwitchin are caribou people; caribou provided food, clothing, tools and shelter. In early times vast caribou fences were made to intercept the migrating caribou and funnel them into corrals so they could be taken with spears, snares and bow and arrow. Once rifles were adopted, the caribou fences were reabsorbed by the land and now the only traces left are in Vuntut National Park. Fences were needed because caribou are consummate travelers; the Porcupine Caribou Herd travels from the Peel into Alaska, from the Beaufort Sea to the Yukon River. The Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in and the Na-cho Nyak Dun would also travel into the Peel for caribou. To this day, they still do, and trap for fur, harvest small game and gather plants.

The Peel was named in 1826 by Sir John Franklin after Sir Robert Peel, who was British Home Secretary (later Prime Minister) at the time. It was first explored by Europeans in 1839 when John Bell of the Hudson's Bay Company ascended it as far as the Snake River. It was not fully surveyed until 1909 despite being the only route used by fur traders into the interior of the Yukon until the gold rush years of the 1890s.^[3] The Yukon part of the watershed contains six major tributaries to the Peel; from west to east: the Ogilvie, Blackstone, Hart, Wind, Bonnet Plume and Snake Rivers. The Bonnet Plume is a Canadian Heritage River.^[4]