Moose, Bison, and Bears oh My!

2012-02-26T14:17:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I blogged about how it was such a gorgeous day to be open. Doug Lindstrand, an amazing photographer that always emails us his latest photos, also made it into the center yesterday. The next six photos are the most recent photos he emailed us.

CUTE, CUTE, CUTE, CUTE, ........CUTE!!!!!
I love this picture! Gilly and nelson must have been checking to see if Doug had any treats for them. I am sure by now all the animals even recognize Doug.

Today, I also went out to visit them. I got some hair samples from all three moose for that ecological study I mentioned earlier.

Today is not quite as pretty of a day. However, I have yet to get sick of the scenery that I live in. photo: courtesy of Doug Lindstrand

The next 2 pictures really show how much snow we still have around the center. A tour bus came in yesterday and still had a tough time turning the corners; even after our roads had been plowed in the morning.

photo: courtesy of Doug Lindstrand
Just one of many snowbanks that have built up from plowing all winter....

photo: courtesy of Doug Lindstrand

The musk ox are looking very happy and healthy. This summer, if any calves are born, we are going to be bottle raising the calves. I am very excited to get to have a new experience working with animals. I could put this up on the list with bottle feeding moose and porcupine.

photo: courtesy of Doug Lindstrand

One of our bull musk ox...I would hate to run into this guy!
photo: courtesy of Doug Lindstrand

Construction of our bear boardwalk has officially begun! They have started bringing in the pipes that will be put in the ground.

I imagine once the noise really picks up with construction our bears will officially be done hibernating. However, on a day like today, where we have had about 6 inches of snow over night they are still sleeping on and off all day.

photo: courtesy of Doug Lindstrand

Today, my old room mate/co-worker Meredith spent part of her Sunday volunteering for a few hours. It makes all the difference when I have extra help. A task like cleaning out snickers house is made much easier when someone can distract him with food while I clean the house out. Otherwise, snickers is climbing all over me while I am trying to clean the house. Not only do I end up really stinky, but I do get nibbled on a bit out of curiosity.

These next 2 photos Meredith fed Jewelie for me. It was also nice to have an extra pair of hands to shovel a bit of the fresh snow away from the gate entrance.

Thanks again Meredith for helping today!
Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

and....we are open!

2012-02-25T15:39:00.000-08:00

woo....it has been a busy past couple of days. Jonathan and I did 2 days worth of school presentations back to back with Snickers the porcupine. 2 Days may not seem like a lot....however, we did have about a 3 hour gap between presentations in anchorage on wednesday. So we decided to see a movie between presentations. Snickers decided to take a nap while we saw the movie.

Wednesday night we had our first family night presentation at Mt. View Elementary in anchorage. They fed us pizza and cookies for volunteering. It was a fun presentation. Basically, we set up 2 tables for an hour and just hung around answering questions while snickers looked pretty for everyone....I guess I should say handsome.

Jonathan was hanging out at the table with all our porcupine information. I was keeping snicker's food supply stocked. We would switch tables every so often.

The booth to our right was a booth from the museum. They had a mammoth painting hanging up where the kids would use a spear representing how the hunters hunted mammoths. Jonathan snuck over and even attempted to use the spear.

We decided to take the opportunity to pose for a picture. It seems we can never booth be in the same picture at once since one of us is always talking while the other takes the picture.

You can see on the table we had a variety of treats to keep snickers busy. That night he had carrots, oranges, an apple....and of course peanuts.

I think he is even working on a few peanuts in this picture.

Today, Saturday, was the first weekend we have been opened this year. What a nice and lovely day to open on as well. I have gotten so much done today. I mega cleaned out Jewelie's enclosure. Everything is finally starting to thaw out. I wanted to clean Jewelie's enclosure while the wind and rain were away finally. The reindeer were checking out all the action going on around Jewelie.

Since it is February you can see that the reindeer have all shed their antlers. Except one.....

Burt! I mentioned a few months ago when we got Burt in December that he is a steer. He will not shed his antlers till much later than the other reindeer. Burt will be turning 5 years old this year.

A bus should be arriving to the center any minute now! My first bus tour of the year! I just hope they don't think I smell too bad since I cleaned snicker's enclosure out earlier....

Goodnight Lower 48,
Erin

My first famous photo...or something like that

2012-02-22T16:16:00.000-08:00

Remember those last 6 pictures I posted on my blog yesterday? Well I posted one of them on the AWCC facebook page and our PR guy also passed it on to the local news! I know its not that big of a deal; I am just really excited to have my first AWCC photo picked up by the news. Here is the link to the local anchorage news website if you are interested:

http://www.adn.com/2012/02/21/2329582/bears-emerge-during-warm-days.html

Today was another beautiful day again! 2 in a row! Also, I had another day off. Typically I don't like taking consecutive days off because I feel like I have missed so much when I return. However, next week Jonathan, the other intern, will be having his parents visiting.

I was excited to get out again and just walk around the center taking photos. I haven't been to the observation deck in a while; so I decided to start there first. I always enjoy the scenery from high up and looking across to see the mountains. The moose calves saw me and came over to see if they could get anything. Jack is in the very back eating grain.

Gilly is the one in the front. I think he will always be the smaller one of the 2.
They also still have their ear tags in that Fish and Game tagged them with when they were first rescued. I believe we will be able to remove them soon. They were left in until we were absolutely positive that they were not going to be released back into the wild. Now, they are to old to release back to the wild. They are to used to human interaction.

This is the scenery that I am talking about from the observation deck.

You can see the bull wood bison in this photo. We should be expecting calves in early spring again. I remember how exciting it was to drive around the corner and spot the newborn calves. Last spring we had 18 calves born. I expect we will have at least 20 or so born this spring.

Driving just past our bunkhouse this is what it would look like. I was leaving the bunkhouse after a lunch break and snapped this photo.

On sunny days, this time of year, we can almost expect for all of our bears to enjoy the nice sunny weather. Kuma seems to be the most active of the 7 bears we have at our center. He is always the last bear to start hibernation, and the first one to wake up.

Once he realized I didn't have any food for him he just kept on walking

Man! That's 2 blogs in a row! If this nice weather keeps up I will even be able to post another blog soon. Tomorrow we have a very long day in anchorage doing porcupine presentations. I expect it will be too late to post a blog tomorrow night, but I will be sure to get photos of our presentations for the next blog.
Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

2012-02-21T16:04:00.000-08:00

Yay! Finally a day where both the sun and my day off happen at the same time! It sure is hard to get anything accomplished on a rainy, and windy day; other than sleeping! It has been very nice to be able to grab my camera and walk around the center without getting blown away. I first took some snapshots of our lynx. They turned this dog house into a kitty house I guess you could say. They are always lounging around in here.

Kaltag is the one that is inside the house while Venetie is on the top.

If you look very closely you can see a notch in Kaltag's right ear.

This was done as they were kittens at the anchorage zoo in order to be able to identify them. In case treatment ever needs to be given to one of them; it will be easy to identify between the two sisters.

Venetie is lounging on top of the house. Kaltag seems to like the inside of the house more than Venetie. It is interesting how much these lynx act like any other normal house cat...they are just a bit more dangerous.

Adonis has been venturing around in his enclosure. Jonathan, the other winter intern, has changed his branches up a bit since we had some strong winds this winter. We also like to change up all the enclosures so the animals can have a change in scenery as well.

As I was taking pictures Adonis was moving around and I happened to get this photo of his wing. It is amazing just how big their wings can be! They don't look very big when they are tucked in. Male Bald Eagles, like Adonis, can have a wingspan of about 72-85 inches. Female bald eagles can have a wingspan of 79-90 inches!

I wanted to collect some feathers from Hooty and Snappy; our Great Horned Owls. I am helping a professor from the University of Anchorage in an ecological study on diets of captive animals. By getting hair and food samples from our animals at the center they can tell how an animals diet changes seasonally. Along with our owl feathers I have also collected some porcupine quills and Wood Bison hair so far.

I would also like to collect lynx hair eventually. Kat, our gift store assistant manager, came up the idea of placing a brush on the entrance of their house so when they walk in and out the hair will collect on the brush. I will keep you posted on whether or not this invention actually works.

As I came back around the corner I quickly ran over to our cubs...or now I guess I should say younger bears. Taquka and Shaggy have been venturing out more and more as the sun comes out. They were very sluggishly playing around. They even came to check on me at the fence.

Of course, Taquka is still the more curious of the two.

Taquka then started tugging on shaggy's ear to play with her. I know it looks like it is very painful....but trust me shaggy didn't even flinch.

Then shaggy gave her piece of mind to Taquka

But seeing as they are still sort of hibernating they get tired fairly quickly after they started rolling around.

