Last gorgeous day



 Tuesday was one of the last gorgeous days of the year.  Soon the snow will set in along with the dark.  I intended to use as much as the day as possible to work outdoors.  Even the bears seemed to be enjoying sunbathing for one last time. 

As I did the morning walk around their enclosure; Joe Boxer and Hugo were just laying around. (Hugo on right and JB on left)

 The animals are getting fluffier every day!  It almost happens overnight!  I noticed shaggy seems to be building up her winter coat.  The kodiak cubs are eatting about 4 pounds of dog food daily!  This is almost the same amount as the adult black bears are getting!

I spent a large amount of time goofing around with the moose calves.  They are now getting only one bottle a day.  They are getting 54 oz. of bottle, about 20-30 cups of grain, and will be getting brush for a few more days.  The willow has basically all died for the year.  There is still a bit of alder around, but it won't last much longer.    The moose calves have gotten so big that later this same day our maintenance man added a shelf for their grain bowls to sit on so they don't have to kneel anymore.  This is Gilly on the left.

There were still a few birch branches left over from a donation.  I added the remaining branches and watched them eat away. 

The moose calves will be fully weaned in about 9 days or so.  I will slowly start to add water to replace the milk until they are drinking straight water.   

After the moose calves got their daily brush; I headed over to give some birch to the musk ox. 

This is fluffy.  He is the younger bull that we have in the herd.  He is only able to eat peacefully because slide, the dominant bull, has not yet figured out that I threw in branches.  Typically the herd has to wait while slide decides which branches he wants.  I spread them out also so that the younger musk ox have a chance at eating the brush.  Mukluk, our orphaned musk ox, is doing very well.  This will be the first winter she spends with the herd.  The herd has been treating her very well.  I notice her laying closer and closer to the females every day.  It also helps now that the new born calves from this spring are much larger and do not need their mothers protection. 

After I threw the musk ox their share of the birch; I rode the four wheeler to go cut alder for the reindeer.  I also gave a few branches to jewelie, our sitka black tailed deer. 

Our garden is seeing its last few days.  I plucked the remaining lettuce from the garden and tossed it to the elk. 

Tomorrow I will clean out the broccoli, and also start pulling cabbage.  Snickers and Jewelie will be very pleased to see some more broccoli.  I will be sure to snap some photos of jewelie and snickers enjoying their broccoli!  Until then.....

First freeze

Sunday morning was off to a nice start.  It was a little foggy, but it would soon clear up.

Only 20 minutes after I took the previous picture the fog was rolling away.  The mountains were peaking out, the sun was arriving, and best of all the rain was on vacation!

I was ready for a full day of work.  I fed the moose calves at 11AM, woke up the big bears, checked all the hot fences, and even started cleaning snickers' enclosure. 

Now that winter is around the corner most of the animals are going to start putting on weight.  One of the animals that may need to add a few pounds is Jewelie.

She currently gets 6 cups of reindeer grain a day, along with fresh brush, and a few fruits and/or veggies.  Every once in a while we give jewelie an extra cup of grain.  The sitka black tailed deer are not very adapted to the winters in Portage.  They are not in the wild in our area.  They do very well in the summers, but never make it as far south as portage.  Jewelie becomes much less active in the winter.  We really have to watch her weight.  She is at a very healthy weight right now and she is 7 years old.   I am also cleaning out the garden and pulling the remaining veggies before we get a big freeze.  I plucked some fresh broccoli, lettuce, and cabbage for jewelie and snickers.  Jewelie loved the brccoli.  We are always open to take donated fruits and veggies.  COSTCO donates pallets of mostly fruit every once in a while.  The pallets are huge and they are always a big help.  Members that come often will also donate fish from cleaning out their freezer, meat from hunting trips, or just come by to watch us give their donated food to the animals.  We are ALWAYS very appreciative. 

Jewelie always goes for the flowers on the broccoli first!  She also loves the broccoli leafs.

