#-alaska-

[maureen2musings]

Stoat in his winter coat, Kodiak, Alaska

krisluckphoto

[rosechata]

Birdy

[wolfcomix]

Jelly cycle, gamblin ink on kitakata paper, hand pressed

[vangoghcore]

by camprobber

[ninakaina]

i was thinking about this today so how long has YOUR JOB existed- not how long your industry has existed, but how long someone has been doing the work you do as a trade notwithstanding changes in terminology and technology. no unemployed option cuz i cant add more answers sorry... tell me about it in the tags

[poempoetryandmore]

[milkcricket]

the vast energy in this single frame is i think beyond human comprehension

[sea-salted-wolverine]

So there are some perks to living in a tourist destination. There are a lot of detractors mostly that you cannot shoot the tourists because you rely on them for your income but you have a semi captive audience with no context for any of the bullshit you spew. You can tell these people anything and they will believe you, the trusted friendly local. Now this is a very much Spider-Man situation where Great Power begets Great Audacity and even worse Responsibility.

My buddy goes on a run and when hes done there is a bar near a creek. So he wades into the creek because the day is hot and the water is cold.

Tourists ask what hes up to, with his running stuff he didn't want wet piled on the shore and him very obviously cooling off in the water. He says he's fishing.

But now here is why I am telling you this story. The universe occasionally aligns in such a way that we get to really really fuck with people and their perception of said universe. The opportunities do not come often and when they come you must seize the day. This is what my buddy did.

So this Creek runs through town and as a result of the highway and neighborhoods and culverts and roads it does not have a great salmon run. It's a short Creek the headwaters are only a few miles from the ocean it never had a great salmon run to begin with. But there are salmon.

One such fish brushes past my buddy's leg. Immediately he knees the fish like he is juggling a soccer ball and pops it out of the water, then slaps it out of the air on to the shore.

This is dumb luck. He could not do this again if he spent years training. Noodling (catching fish with your hands) is a thing that is legal to do with salmon but it is so much harder than literally every other way to catch salmon, including grabbing them with a garbage can. What he just managed is the kind of thing that should make you want to grab the fish and swing it around your head like a stripper with her panties off.

But,

He has an audience.

This is the opportunity offered by the universe.

He plays it cool.

He puts on dead pan straight face on and wades up to shore to grab his fish and nod to the tourists. Someone asks something and he assures them this is the standard way to get a quick dinner here. The tour guide has caught up with his group. He looks at my buddy and his fish and the general lack of fishing accoutrement. Without missing a beat, the guide backs up every ounce of bullshit out of my buddys mouth because if there is one true fraternity it is locals bullshitting stupid tourists.

[gougerre]

4th of July Car launch in Alaska

[reasonsforhope]

Article

As he peered over a secluded cove off the coast of San Francisco, Gerry McChesney couldn’t believe the scene that was unfolding in front of him. 

Fur seal pups — hundreds of them — had taken over the inlet at the Farallon Islands National Wildlife Refuge and were bobbing on the surface of the water in a shiny, blubbery mass, likely hiding from great white sharks as they waited for their mothers to return from the sea to nurse. The sight wasn’t exactly unheard of — island biologists at Point Blue Conservation Science had first noticed the older seal pups using the cove as a covert hideout sometime last year, McChesney, a manager for the refuge, told SFGATE. But he was on the island one day in late October when biologist Jim Tietz delivered the news: The seals were back in full force, and in numbers they had never seen before. 

McChesney decided to go take a look for himself.

“I was amazed to see them all piled in there, getting tossed around like they were in a washing machine,” he told SFGATE in an email, adding that he counted 440 in all. “They looked pretty content and like they were having a good ol’ time.”

The video McChesney captured was shared by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service on social media earlier this week, garnering thousands of comments on Instagram and Facebook, with users referring to the phenomenon as “seal pup daycare” and “nature’s mosh pit.” 

To the biologists, it’s a sign of “a truly remarkable recovery.” 

The rookery’s history

The Farallon Islands host one of just two fur seal rookeries south of Alaska (the other being San Miguel Island in Santa Barbara County) after the species was completely wiped out from the area in the early 19th century. There was extensive seal hunting between about 1810 and 1838... In the first few years of widespread hunting, he estimates that over 150,000 fur seals were slaughtered (“The rookery must have been huge,” he noted) and soon, no fur seals could be found at the islands at all.

But large-scale market hunting came to an end by the mid-19th century, he said. In 1911, the United States signed the Northern Fur Seal Treaty, banning the hunting of marine mammals at sea. The Marine Mammal Protection Act, which prohibits killing and disturbing animals including seals, was established in 1972, further aiding in the protection of the species. Two years later, 141 acres of the islands were designated the Farallon Wilderness and were closed to the public in an attempt to mitigate human disturbance so the seals could return and “breed unfettered,” McChesney said. Large breeding colonies still persisted on the Pribilof Islands, Alaska, and the Commander Islands off eastern Siberia, and in 1996, a female fur seal from a recovered colony on the Channel Islands made her way back to the Farallones, giving birth to the first fur seal pup there after more than 150 years of the species’ absence.

Since then, “the Farallon population has been growing rapidly,” McChesney said. Within 15 years, the local population had boomed to 476 individuals, Bay Nature reported in 2018. Initially, they clustered in one area on the west end of the islands — but now, they’re beginning to expand.

Pictured: A photo of a northern fur seal in Alaska.

A seal surge

Pupping season runs from June to August, with most of the seals born in July and remaining in the breeding colony for a few months before they are weaned, usually by the end of November. Then, the newly independent animals go out to sea on their own. 

Farallon Island biologists from Point Blue Conservation Science have been documenting the population, and this year recorded 2,133 fur seals in total, including 1,276 pups, which McChesney called “the highest pup count yet.” 

“Given that the entire colony can’t be seen, this was a minimal count and there were certainly many more,” he noted.

Pictured: The Farallon Islands off the coast of San Francisco.

Though Point Blue biologists have never documented white sharks feeding on fur seal pups (they typically go for juvenile northern elephant seals and sea lions) the “threat of shark attacks on the seal pups is certainly there and I’m sure the pups are aware of that,” McChesney said. “The cove where the video was taken provides a secluded spot to swim and play without worrying about the sharks.”

When the mothers return, they find their pups by using a distinctive call. But in the meantime, the pups seem not to mind the hours away in their secret hideout where they can splash and play to their hearts’ content.

“It was so much fun to watch,” McChesney said. “And knowing that the sight represents such an amazing comeback for their population made the sight mean so much more.”

-via SF Gate, December 23, 2024

[maureen2musings]

Last rays in Alaska

fernlichtsicht

[mcbrauart]

Here they are all together, in time for the finale!

[herpsandbirds]

Willow Ptarmigan (Lagopus lagopus), in transitional plumage, family Phasianidae, Alaska

photograph by Kristina Ellis

[sizzlingsandwichperfection-blog]

looking for alaska turned 20 today.

what a journey that little book has been on!

[fushigiari]

“And by the way, your grandfather was gay.”

Here’s Gertrude as portrayed by bobthedragqueen, one of my four faves fromdimension20show`s Dungeons and Drag Queens!!! Going to enjoy the premiere tonight, ladies!!!

If you enjoyed this one, please let me know who I should do next!

[poempoetryandmore]