Well the sun is still peeking around the mountains for a few more hours or so...better go take some more snapshots while I can...
Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

Happy Valentine's Day

2012-02-16T15:32:00.000-08:00

Finally another sunny Day! What a great day to have the sun out. I have been here just over 2 weeks and this is the 2nd day we have not had wind, rain, or both at the same time. However, the 2 sunny days sure make up for the 12 other yucky days.

I thought the mountain looked beautiful covered by fog.

Even the animals were peaking out of their enclosures.

Snickers was enjoying his orange and cauliflower.

Jewelie doesn't really like cauliflower so I gave her some lettuce instead.

Jonathan and I have started our education programs recently. I snapped this photo of Jonathan during our Bones and Fur presentation. Jonathan is holding a snowshoe hare skull. The kids are trying to guess what they think the animal is.

We do a program called bones and fur where we divide kids into about 4 groups. They are typically fourth and fifth grade ages. They will get a skull and additional clues throughout the presentation to learn what their animal is. They learn how determine differences between herbivores, carnivores, or omnivores by looking at types of teeth. They learn about prey or predators by looking at the eyes. They can even tell if some animals are young or old, male or female.

Next week will be a very busy week for us. We will be doing a porcupine presentation for over a hundred kids at once! I made 3 batches of play doh this morning so that the younger kids can make their own porcupine at the end of the presentation. The use spaghetti noodles to represent the quills on their play doh porcupine.

The third program that we do is a puppet show. We teach younger kids about the story of our black bear named Kuma. We also teach about bear/moose safety.

Today is my day off and it is windy and rainy outside. I sure can't wait for the sun to come out again and stay out! My bed looks awfully cozy on days like today. I think I will hop back in bed and enjoy a nice hot cup of tea!

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

How to give a moose a manicure

2012-02-10T19:20:00.000-08:00

About 5 days ago we had so much snow built up that Snickers, the porcupine, literally walked out of his enclosure. We found him the next day tucked underneath the observation deck all cozy and warm. We had him back in his house in less than 10 minutes no problem. The naxt day we noticed that Jack, our bull moose, had quills in his front left hoof. I am not sure that this happened when snickers escaped or if snickers quilled Jack through the fence. Anyways, we needed to get the quills out before they worked their way any further into Jack's leg.

We also decided that since we were going to dart Jack in order to remove his quills that we might as well trim his hooves. Hence the name of the blog.
When we have to sedate an animal we always wait about 10 minutes before going in with them so that they are nice and comfortable....... and asleep. Jack just layed his head down and helped the procedure go as planned. He did very well.

Gilly, on the other hand, was getting in my way!

Jonathan and I began removing the quills while Mike, the executive director, trimmed his hooves.

Once everything was done we needed to lubricate Jack's eyes. After they are sedated the medicine can cause their eyes to dry out so we always apply a thin layer of special gel in their eyes to avoid dryness.

Here, Mike is just keeping an eye on Jack and making sure that he is waking up around the time he is supposed to. We also hang around to make sure the calves don't bother Jack as he is waking up.

Once Jack was lifting his head up I was able to lubricate the other eye.

We saved the quills so that we could count how many Jack actually had in his leg. It was a grand total of 76 quills! It is amazing how so many quills can be in such a small amount of area. It makes since that a porcupine can have an average of 30,000 quills on their body at one time!

Well, the day is coming to a close. We just did our first puppet show of the year! The show went smoothly...especially for having about 50 1rst graders in such a small area! They were a great audience. Next week we are going to be very busy with more education programs. This is going to be a very busy year....but I can't wait!
Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

2012-02-09T18:31:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was a B-E-A-UTIFUL day! It was the first sunny day we have had since I have been back. But you know what...it definitely makes up for the 6 rainy, and yucky days we had before. All the animals were out and about. Snickers had his house cleaned out and even enjoyed some oranges and cauliflower afterwards.

The moose calves were sunbathing all day. You can see Jack laying in the back right with Gilly. Nelson was walking around before settling down with the other 2 moose.

The bears even made an appearance! Joe Boxer and Patron were peaking out of there dens when they heard us calling for wiley to come out. Eventually, we had to walk away because they were coming over to the fence to inspect the food we had.

We walked onto the top of Balck Bear mountain to get a last few glimpses of our sunny day just before the sun went behind the mountain. The walk up was a very interesting climb considering the entire mountain was basically an ice rink!

So we thought we would make it easier by sliding back down the mountain/hill.

We ended ou day by driving about 15 miles to the Turnagain Pass. The turnagain pass is a very popular place for cross country skiers and snow machiners. There is a rule, to keep it safer, that the snow machiners are only allowed on the right side of the road; while the cross country skiers are only allowed on the left. You can see that this picture is the side that the snow machiners use.

Sort of a short blog tonight on account of I am very tired after a long day of work. I will post a blog tomorrow talking about the interesting events that went on today. I would talk about that right now but I really have to go to the bathroom. So that means I have to walk all the way back to the bunkhouse since the water is turned off here at the giftstore. Stay tuned for tomorrow's blog......How to give a moose a manicure.

Goodnight Lower 48,

ErIn

Back in AK!

2012-02-04T16:31:00.000-08:00

Well 6 weeks sure does go by fast.

I returned just in time for a huge snow storm. I returned and started work on February 1rst; which made it exactly my 1 year anniversary for working at the center. Last february I really didn't get to experience an alaskan winter compared to what we are getting this year. We have had so much snow in a single night that the animals have literally walked out of their enclosures; don't worry none of them were bears.

Yesterday we had crazy amounts of snow just dumping on the center. We also have to worry about the snowdrifts almost more than the actual snow. When I went out to feed snickers today this is what his enclosure looked like....can you spot his house?

His house is about 1.5 feet deep, sort of in the area where you see Jack standing. So I got my shovel and started digging....
yay! I found him! He was nice and cozy in his house waiting for his food.

He refused to leave his house so I just placed his food bowl in his house.

In the summer the moose would not really be able to look over snicker's enclosure this much. However, there is a foot or so of packed snow that they are standing on right now. If you notice how Jack in the picture has his ears pinned; this is because I was shoveling Snicker's enclosure out at the time. For some reason Jack doesn't realy like shovels. When working with animals as large as bears and moose you really need to be on the lookout for any strange behaviors. In moose, their ears pinned is a good sign that they are not very happy. Jack never did anything other than keep an eye on the shovel. People are constantly asking if I am scared to work with bears and moose. I have never felt that I was in a dangerous position. I think this is because when we are working with thse animals we leave at any sign of an animal being uncomfortable. You never want to make an animal so uncomfortable that they begin to feel threatened.

Gilly and Nelson are now in the same enclosure as Jack. I can't believe how much they have grown in only 6 weeks! Again, you can get an idea of how much snow there is at the center. If you have ever been to our observation deck you probably know that it is pretty high off the ground. Here the moose calves are actually sticking their heads in the bridge to see me!

I missed getting to walk outside and see views like this!

Rick, our awesome maintenance man, has been plowing for hours on a daily basis. Here is an average snow bank that you can find all around the center. They also make great sledding hills!

There are places by our giftstore where you could just about step up onto the roof!

I LOVE living in a place where I can walk outdoors and get pictures that you would find on postcards.
I will try and start the blog up on a daily basis now that I am back at the center. Our internet is very spotty so I can't promise that it will be everyday. In fact we don't even have internet at our bunkhouse right now, so I have to blog at the giftstore.

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

Soon its back to AK

2012-01-22T21:55:00.000-08:00

Well my fellow Texans, and all others in the lower 48, it is about 1 week till I will be walking down this road to work again. I will be both excited and sad to leave the lower 48. On the one hand I will miss my family and friends, walking to get groceries, basking in the sun, and simply being able to wear shorts without getting frostbite. However, I am excited to jump back into action and work with the animals again. Just 2 days after I get back we began our education programs again. I know this is going to be a busier year for me since word about our FREE education programs in schools is spreading.

Meanwhile......

The past 3 weeks have been busy. I have traveled to 2 different states all in one week. First I went to Lake Charles, Louisiana. I attended college at McNeese State University where I received my Biology degree. I wanted to visit some friends, coaches, and even my landlords that I rented an apartment from during college. I always enjoy my visits to Louisiana. It is NEVER a boring state to be in.

Just hours after I got back from Louisiana we packed up the car and headed to Arkansas. I was born in Arkansas so I still have a lot of family there. My brother also attends college there. We wanted to visit him and his wife.

My Grandmother lives on a farm in Vilonia,Arkansas. I always enjoy staying at her house. It is very relaxing and beautiful there, This picture below is an old barn that is used as shelter for a few horses.

Back in Alaska Doug Lindstrand sent me a photo of what our barns are looking like after some heavy snowfall these past couple of weeks.

