Introduction:

“My name is Christi Heun, and I’m the Alaska Senior Representative at Defenders. I hail from many states and currently call Alaska home.

I work on Arctic issues involving terrestrial mammals, especially caribou. Caribou have some of the longest migrations in the world, with the round-trip distances exceeding 745 miles, and protecting their essential travel corridors in the Arctic takes a lot of protections from infrastructure development like mining or oil and gas.

In addition to working on protections in the Arctic, I also work on protecting habitats for Alexander Archipelago wolves and Sitka black-tailed deer on the Tongass National Forest in southeast Alaska. Large-scale clearcutting on the Tongass old-growth forests took place from the mid-1950s through the mid-1990s (although substantial logging went on before and after). Prince of Wales Island, home to about 40% of the Alexander Archipelago wolf population, was heavily clearcut. In the northern area of the island, forests have been reduced by almost 94%.

I’m currently working on developing a habitat restoration project in some of these areas to speed up the recovery process from old growth clear cuts for the benefit of species like deer and wolves on Prince of Wales Island.”

 

How did you get your start in conservation?

“When I was a kid, I wanted to be Indiana Jones when I grew up. Much to my chagrin, my mom told me this was not a viable career option, so I started to consider alternatives.

I figured out quickly during my undergraduate studies at Colorado State University that the people just like me were all the folks studying forestry, wildlife, or natural resources management. We scored free pizza out of the dumpster (waste not, want not), and our idea of a wild college spring break was backpacking in the desert stumbling across rattlesnake nests.

I graduated with a degree in natural resources management and went on to fight wildfires for a season, restore native high desert prairies, map alpine streams, and conduct a whole slew of wildlife surveys for salamanders, big horn sheep, sage grouse, otters, wolverines, and slugs. After two years of agroforestry work in the Peace Corps in Senegal and another few years in grad school studying wildlife biology, COVID hit, and I had to reassemble my life.

I found myself in Alaska working as a research biologist for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, where I got tired of feeling like I wasn’t making a difference with my work. That’s how I landed in advocacy. I wanted to feel like I was taking steps to protect the species that I care about, which is exactly what I do as the Senior Alaska Representative at Defenders.”

 

What's one wildlife issue you wish people understood better?

“I wish more people knew more about how hunting quotas are set, especially here in Alaska. We’re often told things like, “300 caribou from this herd is a sustainable harvest,” and one would assume that this is based in a scientific study about the carrying capacity of the landscape, changing predator-prey dynamics, considerations for climate change and impacts to the habitat, and so on.

In reality, these numbers are almost exclusively some number picked out of a hat by wildlife managers in the 1970s that have never been revisited. We don’t know how sustainable these harvest practices are, and this should be alarming to hunters and non-hunters alike.”

 

Could you share some highlights of your career so far?

“The best highlights from my career are the moments of calm reverie that I get to look out on some wild landscapes and find introspection. I’ve been submerged in many worlds of beauty that few people in this world get to experience, and while I worry we may be on an irreversible path of destruction, I know I’m doing my best to protect the natural world.”

Click here to learn more about Christi and her work at Defenders!

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