Snipe in my backyard

At dinner tonight (during a lively geophysical discussion between the prof and the kids about the earth's magnetic field, which I admit was somewhat lost on me) I spotted a snipe in our backyard -- it seemed to have descended on our wet lawn, thinking it had found a marsh! Yes, around our house the snow is indeed mostly melted now (BTW, we did break the record with 137 inches this winter)!

Snipes do nest in the wetlands at the Nature Center, but this is a first sighting at my house -- we're a good way above the valley floor... I'm sure he'll move on soon, although he did stick around (staying perfectly still) while I was fussing about the flowerbeds -- now that the snow is gone, I was fishing out the candles that had fallen down from the deck (ice-lanterns at Winter solstice). This past winter, at one point, we could practically sled from the deck into the backyard -- that's an advantage of never having built a railing and being able to dump the snow directly off the side... Now it's time for me to dig out the planter boxes for a visual edge, and start hinting to hubby that maybe this summer we should think about building that railing after all !?! Rail sightings being rare around here (hee hee).

Yup, spring is here!

photo credit: http://www.birdforum.net

The bears are out!

Started seeing bear prints in the snow last week. I'm definitely carrying bear spray on the job now, but I got the best protection possible: 20+ loud school children behind me... Fat chance of actually seeing one!

Where is a good place to see wild animals?

Today I tackle the question "Where is a good place to see wild animals?"
It was yesterday's question on Plinky.com, a website whose sole purpose is to provide something for us bloggers to blog about -- never heard of it until I saw Solipsist's post, where he mentions me (blush!) when apparently dumbfounded with an answer to the wild animal question...

Everybody assumes that when you're in Alaska, you see wildlife all the time. In fact, many tourists are either too terrified to walk more than a few steps from their cars, fearing being ripped apart by a huge grizzly, or else they arrive, such as at my place of employment, with camera around neck, expecting or even demanding to see a big wildlife (moose or bear), figuring a sighting is guaranteed.

I received an email this summer from a German tourist who claimed that a bull moose crosses our parking lot every evening at 18:00 -- he wanted to know if that moose is still around during his upcoming visit. Earlier this summer, an RV-touring Swiss showed me a postcard (see picture on left) and said "I vant to fotograf a bear katchink lachs today." I had to tell her that these bears were photographed at the McNeill River Preserve, which is an expensive trip off the road system -- not in her (or our family's) budget.

I sometimes meet disappointed visitors such as one loud New Yorker who walked the whopping 1/2 mile to the Nature Center's viewing deck (it was the middle of a hot summer day) and demanded "I've been here 2 weeks and haven't seen any wildlife yet! -- where the hell can I see moose and bear?" When I suggested the zoo, he scoffed "I can go to the zoo back home!". I held my tongue, but was tempted to tell him "sorry, but our mechanical moose is currently out of order." Instead I patiently explained how dawn and dusk are better times for wildlife viewing...

The truth is that wildlife is shy, and that is a good thing! Even us locals don't see wildlife all that often, although I'm lucky to be able to say that I come across them at work occasionally. But it's not like I see them every day!

I can count on one hand the number of times that I've seen moose out of my kitchen windows, and I've lived here 10 years. I've seen black bears in my yard too, but again that's rare, and it usually means that somebody in the neighborhood left out garbage or grilled some awfully good-smelling salmon!

What is amazing is that we have moose and bear here in the first place! I leave you with a picture of a bull moose that I took this summer at our mailbox -- sure wish he'd show up with that German punctuality every day!

If you'd like to see a post with pictures I took of a moose re-arranging our lawn furniture, click here for a post I wrote last fall.

Skiing with my kiddos

It's definitely winter here, and the skiing is great!
The kids have been skiing right here at home on their home-made ski-jumps in the back yard, but I wanted to venture out onto trails.

So we went to the Nature Center, even though I did not have to work today -- just getting to enjoy an outing with my kids. (I admit, I did work a little bit while the kids had a snack after skiing -- can't help it!)
The trails are freshly groomed and PERFECT!!! We got about 5 inches of new snow on my birthday, making for perfect cross-country conditions. Temps were in the mid 20's (Fahrenheit), which is pleasant enough.



It's less than 2 weeks until Thanksgiving when we'll be skiing into the cabin, and I wanted to make sure everybody has ski gear that fits, which is never a given with ever-growing children. And sure enough, youngest had outgrown her boots and been conveniently slipping into mine (with an extra pair of socks) this past week...so that leaves me with ??? It turns out I fit into son's boots from when he was in 7th grade -- perfect, EXCEPT those bindings don't fit MY skiis. Aaargh, and both kids need longer skis, too. (On the trail today, we actually switched skis around, and at one point I ended up on the shortest ones!)
There are lots of outgrown skis in the garage, some still with the old 3-pin bindings... but the boots are the biggest bottleneck! Looks like we'll be heading into Anchorage this week for some shopping: there's REI, of course, and a used-sports-equipment store called "Play it Again Sports". We missed the ski swaps this year!

I had borrowed a pair of skis to fit the boots-of-the-day, and off we went. We wished the pater familias could have joined us, but his back was bothering him. So the 3 of us went and enjoyed some Winter Wonderland along the historic Iditarod Trail that passes right through the Nature Center. Our favorite trail, the Albert Loop, is still closed. Amazingly enough, there is still bear activity: grizzly tracks were reported again today. This is very late for them to be staying up (way past their normal time for going into dormancy) -- but until recently there were still a few salmon left in the creeks. And as long as there's food, why go to bed?

Backyard moose

Living in Alaska can mean meeting moose anytime. Not necessarily cause for concern, but unlucky people have been knocked down -- but most of the time a moose will just ignore humans and keep on munching on twigs.

Winter can be very hard on moose. Just think, trying to maintain a bodymass of over 1000 pounds on the calories provided by mere bark and twigs! I'd be ornery too.


Deep snow can be a bitch, even if you do have long legs. Mostly, moose try to avoid it. One more reason for moose to come into town....

but trouble can be found there too: Here's a bull moose all entangled in electric lights in downtown Anchorage (Photo credit: Erik Hill, ADN)



Springtime is another common time to see moose in our backyards, like this moose cow with twins who gave birth in a neighbor's yard this May. (Photo credit: Gail Kozak)
Moose cows come into the neighborhoods to give birth because it provides them with some protection from predators, such as bears (but bears can and do follow the cows right into town).
This mama ate all my tulips -- but I forgave her when I saw her with her calves. In fact, I was working on the computer when she came into the yard with her twins. Nobody else was around (prof & kids gone camping), and she stayed for a couple of hours, even taking a little nap right outside the window where I was sitting. I did not have my camera, so I sketched them -- and even though I can't draw at all, I thoroughly enjoyed the process!



In fall, this bull moose felt a real need to rearrange our lawn furniture. He was in the rutting stage, and needed to rub the velvet from his antler -- so here he is in our backyard, I took these pictures 2 years ago around Labor Day (first of September).





Living so close to wildlife here in Alaska is such a priviledge, but quite a challenge to wildlife managers, esp. in urban areas. People love to spot moose, but want bears to stay away from their backyards. They think moose are harmless, and don't realize that without predators, moose populations won't stay healthy. And the habitat of both continue to be compromised by urbanization... We're lucky as Alaskan citizens, but we need to do our job educating ourselves about how to co-exist with wildlife.