Disease, Declining Resources and Immigration 1820–1850
Poster of Immigration
Post-Contact Epidemics decimated the native people of the Red River Valley. Warfare was exacerbated by post contact rivalries, fur trade and a growing scarcity of local resources (for example: diminished bison herds, fur bearing animals). The bison population drastically declined due to increased hunting and settlement and many of the Indigenous people were forced to move west with the bison herds. The nomadic ways and seasonal food gathering of the indigenous population of the prairies were replaced with sedentary farming populations. Vast quantities of old growth tall grass prairie was settled and ploughed and by 1900 most of the Red River Valley was surveyed into the English square mile lot system. Winnipeg was established with rail connections and vast numbers of Europeans immigrants had begun to arrive. Hostilities and bloodshed between the Métis, and Indigenous and White populations cumulated in the establishment of Native Reserves. The original tall grass prairie was permanently marked, changed or lost forever.
