Canada Geographic; Date Created: September 16, 2005
The movement of ice southward brought with it the Inuit people who were following seal and walrus migrations, as well as seeking a fairer climate. When the Norse first settled in Greenland in the late 900's A.D., the climactic conditions were considerably favorable in Greenland compared to the Nordic homeland; this may have caused a boost in immigration of the initial wave of Norsemen who settled in Greenland (Dugmore et al. 2007, 14); however, this temperate weather was short lived.
Most environmental scientists do not believe that the cold, harsh winters were the greatest adversity the Norse faced, but that the cause for their environmental struggles were due to the shortness of the summers (Smithsonian). Farmers needed these long summers to hunt seal and grow sufficient hay to keep the animals alive through early spring (Smithsonian). These conditions would have severely strained the farming resources of the settlements and the Inuit, and most definitely caused a strain on the Norse ability to collect tradeable items.
Due to these unfavorable climactic changes, the increasing amount of ice could have seriously compromised the hunts for seal, walrus, narwhal, etc., in particular, it would have affected the hunting trips to the north (Dugmore et al. 2007, 17). this also caused the Inuit to begin to migrate south toward warmer areas of Greenland, which began to cause conflict between the Norse and Inuit due to limited natural resources, causing the Norse to lose many of the few unique and valuable items they had to trade (La Fay 2000, 123; Logan 1983, 78). The western settlement had disappeared by the mid fourteenth century, due to it being overrun by the migrating Inuit, leaving the Norse with no choice but to abandon the settlement (Logan 1983, 78). The Icelandic annual report from 1379 states that eighteen Greenland Norse were killed by the Inuit people and two boys had been taken as slaves (Logan 1983, 78).
Dugmore et al. "Cultural adaptation, compounding vulnerabilities
and conjunctures in Norse Greenland"
from Elisha Kent Kane's Arctic Explorations, published in Philadelphia in 1856