One of the lucky horses to live on my grandmothers farm.

Can you guess what this interesting looking animal is on the left?

This is a Zedonk. Part zebra and part donkey makes this character a very popular attraction when visiting searcy, arkansas. Most of the locals know about this little guy. My brother wanted to introduce my mother and I to him.

Before we headed out I wanted to get a quick snapshot with my grandmother.

One adventure I was sure to check off my to do list while visiting texas was visit the Houston Zoo. I worked two summers here as a volunteer keeper aide. I basically followed a zoo keeper around all day and helped in any chores they needed done. These 2 summers were when I really found my passion to work with animals in life.

I was kid-sitting (baby sitting but I can't say they are babies anymore) and decided what a better way to spend a saturday with 2 kids.

One of the first animals we visited were the Asian Elephants. This young baby and its mother were getting hay from this box hanging up. This is a similar contraption that we use for the bear cubs to play with while getting their food. It is another way to keep the animals thinking and staying active.

No, this is not Adonis....this is Liberty. She is also a permanent resident at the zoo due to a gunshot wound.

Hey Adonis...need a girlfriend?

These two were the most photogenic animals at the zoo yesterday. This is a 10 month old baby orangutan named Aurora. Cheyenne is the surrogate mother that she is clinging to. Aurora was born to an orangutan named Kelly. However, cheyenne is taking care of her.

The houston zoo has a new Africa exhibit that I was really excited to see. I love giraffes! When I mentioned to this giraffe how cold it was in alaska it was speechless.....he even dropped his jaw in awe!

These last 3 pictures were also sent by Doug Lindstrand. He has been keeping me posted on what the center looks like right now. I feel cold just looking at these next pictures!

Goodnight lower 48, and Hawaii
ErIn

Happy New Year

2012-01-03T12:25:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year! It has been 11 months since I started my adventure in Alaska. I am still visiting family in Texas; but I have still managed to find some animals in Texas to play with. These 3 dogs on the left are some friends of mine. Christmas day I dog sat these three. Thor is the Black lab in the front. Duke is the dog on the back right. Sadie is on the left.

When it came to bed time Duke seemed to think he could use my bed!

Before I took the internship in Alaska I was an intern at TGR Exotics in Spring,Texas. It is basically I privately owned zoo. In order to apply for the internship in Alaska they wanted the applicant to have some training experience. Fortunately, I was training a camel named "Cookie" at the time. Cookie seemed to remember me...or she was just not a fan of my camera.

I was very excited to return to TGR and visit the animals again. I was also excited to meet the new animals.

Here is one of the newest additions to TGR. I have never worked with a Water Buffalo before. This is "Buffy". She was so sweet. She is basically just a big puppy dog. She loves people and when you scratch her she lays down.

Also, another new addition was Walter. Any ideas what Walter is...I will give you a hint. He is in the movie the Lion King. He has a friend named Timon. Walter is a Warthog! He is only 4 months old. I can't imagine how crazy he is going to be when he is fully grown!

This is "creature". Do you know what creature is? They come from Africa. They are very good diggers....Aardvark! Creature was sleeping. They are nocturnal animals so I imagine he is very active at night time.

Scarlet AKA Scar was one of my favorite animals that I was able to work with while at TGR. Scar is a Binturong. They are sometimes called bearcats. Yes they do exist. They are found in asia. Scar was an attention hog. She is very vocal when she wants to be let out of her enclosure. I was able to hold her for a short time until she decided to hide under Creatures bed. Binturongs have a very unique smell. They smell like popcorn or fritos. No really! If you ever get within smelling distance of one you will understand. They also spend most of their lives in tress. Their tails are what helps them balance in trees. Scar had her tail wrapped around my neck to help herself balance.

You can see here just how important their tails are for balance.

Ahhhhh another 2 animals I missed working with.
Meet Clairece and Lector. I know...their names are awesome. These 2 are called African Crested Porcupines. They look a bit different than Snickers from alaska don't they. They have a few differences in their adaptions. For example, these are found in Africa. Also, you may notice that their quills are much longer and thicker than Snickers'. However, their quills do not have barbed ends like Snickers does.

This animal is also another type of rodent. In fact this is the largest rodent in the world. Thay are called capybaras. They are found in South America.

And que the Darth Vador theme music.....THOR!!!! One of the only animals that has not really taking a liking to me. Thor is a Kune Kune pig. They originate from New Zealand.

Buffy is very photogenic. I had to stop by and say bye to her before I headed home.

Goodnight lower 48, .......upper 2 in this case.....
ErIn

Feliz Natal!

2011-12-25T21:26:00.000-08:00

Well Hello Lower 48! I'm back after being away for nearly 11 months!!!!! I arrived in Texas on December 15th to a muggy day. I left Alaska just before a blizzard hit the center causing it to close down. Only to arrive in a Sunny Texas where it was 75 degrees that day. You could say it was a bit of a climate change. The first night back we had our annual moms vs. moms soccer game. My youngest brother plays soccer on his highschool team. Every year they have a fun game where the moms from all 4 highschool teams play in a game. This picture is with my mom, corey, and parker (my 2 younger brothers).

I was very excited to meet the newest member of our family...Low Rider AKA Rider! She is a rescue dog. One day my brother, Corey, and mom were at Petsmart. They had dogs up for adoption and it was love at first site for my brother. On her papers it says she is a mix of Lab and Basset Hound. I am convinced that she also has a bit of pit bull in her. Pitt Bulls have a bad reputation for being aggressive dogs. However, I believe that it is not the dog that is bad but the owner that trains it to be aggressive. All dogs have the potential to be aggressive and threatening. I believe that a domesticated animal, such as a dog, if given attention and love can be a life long friend. So here she is making her first debut on my blog....Low Rider!

One reason why I headed back to Texas a bit earlier for the holidays was because my brother Parker was getting married!!!!! This wonderful, cute, couple on the right became Mr. and Mrs. Parker Leighton on December 17th 2011. Lauren and Parker went to Cancun for their Honeymoon. After they got back on the 23rd they still had a few wedding gifts to open. I think one of my favorite gifts they received was a pair of Bride and Groom frogs. You can see Parker looking at the frog as he opens it.

Here he is loving his first ornament with his new bride; a pair of bride and groom frogs!

On Christmas Day we headed to Church. Church is one of the things I miss most being away from my family. I also can't remember the last time Christmas landed on the same day as Church. On Christmas morning it is tradition to open our stockings first in our new pajamas. So after opening our stockings, going to church, opening gifts, it was about time for lunch. Here is my Dad with my dog, Delilah. Delilah is also a rescue dog. I found her near a dumpster in Louisiana. She is a miniture Dachsund. Don't let her size fool you...she is a HANDFULL! She is constantly trying to get people to play fetch with her. On christmas morning we had to give her new toys to distract her while we opened gifts. It didn't really work. She quickly got bored with her new toys and found one of her favorite tennis balls to nicely drop in our laps to throw to her.

Parker and Lauren also joined us for their first time as Husband and Wife. It was fun having a new family member, my sister-in-law, with us on Christmas Day.

After spending the morning with parents and siblings; we meet up with my cousins,aunts, uncles,grandfather, and Great Grandmother. This year we ate lunch at Bouca Di peppo. It is an Italian restaurant. In all we have 21 family members on my mother's side that live all in Texas...(except me).

On the left side we had the "adults" sit together. On the right the cousins, and now my brother's wife, all sit together.

A somewhat new tradition that has gone on for 3 years now is our White Elephant Gift Exchange. Because there are so many family members it can be stressfull to buy everyone a gift. So a few years ago we decided to switch to white elephant gift exchange. You can either buy a really cheap gift or even find something from around the house. I wanted to make my gift something alaskan. I bought a moose hat from our giftstore at the center. I was thinking that the younger cousins (around 10 years old or so) would be fighting over the moose cap. I never would have thought that my 21 year old cousin and his sister in highschool would have been competeing for it! All in all you could say our gift exchanges are always a lot of fun.

I do go a little photo crazy when I am home since it may be a while till I am back home. Here is me and my mother.

This is my great grandmother. We all call her Nana. She just celebrated her 94th birthday!

You go Girl!!!

Now since I will be away from the center for another month or so; I still get wonderful emails from Doug Lindstrand to keep me filled in on whats going on up in Alaska. These next four pictures are what happens when you play with a 350 pound, 6 month old, moose named Nelson.

Don't worry no interns were injured during the filming of this event.

Thanks Doug for these pictures!

I also wanted to explain the title of todays blog. I was catching up on my facebook today and noticed that I had 2 un-read messages from people in Brazil. Both were viewers of a television documentary about our center. Earlier in the summer I was interviewed by a journalist from Brazil. I completely forgot about the interview. When I was reading the messages today it reminded about the interview. They were very interested in learning how the cubs were doing. So todays title "Feliz Natal" is simply Merry Christmas in portuguese for the loyal followers of our animals at the center.

