The Yukon's first resident paleontologist retired at the end of April. Though John Storer was here for slightly less than a decade, those years did much to fill in blanks in what he calls, the Yukon's "long and complicated story."

Of the scientific initiatives he took part in here, the general public is most familiar with the popular Beringia Interpretive Centre, which celebrates ice-age flora and fauna and the early human cultures that came to depend on them.

In fact, the Beringia Centre was the primary reason the Yukon paleontologist position was created in 1996.

"The position had been talked about before that," says Storer. "People had realized that paleontology of the Yukon and especially ice age mammals were a huge asset, both in scientific terms and as something the public would readily latch onto as a gateway to learning more about the Yukon."

Storer first read about the new career opportunity while working at the Royal Saskatchewan Museum in Regina.

The Beringia Centre "was the first item I got to tackle when I was project manager, though many people, paleontologists, glaciologists, archeologists, First Nations people, all did a lot of work on it.

"And not only were great cultural and scientific people involved in all parts of the centre, but I was extremely fortunate in having an excellent architect and excellent exhibit designer aboard as well… and we got it open in time for the promised May 1997 date."

Subsequently, of course, Storer was involved in other projects every bit as essential to filling in the blanks in the Yukon's story. These initiatives were not as frequently covered by the press or well understood by the public, however, in part because of the size of the fossils he sought.

"At one time or another I've worked on everything from shrew to elephant in size, but I'm a little bit better known as a small mammal researcher," says Storer.

Why would someone specialize in vole, lemming and shrew bones rather than, say, majestic mammoth and saber-tooth tiger skeletons?

"We always want to fit these large things in," he says. "There's always a need to know when bison arrived in our area and how muskoxen and camels evolved, but "there are two things that give an advantage to the study of small mammals.

"One: you can build up a pretty decent sample of fossils; by screen washing sediments you can likely collect a great number. If you're looking in the same sediments for mammoth bones, horse bones, camels or muskoxen, you're going to find fewer.

"Two: If you're going to tell time with fossils, what is changing faster at any given time? The groups that give you the best chance of seeing changes in the animal community are at the small end of the scale."

Chronology is at the heart of the matter. Storer is very appreciative of pioneer work on dating layers of soil and volcanic ash done in the territory by John Westgate of the University of Toronto and Duane Froese now of University of Alberta.

"I found it was possible for me to collect fossil mammals from these layers in a context that could be dated."

Once certain forms of voles, for instance, are associated with a dateable layer in one place, when that form appears in another location that has not been dated, the vole itself provides "a tick on the yardstick."

So what, other than the Beringia centre, was the high point of his sojourn here?

"For most of us, the last project is always sort of the highlight," he says.

"I suppose finding that it was possible to date and get mammals from two different levels at Thistle Creek in the southern part of the Klondike gold fields was a big highlight.

"It was the focus for a lot of my work for quite a while -- where the combination of geological studies, availability of fossils and co-operation of a very, very interested placer miner all came together."

The two different levels at Thistle Creek Storer refers to are the Old Crow Tephra, a band of volcanic material laid down about 140,000 years ago, and the Gold Run Tephra, which is about 700,000 years old.

Being able to fit fossils into such a timeline allows scientists to follow the progress of evolution and to obtain a picture of climate change over that period.

Storer has witnessed many changes in his profession over four decades in the field.

One of the biggest is that he and his colleagues are now applying statistical methods to the largest possible range of samples, rather than concentrating on a few large and perfect fossils.

"Screening small bits of mammals -- very few people were doing that when I was a student," he says.

Over the course of his career, the science has been breaking out of a mould established by naturalists more than a century before.

Though Storer may know a lot about the past, he's a bit vague on the future. "I don't like to plan" he says.

He does know that he is moving to the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia, where he intends to "loaf" and play his clarinet.

However, after indulging in that bit of disingenuousness, he admits: "People always continue to do paleontology at some level or another and B.C. is a very under-explored place in my field."

He remains fascinated by the ancient animals of Alberta and Saskatchewan, he adds. And any article about him must stress -- absolutely -- that he plans to keep up with research being done in the Yukon, Storer says.

"There are a lot of things to do."