Agent Based Modelling of Caribou Environmental Interactions in the Canadian Arctic

Agent or individual based modelling (IBM) is recognized as an important tool in biological modelling for simulating animal behaviour and interactions with the environment at the level of the individual while maintaining a collective perspective. The method allows rules to be programmed for the interactions between like and unlike species, responses to geographic factors and impacts from human activities. By emphasizing the development of appropriate rules for the individual, one can avoid imposing ad hoc assumptions concerning the population as a whole and instead allow emergent phenomena to unfold at the larger scale. Here we report on preliminary results using IBM to simulate the movement and population changes of an idealized caribou herd in a Northern Canadian Arctic setting. A wolf population is included in the simulation to study how the predator-prey relations impact the fluctuations in total population. The simulations use GIS data to account for a varying landscape including topography, water bodies and vegetation. The challenges of developing the software components will be discussed including the relative merits of using C# and NetLogo as programming languages. Future inclusion of Inuit hunter agents will be discussed.