Here is the latest picture of Taquka and Shaguyik.....

Shaggy is on the left with Taquka on the right

Feliz Natal Lower 48....and I guess now Alaska and Hawaii....y Brazil!

ErIn

Tis the Season

2011-12-10T13:56:00.000-08:00

Gilly, aka the sweetest moose ever, was posing very well a few days ago so I decided to take advantage of this opportunity. The calves are getting huge! Gilly must weight over 300 pounds! I remember when we first got him this past summer, and he weighed 40 pounds. We have to now start being careful around them because of their size. Even though we bottle raised them they still have natural instincts when they are scared or feel threatened. I suspect Nelson will be the dominant of the 2. He has learned that he can kick now. It is amazing how a wild animal can still develop their own unique personalities. Nelson is the boss and straight to business. Gilly is the lovable and playful calf.

On wednesday I had a day off. I didn't really have any plans and didn't want to waste a day laying around indoors. Mike, our executive director, was going to an event wednesday with a reindeer. I asked if I could tag along if he needed any help. I am very glad I went. On the way to the event Mike decided that he wanted to buy a reindeer from the reindeer farm in Palmer,Alaska. At the center we have all male reindeer. This means that they have all dropped their antlers already. The reindeer farm had a 4 year old steer that still has his antlers. So here is a little bit of reindeer knowledge: A steer means that the animal has been castrated. In reindeer this means that they will retain their antlers much longer than the typical male reindeer because of the difference in hormone levels. This picture above is our newest addition to our herd. This is Bert the reindeer. He is very lovable and is fitting in well at the center. After picking him up we went to an aviation museum at the Anchorage airport. They were having an event celebrating a certain type of retired airplane. There was lots of food, music, games, and Bert the reindeer. So we hung out for about 3 hours letting people meet Bert and talking about him. I have to say this was the first time I have ever felt like it could not have felt anymore like Christmas time. I was standing outside in Alaska while it was snowing holding a reindeer, and listening to christmas music.

This previous photo was taken by Clark Mishler, a photographer that emailed me this photo from the wednesday night event.

This picture was taking by Doug Lindstrand. Mike and I had just gotten Bert ready for the event.

Mike posing with Bert. We now have about 11 reindeer at the center. Bert will be making more appearances since he has been trained very well to be comfortable with people taking pictures with him.

Photo again by Doug Lindstrand.

On Friday I gave a behind the scenes to tour to some returning friends who also brought 2 friends from Michigan. I always love giving these tours. It not only adds some variety to my day, but I always get to meet cool people. We actually ended the tours in August;however, if we get requests for specific days and we have a guide available we would love to give a tour. The tours are also a way to not only get to meet the animals up close, see how a day in the life of an intern is, but it also contributes directly to the animals 100% since we are a non-profit organization. Here I am introducing Snickers to my tour. Doug Lindstrand also got this snapshot.

Well fellow readers I am sad to say that I will be leaving Alaska in 4 days to return to Texas for the holidays. But fear not! I will be returning the the wildlife center in Portage,Alaska. I will still be updating my blog during my vacation. Who knows...I may even get to meet some animals from a previous internship...bearcats, sloth, hyenas, camels....and many more! Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!!!!!
Goodnight Lower 48...and Hawaii
ErIn

2011-12-06T18:52:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I had a porcupine presentation in Whittier. It was Snickers first trip through the whittier tunnel.

I did a presentation to the pre-school/kindergardeners first. Then, I went and introduced Snickers to the junior high/highschoolers. The whole school only has 37 kids! I graduated with 1,063 seniors in my highschool! That is more than the entire town of whittier! You can see the kid in yellow on the bottom row is holding Stanley.

After we got back from the presentation I still needed to feed the owls. This time I wanted to capture the feeding on camera. I was feeding them one quail each. The first owl to usually eat is the female. In birds of prey the females are typically larger than the males. Our female,Snappy, loves to fly to the hollowed log on top of the enclosure. The male, Hooty, usually eats the mice/or quail off of the lower branches of their tree.

Here, Hooty is jumping down to the branch with the quail placed on it.

After the female grabbed the quail from the upper log she flew to another perch. You can see her holding the quail with her talons.

I really liked this picture! The male usually holds onto his food a bit longer than the female. He was holding the quail with his talons. The way he was holding it makes it look like it is standing up just under him.

Today at work the moose calves went into a Banana coma. We used an entire palet of bananas to distribute through the center today. At the end of the day Jonathan and I went to feed them bananas. They had just been fed some of the bananas from the pallet. They were so full that they didn't even get up to greet us! This was definitely a first. Jonathan wanted to take advantage of this opportunity and take some snap shots with us standing in between the calves. I also had to get a picture with my man Gilly.

Nelson is on the right and Gilly on the left. Nelson was even burping a little. The moose had banana breath. I think it is safe to sy that they may be sick of bananas for at least a day or so. Well ok, so maybe only a few hours or so till they are ready for more bananas.

Tomorrow we will see just how excited they are to get more bananas. Until then.....Goodnight lower 48...and Hawaii
ErIn

Flat Stanley

2011-12-02T21:52:00.000-08:00

Well readers sorry for the absence. Have you ever heard of Flat Stanley? This is the second time I have been able to help out with a project called Flat Stanley. Many kids in school seem to do this project. They have a paper figure known as Stanley and then they take tuns getting pictures with Stanley all over the world. I have to admit getting Flat Stanley sent to the wildlife center is a really unique place for Stanley to visit.

In this case Stanley was able to meet with Gilly. Gilly almost tried to eat Stanley, but don't worry readers Stanley escaped.

Next, Stanley headed over to help feed Jewelie. Jewelie was more interested in her grean beans and grapes then eating Stanley.

Last, but definitely not least, Stanley was introduced to Snickers. Snickers is always happy to meet new people. Snickers has been introduced to Stanley a few times.

Stanley will be leaving for New York to share his adventures at the center to his classroom.

We have 7 bears at the center and currently 5 of them are hibernating. The brown bears are usually the first to hibernate. Next, Uli the black bear will be hibernating until late March. Kuma, the male black bear, will hibernate on and off all winter. Last, we have our 2 Kodiak bear cubs. The bear cubs are still awake. They have never actually learned how to hibernate. It will be interesting to see if they naturally learn to hibernate. I think they will naturally learn. We are feeding them less and less, it seems, every day. They bears seem to be less active every day. Doug Lindstrand was able to send me snap shots after I fed the cubs.

Photo courtesy of Doug Lindstrand

Today, was my day day off. I must say it was one of my favorite. I skied for 6 straight hours! I am very tired and yet I am excited to listen to some blue grass music tonight.

Tomorrow, saturday, will be another day with the animals. Who knows what the day will bring. Well readers I guess you will wait and see!

Goodnight lower 48....and Hawaii,

ErIn

Happy Thanksgiving

2011-11-24T20:50:00.000-08:00

We have had lots of snow these past few days. We are also about to start training our 2 moose calves Gilly and Nelson. However, I am not so sure I can even call them calves anymore. They are taller than me! Gilly was very interested in following me and my camera around. While I was trying to be patient and get pictures with the 2 of us; Doug Lindstrand was passing by. He quickly hopped out of his van and snapped a few photos of me with Gilly and Nelson. Gilly is the lovable one. He even gave me a few kisses.

Nelson, is the more physical calf. If we put our heads down he loves to push his head against ours. I think he will be the more dominant Bull between the 2.

This same day we had a surprise visitor. We had done some filming a few days earlier with our 3 year old bull moose. Vanessa Hudgens was even in the scene with Jack the moose. Vanessa, her sister, and her mother stopped by the center for a tour. Jordan gave them a tour of the center. I also hopped into the yukon to give them some bananas for Jack. They were able to feed Jack, snickers, visit with the moose calves, and also meet Shaggy and Taquka.

At the end of their visit I was even able to get a photo with Vanessa.

The movie Frozen Ground is expected to come out later next year. Hopefully I will be able to make it to the premier! It was very nice to meet Vanessa and her family. They were very sweet and interested in everything Jordan talked about.

Just 2 days after filming Jack actually lost one of his antlers! Wow! Talk about good timing! I don't even want to think about what would have happened if he lost it before filming! Tomorrow, Friday, is a free day at the center. I am working in the ticket booth. Today Alyeska, the resort in Girdwood, opened for skiing. I am really excited because I may go skiing on Sunday! Hopefully, I won't be as bad as my first day on Alyeska in February! I remember how soar I was after that. Wish me luck!

The photos from this blog were taken by the wonderful Doug Lindstrand. As always, very appreciated Doug...Thanks!!!!!!

