During April, a host of events and activities have been held under the banner of Yukon Biodiversity Awareness Month. As part of this round, a special event took place earlier today when the first annual Yukon Biodiversity Awareness Award was presented to Whitehorse resident Helmut Grünberg.

The author of Birds of Swan Lake, Yukon, Grünberg is well-known in the territory as an ardent birder. He helped start the Yukon Bird Club, and contributes every year to efforts such as the Christmas Bird Count and the Breeding Bird Survey.

For decades, Grünberg has shared his knowledge of and enthusiasm for the Yukon's birdlife, and regularly leads local birdwatching trips. He is often the person that visiting birders will call for advice on where to spot a northern specialty, and more often than not he will take them birding himself to ensure that they have a good experience.

The Yukon Biodiversity Working Group is presenting the award. "The idea is to show appreciation for an individual who has made a significant contribution to biodiversity education and biodiversity awareness in the Yukon," says Bruce Bennett, a biologist with the Yukon government's Wildlife Viewing Program who is one of the group's members.

As well as the annual award, the group has also decided to present a lifetime achievement award to Bob Frisch, the author of Birds by the Dempster Highway, first published in 1982. This posthumous award will be made at a later date.

While both of these awards are being presented to people best-known for their birding activities, biodiversity is not limited to things that fly. Rather, the term refers to the variety of life on earth and the complex interdependence of all living things.

To help people appreciate what makes the Yukon's biodiversity special, Grünberg also helped start the Nature Appreciation Series run by the Yukon Conservation Society. This annual series of walks and talks covers all aspects of the Yukon's biodiversity.

Compared to most parts of the world, biodiversity in the Yukon is in fairly good shape as only a few species here are considered to be at risk. But the working group also does not want to take this state of affairs for granted. As industrial activities expand in the territory and other parts of the globe, scientists have warned that many of the territory's species are increasingly at risk.

Keeping tabs on biodiversity requires lots of monitoring and assessment work on everything from amphibians to fungi, and this can be an overwhelming task in a place as big as the Yukon.

This is where the working group comes in. Made up of representatives from government agencies and non-profit societies, the group tries to help coordinate different research efforts, and make sure that information is shared among the interested parties.

Under the group's umbrella, the contributions of dedicated naturalists like Grünberg, biologists and other individuals can be combined to form a more complete picture of biodiversity in the Yukon.

Dave Mossop, a biologist who teaches at Yukon College, helped to start up the working group. He says that this first award is a tribute to Grünberg's enthusiasm and "amazing energy."

"His contribution has been to increase substantially our understanding of bird distribution in the Yukon," says Mossop.

Mossop hopes that this annual award will help to raise people's awareness of the Yukon's special place in the overall biodiversity of the planet "simply because of where we are at the edge of the planet and because we are a place with some pristine systems left."

For more information on the Yukon Biodiversity Working Group, contact Scott Gilbert at Yukon College at 668-8776 or by e-mail at sgilbert@yukoncollege.yk.ca.