 The moose calves got their daily lunch.  A 44oz. bottle each along with 20 cups of grain.  They also had birch leafs that were donated by a member.  He cleaned up his yard and knew that our moose would be more than happy to take the branches.

 Around noon it was so nice outside that I wanted to feed the bison a little early.  This particular group of bison are the bulls.  Total amount of grain that I fed to all the bison in one night was 720 pounds!  Can you imagine the food bill!

 I also did a porcupine presentation.  Snickers was very interested in watching me clean his house.  It was his annual cleaning before winter arrives.  Boy!  Did his house stink!  If you have ever smelled a North American Porcupine try smelling where they live!  Well, anyways, it is clean now...at least for the next few days....

Snickers had the remainder of the cantelope along with fresh lettuce and broccoli from the garden. 

As I was passing the garden I saw a great opportunity to get a picture of one of our caribou.  For the most part he didn't mind me taking a few pictures.  He just huffed at me a few times but never really moved. 

I finished off the day by going back to the garden for some last minute cleaning before winter arrives.  Sunday night we had our first freeze and it was just a glimpse of what is coming soon.  On monday morning I walked outside and there was a very thin layer of ice on the ground.  It was very exciting.  I may be excited for winter now, but we will see how long the excitement lasts when the snow won't stop coming! 

I have a long day of work outside tomorrow.  I will finish up working in the garden after all the daily chores.  It is supposed to be a very nice day again I plan to take advantage of the last few sunny days left.

Goodnight lower 48,
ErIn

A Few Changes....

Hello again fellow readers!  There has been a little change...my blog is now connected to the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Centers Facebook page!  The members and guests can also enjoy hearing about what goes on at the center.  I am very excited.  I have been working in the gift store the past few days.  I was in the gift store today as well.  It stopped raining and the sun decided to show up.  During the slow times in the gift store I would run outside and feed the animals.  Today the lynx, Venetie and Kaltag, had 1/2 a raw chicken each.  This is their favorite day of the week! 

Venetie immediately pounced on her half when I tossed it to her. 

These next 2 photos of Venetie were taken by Doug Lindstrand who emails me photos often to add to my collection.   I know for certain that the second picture is Venetie, because Kaltag has a notch on her right ear.

My next animal to feed was snickers.  We had a special treat for him that he hasn't had in a while...cantelope.   I think he enjoyed it.

I have posted a few videos on youtube from the past few weeks and will also post the links here. 
This first link is a video I just finished editing.  The vegetables from the palmer fair were donated to the center.  We always give most of them to the three adult brown bears.  Patron and Joe Boxer enjoyed the vegetables the most....did I mention they were covered in Honey and hotdogs?
http://youtu.be/0oQjmesrFm0

These next 2 videos are the newest chore that Jonathan and I have added to our job on the weekends.
We feed the bison.  Now that I know how to drive the tractor it makes life just so much easier. 
http://youtu.be/EQiJQozDcZg  Part 1

http://youtu.be/sI1SCgdRudU Part 2

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

Deer Escape!

Yesterday was B-E-A-UTIFUL DAY!  I woke up to a nice rainless day finally!  As the day went on it continued to get nicer.  The cloud coverage has been very low on the clear days.  I went to work at 9 AM and with in the hour you could see the difference in how the fog came rolling in....

Here it comes creeping slowly in....

Now this is what it looked like with in 30 minuets or so.  You can see the fresh snow at the top of the mountain. 

After feeding the moose calves I did the walk around the bear enclosure to check the hot fence and make sure they are not digging any holes.  I came around the corner and this is the view of the bison pasture from the back of the bear enclosure....And to think, that this picture doesn't even do the actual scenery justice!  This morning was a very interesting morning.  I was walking back to the kitchen and noticed there was a small crowd around our sitka black tailed deer's enclosure.  As I got nearer I also noticed that there were reindeer in with our sitka deer!  Hershey, our dominant male caribou got his antlers tangled in the wire fence.  This resulted in him accidentally tearing Jewelies fence down.  Mike, our executive director, had to quickly fix the fence before the caribou/reindeer hurt jewelie.  They are in rut so they are VERY aggresive.  In the end Mike was able to herd jewelie into her area and I helped him fix the fence.  However, this was not the end of the morning craziness.  After leaving Jewelie's enclosure someone left the gate open....I am not going to name names, (Mike Miller), but Jewelie just simply walked out into the open.  Luckily we had people help lead her back to the area of her gate and then picked her up to put back in.  So finally I was able to get right back on track of my daily chores.   