Goodnight Lower 48,

ErIn

Now that's cold!

2011-11-19T22:39:00.000-08:00

These past few days I have felt what is like to be a real alaskan. When I arrived in February the coldest temperture I experienced was about -10 degrees. We had a warm winter last winter. Now, however, this month is colder than a typical November I hear. Today it was -18 degrees! Now that's COLD!!!! On wednesday we were supposed to use our 3 year old bull moose for filming a movie scene. However, it was so cold that they had to actually push filming back a day.

On my last day off I took this picture just as the sun was setting. I loved the color of the sky.

Purple is, and always will be, my favorite color. The sunsets in Alaska always surprise me. I have yet to get used to the beautiful colors in the skies of alaska.

In order to get Jack ready for filming I had to go in with him a few times a day. He needed to get comfortable with walking in and out of the trailer. Of course, I had to take this opportunity to get a snapshot with him.

On every wednesday in November Jonathan and I have an hour to do some sort of presentation at Girdwood Elementary School. This past wednesday we used Snickers for a presentation. We taught kids ages 3-9 about porcupines. After Snickers made his debut we gave every kid some playdo to make their own porcupine. Then they used spaghetti to represent quills on their porcupines. This coming wednesday we will be teaching about insulation animals have in Alaska.

Friday it was time to use Jack for filming. Mike and Matt went to Anchorage around noon with Jack. Even though filming wasn't until at least 5ish Jack needed to get used to his surroundings. Jonathan, Jeremy, and I headed into Anchorage around 2pm. We then froze our limbs off until filming started around 4:30pm. The excitement kept any of us from thinking logically about staying warm. Jack is behind us in the trailer.

Jack did very well in filming. He was even in a scene with Vanessa Hudgens!

Here I am trying to get Jack back into the trailer after filming was over. Of course it was easier getting him out than in. Eventually tangerines, bananas, grain, and a pie pumpkin was his treat once he got back into his trailer.

I am very excited to get to start training our younger moose, Gilly and Nelson. We need them to be able to be comfortable with filming if they are needed.

Goodnight Lower 48!
ErIn

Musk and an Elk?

2011-11-14T22:26:00.000-08:00

I said that yesterday I would post pictures from the bear cubs' surgery. This first picture is
during Shaguyik's surgery. Melissa, on the right, is visiting from Montana. She works for Bear Trust International. She had to continually monitor Shaggy's breathing to make sure it stayed normal. Also, we checked for any signs of waking up. Meredith, my roomate is in the middle of the picture. We were both in aw of our opportunity to work so close to a brown bear.

Photo by: Doug Lindstrand

The hardest part seemed to be actually loading and unloading the cubs. Here, we are unloading Shaggy into her recovery pen. We made sure to provide about 3 bales of Straw for cushion.

We have been checking on her every few hours since to make sure she always has snow available for hydration.

Tonight I gave her some tangerines to help with hydration as well.
Photo by: Doug Lindstrand

This morning started off with some abnormal excitement. The youngest male elk hopped the fence into the musk ox enclosure. He then started challenging the musk ox. Immediately we made sure visitors stayed in the gift store or that they didn't drive around to the area they were working to remove the elk in.

Elk and musk ox photos by: Doug Lindstrand

Once the young elk was removed; it was decided that it was time to combine all the elk.

You can see that even before they were put together the Roosevelt elk,on the left, was already trying to fight the breeding bull through the fence.

Photo by: Doug Lindstrand

Then the action really started! Brawny, the roosevelt elk fought the breeding elk all day long!

Photo by:Doug Lindstrand

I had a special treat left over for snickers. It was the last avocado paid for through a donation.

Snickers wasn't the only animal to get a treat. The Wood Bison were very excited to get some more donated pumpkins.

Kuma also got a pumpkin, or two, along with a few tangerines as a treat. Later, Uli even made an apperance after a few weeks of hibernating.

I went to check on the bear cubs. Taquka is finally beginning to act himself. He is still a little sore, obviously, but he is coming around.

As often as I am chasing away these pesky birds; I stopped to get a few shots of one particular Magpie.

We have filming with Jack on this Wednesday. We are loading him up in the trailer for practice. We also want Jack to be used to the trailer. We loaded him up today and drove around the center. He did very well. I was able to visit him 2 times today with donated bananas and bread.

Tomorrow is my day off! I think I will be heading into Girdwood for a nice cup of coffee and a book to read. We may even try to walk a nice trail. I hope to get some good outdoor shots tomorrow. Guess what....ski season starts in about 2 weeks! I guess it is time to get the Go Pro camera out!

Goodnight lower 48 and Hawaii,

ErIn

What a Day!

2011-11-13T23:13:00.000-08:00

First things first, I must correct my spelling error. I spelled icecicles wrong. You must forgive a texan that never has had to spell this word before. The correct way is icicles...there I feel so much better for fixing that mistake.

We have had some snow these past few days!

Yesterday we had 6 inches of this fluffy white stuff called snow.

I wanted to get some good photos with the snowflakes. I first ran into Doug Lindstrand who was able to get some photos with me and snickers, our porcupine. I also wanted to get a photo of Doug in action so that the blog readers could see who is taking these amazing photos that I occasionally post.

The elk were just behind snickers. I walked onto our observation deck and was able to get some good upclose photos of the elk.

I have to go in with Jack, our 3 year old Bull moose, in order to get him used to me. We are using him for filming on Wednesday. He needs to be comfortable with going into the trailer. I have been going in a couple of times a day and giving him his favorite food...BANANAS!

The big bears were also awake for a short time. Mike, the executive director, went in on his four wheeler and dropped off some hay. They love to use this for their den. Patron was pulling the hay into her den when I pulled up.

Last night we had an owling event at the center. Kids came to the center to learn about the different owls in Alaska. Then they went around the center playing owl sounds to try and hear if any owls replied back. We did happen to hear 2 owls possibly 3. 2 of the 3 owls were Hooty and Snappy; the owls that live at the center. Then we went back to the barn for Hot Chocolate. Earlier in the day, Jonathan placed a fake owl in the tree just as an example for what the owls would look like in the trees.

Today, Sunday, we had a busy day! We actually got to help assist in the spaying and neutering of our Kodiac bear cubs;Taquka and Shaguyik! I didn't want to post pictures just yet. I think I may be able to get some really good photos from friends. Until then I will leave my readers with this last photo. This was the sunset at around 4:45ish. It is starting to actually feel like winter with the shorter days. At 6 PM tonight it was completely dark! Riding around on the four wheelers and feeding bison felt like it was midnight! I also start to feel sleepier sooner. I guess I am getting ready for hibernation as well.

Goodnight Lower 48...and Hawaii, ErIn

P.S. Thanks to Mrs. Sharon for the awesome Poem about icicles...I loved it!

icecicles

2011-11-10T15:43:00.000-08:00

I have been keeping an eye on one side of our giftstore. I have noticed in one spot in particular the icecicles seem to be curling. This may be nothing impressive for a typical alaskan, however, for someone that never sees icecicles it seems extraordinary! I think I may have to start an entire photo album of the different icecicles I see this winter

This is the spot where the icecicles are so long tht they have begun to curl!

Today was a very windy day at the center. If any animals didn't have snow on their face I would have been shocked. When I went to feed the calves their morning grain I noticed that Gilly was just covered in snow....typical Gilly. We will also start halter training the calves in the next few days. This will be helpful if we ever need to use them for filming, or simply to load into a trailer. I am looking forward to learning how to train a moose.....can't be much different than a camel I once trained right?

The bison love this weather. I think they get the most excited on days like this. Today I watched the young bulls just run around and fight each other. They are always very energetic when we have wind and snow. This male in this picture was just enjoying a nap.

The musk ox where grazing on their daily hay. Mukluk, the orphaned musk ox, was sitting right next to the heard also enjoying the sun peaking out of the clouds.

Here is an older female that was laying nearby also enjoying the weather.

As I drove around the center I was able to catch a young bison nursing from its mother. It is hard to believe that this calf is only from this summer's batch!

A few days ago Doug Lindstrand took this picture just after Jonathan and I had fed the Wood Bison. What you don't know about this picture was that 10 minutes before I got the four wheeler stuck in the snow! I guess the snow machines will be coming out soon.

Goodnight Lower 48...and Hawaii
ErIn

Pumpkins Galore!

2011-11-06T15:51:00.000-08:00

Wow, sorry for the long absence. Our internet has been completely out! Once we got our first snow it was kaput! Let me fill you in on what has been going on in Portage,Alaska.

After Halloween we call around to see what pumpkins we can get donated from all the grocery stores in Anchorage. Matt, one of the maintenance guys, went to Anchorage 2 days in a row and brought back 8 pallets full of pumpkins!

