Ole Bates checks fish wheel at Slana after Copper River rises from heavy rains.
We got our turn on the fish wheel this week. The fish wheel floats along the shore of the Copper River just downstream from the confluence of the Slana River. The salmon have spent several years feeding at sea and now they are returning to spawning streams in the Slana River drainage. Most of the salmon are sockeye or as they are locally called, Copper River Reds. Continue reading
The Sea Life Center in Seward, Alaska is one of our granddaughter’s favorite places. She loved the Steller’s sea lions, the harbor seals and the sea ducks. Watching a king crab eat a fish, and getting to feel the anemone tentacles and watching it feed were exciting too.
But what fascinated her the most was that “scary thing” scraping the scum from the sea lion tank.
Stellar’s sea lion.
Grizzly boar.
What happens in a close encounter with a grizzly bear is dependent on a lot of factors. What you do is important but the most important factor might boil down to which of the local bears you have just run into. Not all grizzly bears are the same. In fact they are all individuals, with different habits and temperaments. Sub-adults, lacking experience and confidence, often travel with a sibling for extra security and status. Females with cubs don’t like close surprises. Sows with cubs attack people more often than other classes of bears. These defensive attacks can be very serious but rarely end in death. Continue reading
Long-billed dowitcher found interior Alaska still in the grip of winter.
What a difference one year can make. This spring came earlier than normal to the Upper Copper River country in interior Alaska. It was warm and without our
usual spring snow storms. But last year, during the first week of May and at the peak of spring bird migration we were hard hit by a freak blast of winter weather. More than two feet of heavy snow fell over a period of several days covering everything including most sources of food for migrating birds. Continue reading
There are over two dozen species of willow in central Alaska. Identification can stump even seasoned experts. Willow can be found almost anywhere plants grow. Willows are unisexual meaning each individual plant produces either male or female catkins. Continue reading
Steller’s sea lions hauled out on rocks along Alaska’s coast.
Going through ten thousand photos and trying to pick out the best is a daunting task. That was my goal upon returning home from two week photograph trip to coastal Alaska. You must be ruthless and delete the vast majority of shots. There is really not much sense in keeping too many of your photographs. They clutter up your files and make it hard to have the cream, those photos with value, at your finger tips. And when you have whittled your work down to bare bones it makes your entire collection look its best. As you might expect bringing the cream to the top is not so easy. Deleting shots that took a lot of work and more than a little luck requires a collection already bulging with good material and knowledge of what has a chance of being published in this market of low demand and high, very high supply. I pick my keepers by asking questions. Continue reading
Each spring herring mass by the millions along isolated sections of Alaska coast in preparation for their annual spawn. Recently I had a fantastic trip to photograph the bird and mammal predators that are on hand for this spectacular feast.
Large rafts of resting Steller’s sea lions assemble between sessions of frenzied feeding. Continue reading
Caribou in the high country of Wrangell/St. Elias National Park.
The red fox, Vulpes vulpes is one of nature’s most successful predators, thriving in a variety of habitats from tundra to desert, forest to mountains. Though common throughout their vast range, the red fox makes a tough photo subject. Continue reading