Despite their young age, the boys, who are cousins, are experienced hunters. They went home and got a sled, then butchered the caribou on the ice where it fell. Caribou is a staple of the diet in NW Alaska. The NW Arctic herd is at around 400,000, the highest ever counted. Thousands of the animals passed Kotzebue just a few miles from this spot. The lone bull was a straggler and perhaps had come close to town to avoid wolves, which also are more plentiful than ever.