This picture is only half of the pumpkins we received.

I was told that the moose really enjoy the pumpkins the most. I headed over to drop a few off to Jack and Chimo.

As soon as I placed 2 pumpkins on the ground Jack immediately started heading in my direction.

getting closer.....

ahhhhhh! the pumpkin is getting eaten! I don't think the pumpkin was very happy!

The next few days you could say we have had a bit of snow....This picture was taken as we were leaving Girdwood to pick up some mail.

A couple of days ago we had just fed the bears and I noticed an Eagle happened to get a scrap of moose. The eagle flew to the trees only to get pestered by 3 or 4 ravens.

The Eagle was getting chatty with the ravens....

Finally, after the food was gone, he just waited around to see if there were any more scraps.

2 days ago we had crazy snow! Well, crazy for a girl from Texas but normal for an Alaskan. This was the drive back from Anchorage for a town run.

We also stopped at Girdwood to check the mail...Oh did I mention I went to Anchorgae to get my Alaskan license!

Ok almost up to date...
Yesterday, Saturday, was our annual pumpkin feeding to the bears. Before the pumpkin feeding I fed snickers. He must have been very hungry, because he shoved his face right into the bowl.

Right after we fed snickers, we hurried over to the big bears to watch the pumpkin drop off.
Mike, our executive director was just pulling up in his tractor full of pumpkins.

He talked a bit to introduce the bears and make sure all the visitors had arrived.

ok time to toss the pumpkins....

Joe Boxer was the first bear to really get into the pumpkins. He had pumpkin all over his face!

Then he went all in! By the end of the hour both Joe Boxer and Hugo were covered in pumpkin. Hugo was rolling in it. Patron wasn't very interested in the pumpkins. I believe that she will start hibernating any day now. This may be the reason she isn't eating very much anymore.

Notice anything unusual.....

The bears weren't the only animals that got treats on Saturday. We had a friend donate $10 dollars that she wanted to see spent on treats for snickers and Jewelie. I made sure to at least get some avocados for snickers. I think he may actually love them more than corn or peanuts. We brought snickers into our gift store and let him run around a bit. Don't worry he didn't leave his smell on anything.

Goodnight Lower 48, ErIn

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T22:57:00.000-07:00

Halloween has arrived!!! These past few days leading up to the 30th we were getting ready for our Halloween event here at the center. For 3 days we have been setting up haybales, streamers, games, and plenty of spider webb for decorations. This pumpkin on the right was part of a game as well. I worked the porcupine station. Snickers, our porcupine was in the old fox cage. We had pin the quill on the porcupine, and a guessing game to guess how many quills were in a jar....there were 225. We also had a bean bag toss, scat trail, Guess the animal, and a special guest from Bird TLC did a Great Horned Owl presentation. All of the employees were excited to dress up.

My roomate Meredith dressed as a polar bear. Guess what I was.....

a porcupine! Don't worry, I didn't smell like snickers.

Jeremy was our hotdog griller....so his costume was perfect.

Jonathan, the other intern that works with me, was Scat Man. He worked the scat trail. We made a fake trail lined with 8 different types of Scat. The kids would walk along the trail and learn how to identfy what animals had been in the area.

At the end of the night the group that worked the event possed for a group picture.

From left to right: Scat Man, Aaron who wore a german outfit, hotdog guy, a bumblebee, Mike our executive director wore a pink cowgirl hat, Kelly was a witch, and meredith and I are on the bottom row.

Today I woke up and looked out my window to see 3 imches of snow!!!! Winter is here!

I spotted a young bald eagle in a tree. The snow brought lots of eagles and ravens today looking for food.

On my way to work I hopped out of the car to watch the cubs play in the snow. Shaggy had snow all over her face.

Taquka had dug out a hole and was laying in it. He finally looked up when I called his name.

The Roosevelt elk was laying next to Jack the moose. I tried to get a pic with both of them in the picture. Jack moved before I could get the both of them.

I had meredith take a quick picture to show how much snow we had today. By the end of the day we had 6 inches and still counting!

At the end of the day I went to give the calves some donated bananas.

After I finished I made a drive around the center to check on the big bears. Unfortunately they were not posing very well. I did take a few more snap shots to show how white it really.

I can't wait to wake up and look out my window tomorrow morning! We are going sledding and building a snow man. I will do two things tomorrow that I have never done before!

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

I'm Baaaaaaack!

2011-10-28T00:20:00.000-07:00

I am Back from Minnesota! So much has happened since I have been gone! First thing is first, I had a wonderful time visiting my boyfriend, Scott, in Minnesota. We went to an Atmosphere concert, I met his friends from his fraternity, and he showed me around his home town in Shakopee,MN. It was also homecoming weekend while I was there. I got to meet up with an old college friend who is going to med school now. The trip went by way too fast. I feel like I never even left the wildlife center! I am very excited for the next trip to MN. Maybe Mall of America next?

The cubs were very playful on the day I headed out to MN. they are starting to slowly get ready for hibernation. I notice that they are laying around more and more every day. The black bears are even more lazier than the cubs. Uli, the 7 year old female, has already started napping longer and longer. She will go days before I see her make an appearance.

Today I headed into town to pick up some last minute party supplies for Halloween. This is the reason I haven't blogged since I got back from MN. There is lots of stuff to get together. On the 30th we are having a free party for kids at the center. I will be doing a porcupine presentation, there will be a bean bag toss (done by my awesome roomate Meredith), live Owl presentation, hot dogs, and other fun games. On the drive back from Anchorage I whipped out my camera to take a few snap shots...don't worry I wasn't driving.

I always love taking pictures of the skies. Something about the clouds that I just love....

While we were in town we ran across a mother Moose and her calf. They almost seem the same size in the picture. I believe the mother is on the left and the calf is on the right. They literally ran right through a school parking lot!

This is how close they were to our car...

How would you like to look out your classroom window and see a moose in the front?

Or taking a lovely stroll and come across a mama moose! Do De Do De Do just enjoying this nice lovely weather on a nice stroll......Oh my goodness there is a moose! I imagine that's what this lady thought below....

The weather lately has attracted lots of bald eagles at the center. Yesterday I saw 3 just perched in trees in the black bear enclosure alone! We could be getting snow any day now. I can't wait!

This picture below is a juvenile Bald Eagle. They get their white feathers at 5 years old roughly.

I am hoping the weather is nice tomorrow so that I can get the party stuff together much easier. Plus, it is always a good reason to take a break and drive around getting pictures to show my blog readers. ;)

Goodnight Lower 48!

Erin

Thanks to Mrs. Rhonda and Mrs. Sharon for reading my blog!

Vacation on Vacation

2011-10-18T00:39:00.000-07:00

Well the time is almost here! I leave tomorrow for a week in Minnesota! I have to say that it will be a nice vacation. But wait a minute.....I already am on vacation! Some people might say that it's nice to get away from work...in a way I guess it is nice to travel and see someone very special to me (wink). I will miss the animals while I am away, and snow could be here any minute!

I apologize for the long absence in blogging. Until today the weather has been sort of crummy. I really didn't want to take my new camera out in the rain. Today, I am working in the ticket booth; and of course the sun is out and the rain is way. I guess it could be much worse.....

The past few days I have been chucking tangerines like crazy to all the animals. We have received 2 pallets of tangerines and clementines from COSTCO. So in order for the fruit not to go bad too fast we are throwing them to the animals every day until they are all gone.

The lynx are doing well. They have reached the point when I walk by they recognize me. Obviously it has nothing to do with the fact that I am only 1 of 2 people that gives them cat food, raw chicken, or moose on a daily basis.....

Taquka and shaggy are huge! They must weight 250 pounds now!

This is the younger of the 2 bull musk ox. I was throwing their daily tangerines. The musk ox probably enjoy the tangerines more than any other animal at the center.

Yesterday, Sunday, we had a donation of bananas brought to us. Of course I headed straight to the bull moose first. Jack and Chimo instantly recognized the bananas from the fence. Bananas are just about the only thing that can make these 2 lazy moose get up.

On saturday and sunday I fed the big bears. Now that the bears are getting ready to hibernate they are getting about half the amount they typically get. Patron may even go into hibernation in just about 2 weeks. Joe Boxer, in this picture, has a filet of salmon from sunday night's dinner. Hugo and Joe Boxer will probably stay awake until the end of november.

Well I better go pack for Minnesota!

Goodnight Lower 48

and Happy Late Birthday to Mrs. Rene!

Yet again....we have another sunny day!

2011-10-12T00:22:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I had another day outside in the sun. I spent some extra time hanging out with Snickers.

He was trying to get me to give him some carrots. After he was out of the carrots he also had turnips, grain, and the last of our home grown broccoli from our garden.