We are expecting our first freeze any day now so I wanted to take advantage of the gorgeous day and do a little Gardening.  Our garden hadn't been weeded in FOREVER!  I picked a tub full of lettuce for Jewelie and snickers!  I then spent about 3 more hours just weeding the garden.  I actually enjoyed getting my hands a little dirty on such a nice day. 

These are our remaining lettuce heads after I pulled most of them out. 

At 1PM I did a porcupine presentation with snickers.  He loved getting his corn on the cobb.  He also loved the fresh lettuce I picked for him.

I had a great end of my day when I learned a new skill to add to my resume...

http://youtu.be/YVMxx51m0JU

The Snow is Back!

This morning when I went to wake up the big bears and feed the moose calves I noticed a change in scenery....the tops of the mountains are covered in snow!  The snow is back!  I feel like it just left.  The past few days I have been pulling some extra shifts in the gift store.  We are now into our winter hours.  We went from being opened 8-8 to now being opened 10-5pm.  The days are already getting shorter.  I cannot wait for the snow to to slowly work its way down to us!  As I was feeding the calves today I realized just how much they have grown.  I now have to raise my arms as high as they will go to feed the calves.  Soon I will be on my tippy toes and feeding them.  They are eating about 20 cups of grain a day!  In this picture Gilly is on the left and Nelson is on the right.

I mentioned in the previous blog how our elk are seperated.  This picture shows a very good reason why.  This is only play fighting compared to how it would be if females were around. 

Jack has finally shed all his velvet as of about a week ago.  When we gave the animals the left over veggies from the palmer fair we also gave some to the moose and elk.  Jack is enjoying his share.....














I realize this blog is rather short, however, I am actually working outdoors tomorrow so I will be sure to get some snap shots and a goodnight lower 48 video. 

Until tomorrow night a simple Goodnight Lower 48 would have to suffice.....

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

Bear and Veggies

Yesterday was a very busy day!  Where do I begin....Since we are down to only 2 interns left it was a full saturday for me and Jonathan.  Right away we knew we were in for a treat when the writer/Director  for 'Frozen Ground' arrived at the center.  The movie is in preproduction still, and he was checking out our animals to use for the movie.  They may also be filming at the center!  There will a few big actors such as Nicholas Cage and John Cusack!  I had to get the bears awake so we could show the writer/Director how big Joe Boxer was.  The picture on the left, as well as all the others in this blog, is from a very talented photographer-Doug Lindstrand. 

The next big task for the day was to feed the bears the donated veggies from the Palmer state fair.  The fair has the state competitions for the largest vegetables.  We even had a cabbage that was about 6 oz. away from breaking the world record!  It weighed 126 pds!!!!!  Mike, the executive director, drove the tractor in full of vegetables covered in honey and hotdogs underneath.  The bears were very interested in the veggies of course.  Joe Boxer is on the right and his sister, Patron, is on the left.  Hugo was off in the background waiting patiently for her turn. 

 Today, Sunday, I actually worked in the gift store on one of the most beautiful days we have had in a long time!....go figure....

Doug Lindstrand emailed me his latest pictures from the past 2 days. 

He has been trying to catch the elk bugling.  These are the sounds they make when they are in rut, which is breeding season for them and all the other animals at the center. 

 Here, he is hanging around one of his girlfriends for the day. 
















Finally, success!  Doug got a great shot of one of our elk bugling! 

The bears were not the only ones to get veggies.  The Wood Bison also got a tractor full of cabbage.