Later, I received an email from Doug Lindstrand with this photo:

It was a bull moose in downtown Achorage. It is hard to imagine our moose calves, Gilly and Nelson, getting this big! By next year they will have gained about 600 pounds their first year of life!

We recently received 2 pallets full of tangerines and oranges. The moose calves didn't know what to think when I gave them some. We also like to make sure the adult moose also get anything with extra vitamin C.

Today was a different kind of work day. Instead of working outside, I actually had to run to town for a few errands. I also picked up a tripod for my new camera and tested it out on the way home. As I got to the center I went to one of my favorite spots at the center. At the end of our property we have what we call "The Point".

Next blog I will post a few more panoramics.

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

sunny day off

2011-10-10T00:06:00.000-07:00

Today was my day off. I finally had a day off where it was sunny outside. I decided to walk around the center and test out my camera again. The first pictures I took were of Kuma our 7 year old black bear. He was sun bathing above his den.

Next up our Wood Bison were grazing on a new Bale of Hay.

This young bull seemed to be enjoying his fresh hay.

The bear cubs were running around in the sunlight. It seems that all the animals were also taking advantage of one of the last sunny days of the year. In this picture Shaggy seems to be as big as Hugo; our 11 year old grizzly.

Taquka finally followed Shaggy over to the fence.

Once Shaggy realized I didn't have any food she simply layed down.

Taquka did the opposite......he went to splash around in the water.

I went in with the lynx when I noticed that they were actually moving around in their enclosure. When I went in Kaltag immediately was interested in what I was doing. You can really see the notch on Kaltag's right ear. This is how they are able to identify between the two sisters.

We just received a fresh crate of tangerines from Costco a few days ago. The musk ox were enjoying a recent delivery of the tangerines.

This is one of the 2 bulls that we have at the center. This is the younger of the two. We call him "Fluffy".

Next on my walk around the center, I went to visit the 3 brown bears. Hugo had some left over moose from a few days ago.

Joe Boxer was also munching on some left over moose. He stayed and played with it in the water for the next 20 minutes. I was able to get a series of shots of him playing with the bones.

In this first picture he was hanging out by the bears' favorite spot in the whole lake.

Here he would drop the bone and swim under water to find it again.

Last, he was finally throwing the bone around and splashing around in the water.

P.S. Just learned how to use my Panoramic Maker...
We call this spot at the end of the property "The Point"

Trying out my New Camera

2011-10-08T23:16:00.000-07:00

Man! I had a great day! I keep thinking that each day is the last sunny day left before it starts raining for good. It was absolutely gorgeous today! I know I say that a lot, but today was definitely in my top 10 favorite weather days in Alaska so far.

Mukluk was even up close to the fence so I was able to say hello to her. Notice that her horns are coming in very nice. They have grown about 2 inches since we introduced her to the herd.

I went to feed snickers his grain, carrots, apple, and even turnips. After the apple slices are gone he goes for the turnips next. He was very interested in my camera today.

The female elk were running around today. There was one specifically that would chase the other females away. Then their boyfriend was following soon after...

I was in the moose calf enclosure when I got these pics. He wasn't very happy that I was hanging around his girlfriends. He kept charging the fence at me. Eventually, he would buggel when he heard the roosevelt elk from across the center.

Gilly was being very social today. They are completely weaned from their bottles now. Brush is also no longer being cut. They get about 20 cups of grain each a day. Once they are fully grown they will be going through a 40 lb. bag of grain every other day!

Hooty and Snappy had 4 mice each for dinner today. When we feed them the female almost always eats her mice first. She flys into the log house, while the male hops down on another perch and takes his time. He usually gulps the first one down, and then holds onto the second one a bit longer.

These next 2 pictures are my most favorite pictures from today. After I fed Adonis 6 hooligan I wanted to see what my camera could do. I was amazed at how detailed the images came out to be. Eventually I want to be able to capture Adonis with his beak opened.

One of my last duties of the day was to feed the big bears. Our coyote even made an appearance. This morning I gave him a few hotdogs as a snack. I am sure he will have some of the left over dog food from tonight once the bears decide to rest. He is 7 years old and looking very healthy for a coyote.

I don't think I ever explained where the original herd of Wood Bison came from. Our original herd of 13 originally came from Canada. Specifically, they came from Elk Island in Alberta. In order to pay respect for the original herd we have an american flag along with a Canadian flag by the herd of Wood Bison.

Since brush is no longer growing we are now giving our herd bales of hay. We are getting them delivered just about every other week. In order to keep the bales fresh we must tape up any holes that are in the plastic surrounding the hay. As I rounded the corner I noticed that we have some taping to do. Every single one of these hay bales must be checked for holes and taped up if any are found. So I guess this is another chore to add to my list. ;)

I noticed that I haven't placed any pictures of Jack or chimo lately on my blog. Jack is looking very good. He has completely shed all his velvet and is currently in with 5 male elk.

Although Chimo may not have as nice a rack as Jack; he is still a very healthy moose. He is 11 years old and has the typical body of an 11 year old moose. He has a bit of arthritis and also does not grow his antlers near as much as Jack. This is expected of a moose that is 11 years old. Once their bodies get to this age they no longer produce enough testosterone to even grow antlers.

I went back to Snickers to drop off some broccoli from our garden.

Last, but certaintly not least, I went to visit Jewelie and give her some water. I always like visiting Jewelie. She is the most friendly animal we have at the center. She is always welcoming any attention she can get.

She also loves to give kisses! Jewelie is 7 years old and is doing very well. I will miss all these wonderful animals when I go to minnesota in 10 days!!!!!

Goodnight Lower 48,

ErIn

Last Day of Brush

2011-10-05T22:07:00.000-07:00

Fall is Here! The leaves are falling left and right, the bright orange colors are out, and snow is just around the corner. The chickens are growing very fast. It was just yesterday when we got the little chickens. This is one of the older chickens, but the new chicks are almost just as big.

Taquka and Shaggy were waiting for me to feed them. We don't go in with them anymore since they are getting so big.

They probably weigh about 250 pounds now!

In the meantime, all 7 of the bears are getting ready for hibernation. The bears in the wild are usually gorging themselves right about now on berries and anything they can eat. They are putting on a lot of weight for the winter that lays ahead.

Jonathan and I decided that today was officially the last day of cutting brush. This is what the fireweed looks like now.

I think these might be bunch berries, but I am not sure. They are located across the property.

This is the property that we cut brush off of. It is railroad property so we have permission to cut brush. We had a difficult time finding enough brush for the moose calves, musk ox, and reindeer.

In the end we ended up just giving the moose calves one last huge pile until next year. Tomorrow is also their last bottle feeding.

We wanted to get some last minute photos of the bottle feeding and giving them brush. Gilly is on the left and Nelson is on the right.

To finish up the day I cleaned out the fridge. And headed on home before the bad weather started to set in. Tomorrow should be an interesting day...we are having a gift store employee work as an intern tomorrow. It should also be bad weather all day long.

I will let you know how tomorrow goes.....

Goodnight Lower 48,

ErIn

New Camera and 2 weeks to go!

2011-10-04T23:49:00.000-07:00

I decided that since I am staying in Alaska a bit longer than I expected that I needed a nicer camera to capture my time up here. I had to run a few errands today after work. After a quick trip to Best Buy and a beautiful drive home I was able to put my new toy to the test.

I didn't drive back so I took a few snap shots on the drive back to the center.

The sky was blue, the mountains had snow on the tops, and the sun was out.

This is probably one of the last sunny days of the year. We could even be getting snow tomorrow night!

The mountains have snow on the top 1/3 of the mountain.

As soon as I got back to the center I knew exactly who I wanted to get pictures of....

Nelson and Gilly! They still needed to get their daily brush. When I went to cut the willow and alder; I realized there is only a few days left of cutting brush. Everything is starting to die. The calves also have only a few days left of bottles. They now get about 44 oz. bottles. Every day we add water to the bottles and take away formula so that they can be slowly weaned.

After feeding the calves I wanted to go to my favorite spot at the center, black bear mountain.

Eventually, I hope to get a panoramic view of this spot.

I still had to feed the birds. Hooty and Snappy were getting 8 mice today. Hooty, the female, almost always eats first.

Snappy, the male, prefers to eat the mice from the lower branches.

Tomorrow I will have another day of work outside, and that means another day of getting lots of pictures!

Also, 2 weeks till I go to Minnesota!!!!!!

Goodnight lower 48,
ErIn

8 months already!

2011-10-02T14:20:00.000-07:00

All righty fellow readers. Sorry I have been slacking lately...however I would like to blame my absence on these 2 hooligans....

This is Scout

and this is Ginger....

I have been house sitting for the past few days. when I get home from work they keep me busy. It has been almost a vacation being able to have a vehicle, quite place to sleep, and just lounge around the town's coffee shop on my time off.