Here is a great picture of our Curator, Dr. Jordan Schaul on the left with writer/Director of frozen Ground, Scott Walker on the right. 

The moose calves are getting huge!  I don't know how much longer I can even call them calves.  They are officially getting 2 bottles a day, along with about 16 cups of grain, and willow galore!

The lynx are also settling in very nice and I am excited to work with them all winter.  They will especially love all the snow we will be getting.  Kaltag is on the left, and Venetie is on the right. 

Well, it's about midnight and I have work at 7:30AM in the ticket booth.   Another first for me and well it's extra money.....

Goodnight Lower 48,

ErIn

SUN!

We finally had some sun break through the clouds today. After 4 straight days of rain it finally stopped and let me dry off.  With the sun coming out I was running around every where trying to catch up on cleaning.  The first thing I start my mornings off is still giving the calves their bottle.  They are down to 3 bottles a day.  However, I just did the last 11pm feeding!  Starting tomorrow they are now down to 2 bottles a day!  I can't believe they are already being weaned off of their bottles.  It seems like just yesterday we were giving them 6 bottles a day!  I thought 11pm was late; I still remember when we were feeding them at 3AM!  I will post some pictures of them next post so you can see how big they are. 

With the animals being in rut we have to seperate the elk.  The five bull elk that are not with the females are in the same enclosure as the moose!  You may also notice that Jack, the moose, has finally shed his velvet.  He was the last deer to shed.   

Two days ago we recieved the vegetables from the Palmer fair. The vegetables are from the competitions. This picture is a head of lettuce! It must have weighed about 40 pounds!

Since the sun was out I went to visit Jewelie. I also gave her enclosure a good cleaning. I added some carrot and apple to her grain. Of course, she gobbled it right up.

I thought Alaska had Earthquakes not Hurricanes!

My new task on the weekends...

http://youtu.be/EQiJQozDcZg

New task part 2.....

http://youtu.be/sI1SCgdRudU

Those were a few videos that I have been meaning to load. 

Today we had winds that were an average of 40 miles an hour!  At Portage lake, 12 miles away, we had a 94mph gust of wind!  By the time it reached the center it was about an 80mph gust.  Wow!  I thought I had experienced windy weather in a Louisiana Hurricane.  So today was basically a day of fighting the weather. 

I had to change clothes twice.  I was completely soaked through my rainjacket, rainpants, and even my muk boots were soaked through.  I walked through puddles that were past my knees!  I had so much fun driving through the mudd puddles on the four wheeler. 

After feeding all the animals, cutting willow for the calves, and changing clothes numerous times, I was able to squeeze in a goodnight lower 48 video clip....

http://youtu.be/Y97prlR6snQ

Fall is creeping in

Sorry its been so long!  The only weather we have had in Portage valley was rain, rain, and more rain!  We did have a nice weather day a few days ago but they are all blending together with all this rain. 

We, the only 2 interns left, have been in charge of feeding the 3 brown bears for the past few days.  Here is what a typical days worth of food looks like...

Each bear gets a bucket full of Dog Food and Salmon.  Each bucket totals at about 30 pounds!

 

 On August 30th here is what the sunset looked like driving back from Anchorage. 

Here is that 1 sunny days we had about 5 days ago....

The newest addition to the center!  We got 2 lynx in about 2 weeks ago,  This is Venetie and her sister is Kaltag.  They are 7 year old lynx that we rescued from a forest fire as kittens.  They had severe burns on their paws and ears.  They also had a brother who actually did not surive because he was so badly burned. Anyways, the cats went to the Anchorage zoo until we were ready for them.  One thing led to another and 7 years later we finally got them back! 

 I gave Venetie and Kaltag each a mouse.  They don't really like their food to have feathers or fur on it. 

 

The Fox has a name!

Meet......Drum Roll Please...

Tokala!

pronounced-donkhanlah which is Lakota for Fox

Thanks Mrs. Rene for the name!

Goodnight Lower 48,

Erin