Here is what has been going on around work...

The past 3 days we have had high tides...in fact one of the tides was the highest in decades!

These next few photos are from the morning of the 28th...it was a 33ft. tide that came in....

This first picture is the bison enclosure completely filled with the tide water. The bison had already been moved to a different enclosure.

The elk and moose enclosure also gets a lot of the tide. There is high ground in all the enclosures for the animals. Even with the tide in it the animals are still ok to get around. The tide only lasts in the center grounds for an hour or so.

Jack and Chimo just hanging out till the tide leaves....

This next pics are from the morning of the 30th. It was only a 32 ft. tide....

Mike, our executive director, moves the bison every morning and evening during the high tides....

what the pictures don't show is the mess that Jonathan and I have to scoop up the next morning...

NOTE: If one ever needs to shovel bison patties a nice coating of WD40 on the shovel, or any other tool to scoop with, makes the patties slide right off.

Well, I thought I would post this blog before I headed in for a few hours of work at the center. Of course, it is a very rainy and windy day. I think I will be doing some indoor projects once the animals are all fed.

All of the photos that were used in this blog were courtesy of Doug Lindstrand.

Goodnight Lower 48,

ErIn

Last gorgeous day

2011-09-29T00:23:00.000-07:00

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

2011-09-26T23:50:00.000-07:00

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....

2011-09-24T01:32:00.000-07:00

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!

2011-09-19T14:03:00.000-07:00

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!

2011-09-16T23:38:00.000-07:00

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

2011-09-12T00:57:00.000-07:00

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!

2011-09-09T15:29:00.000-07:00

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!

2011-09-05T23:23:00.000-07:00

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

2011-09-04T23:34:00.000-07:00

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

Comin up on 7 months already!

2011-08-29T00:13:00.000-07:00

Here is what you have missed this past week....

Joe Boxer was enjoying the nice sunny weather we were having a few days ago....and no he was not rolling around when I took this picture...this is how he was sleeping :)

Oh...and did I mention we got a fox kit in a few weeks ago....we haven't named him yet so.... any suggestions?

The sunny weather didn't last but a day. For the next 3 days we had rain, rain, and more rain! I guess I can't complain since Texas needs rain so badly.

Still waiting for those suggestions....

more rain...but Alaska is still just as beautiful.

Scott and Joe Boxer where wondering what the other was doing...

Gilly and Nelson are finally eating their grain and we are starting to wean them off of their bottles.

Sarah AKA-Howie left 2 days ago ;( Now we are only doen to 3 interns! The summer is coming to a close so fast!

Goodnight Lower 48,

ErIn

Dinner and Bear talk

2011-08-20T21:07:00.000-07:00

Yesterday it was a cold rainy day. The month of August and begining of September are both cold and wet months up here in AK. I can not complain since I am hearing how hot it is in Texas from friends and family. I decided to use my day off yesterday by cooking dinner and making dessert for my roomates. I went to Girdwood to get the ingredients for Taco soup, corn bread, and oreo balls.
Here is how they turned out....

The corn bread...

The oreo balls...

and the taco soup went so fast I didn't get a picture. :)

Today we had to set up the barn for a birthday party. We were taking the kids on hayride as well.

After the hayride I did a porcupine presentation. Snickers did very well...as usual.

I had to run out to the bears at 1:00pm for my 2 hour shift. I was able to get a clip of Hugo, our 11 year old grizzly, trying to get me to feed her some hotdog.

Later, we had a senator from Alaska stop by. We were throwing brush to all the animals and even Mukluk was able to sneak between the fence and grab some willow to munch on.

Horseback Riding

2011-08-19T12:27:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday the interns got together for one of our last trips together. We all loaded up the car to go horseback riding before the porcupine presentation.

My horse was named Thundercloud. She is 17 years old.

The guide took us up a less used trail since we could handle the trail.....or so he thought. When we got to the top of the mountain this was the view.

As we started to get to the bottom we were able to take a group picture. I think it looks really cool with the background.

At the end of the ride Thundercloud received a lot of grain as a treat.

When we were coming home Sarah was really tired and was the first one to fall asleep...AKA the victim.

Shedding velvet

2011-08-16T20:19:00.000-07:00

Today was a beautiful day! Honestly, I think today may have been one of the top 5 days of the summer. The sun was out, the sky was a pretty blue, and the animals are getting ready for rut. The elk and caribou are both starting to shed their velvet.

Hershey, the caribou that we walk daily, has completely shed his velvet already. he shed it all in one day! The females were taken out of the enclosure to prevent the males for fighting over them, and possibly injuring themselves.

I told you it was a B-E-A-UTIFUL day! :)

After work me and sarah went in with Chimo. He is our 11 year old Alaskan Bull Moose. The Alaskan Bull moose is the largest member of the deer family. Anyways, so this is Chimo. He has a hoof growth deformity. This means that we have to annually trim his nails for him. If he were to be released into the wild he would eventually not be able to run from a predator or even walk around since they would grow so fast.

When we were feeding the calves at 6pm we wanted to goof around and take some funny pictures. The moose both turned around and well.....it was just a funny picture I think.

Have you ever heard of the laying down game? It is an international game where people try to get pictures laying down in odd places. I figured a moose would be really odd right?

Then I figured why not upgrade to a bull moose....

Goodnight Lower 48,
Erin

A few videos

2011-08-12T19:30:00.000-07:00

I started my Wednesday off with a nice walk around the 18 acre bear enclosure....such a beautiful day!

Patron was already waiting for her morning snack of hotdogs and reindeer dogs.

Hugo and Joe Boxer were hanging out as usual.

Thursday morning I also had the AM bear shift. I even had a few staff members from the sealife center in Seward visit for a behind the scenes tour. It was just as beautiful yesterday as it was on Wednesday. However, we did have wind all day long....which still beats the mosquitoes.

I posted a few videos in the past couple of days....This first one is the latest update of Gilly and Nelson
http://youtu.be/CQ1aE8nATSc

We had a really busy day full of running around with the sealife center employees. There were only 2 interns working yesterday, but we still managed to get all the animals fed and cleaned. Joe Boxer was following me around the bear enclosure as I was walking it at 5pm to check for any holes.

Today, Friday, I fed the moose calves at 8AM and they were ready for their bottles. They are now getting 32oz. 5 times a day! This is Nelson that is looking at the camera and Gilly is in the background.

Now Gilly came over to check out what we were up to.

This is Gilly. He still has his orange coat that the younger calves have. He will probably be all brown with in a week. He is shedding it like crazy!

We have been keeping an eye on patron's nose. About a week ago we noticed that she had a single porcupine quill in her nose. I know, how does a bear only get 1 quill? Well, it was definitely a quill. Eventually, it either fell out or has burrowed itself completely into her nose. Either way, we are keeping a close eye on it for any signs of an infection. She seems to be doing fine.

uys I only had to work one day. So as I headed home I stopped by to visit with one of the maintenance guys dog...mazzie.

As I end my blog for the night; I will leave you with a video to check out if you haven't already seen it.
This second one is the bear cub update
http://youtu.be/4JA4TbX763o

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

Pink Salmon for the bears

2011-08-09T22:18:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was my day off...so naturally...I worked. I was getting trained to work in the gift store. I fed the moose calves at 8am.

Doug Lindstrand, a photographer who takes pictures for the center, brought 3 freshly caught Pink Salmon. He is at the center almost every day getting amazing pictures at the center. If you see photos on my blog they are almost always from Doug.

Doug is also a very good artist!

Shaggy dug right into the fish. The brown bears seem to like silver salmon way more than pink salmon. Also, they would rather eat the brains, eyes, and scales, rather than the actual meat that we love.

I was feeding the cubs before I headed into the gift store for training...don't worry I was very careful not to get stinky salmon on my clothes.

Taquka really liked to play more with his fish rather than actually eat it....He would sling the fish around.

When shaggy got her second fish she gobbled up the whole fish right away.

Taquka playing with his fish.....

Today, Tuesday, I also had a day off which I traded in for a day in anchorage and the gift store. I first went into town to work a booth at the Anchorage education headquarters. We basically talked about programs that we had to teach ages from K-12th grade.

After the seminar was over we packed up and headed back to the center. I changed into my gift store clothes and went straight to work. I worked a total of about 12 hours today and am calling it a day...whew!

Goodnight lower 48,

ErIn

Musk Ox Farm

2011-08-07T20:49:00.000-07:00

In my last blog I mentioned that I will be staying until December....I meant to say that I am staying till December then going home for a wedding/christmas, and returning in January for work. So I still have a full time job out at the center and am so excited to stay a full winter in Alaska!

So here is what has happened in the past few days....

On Friday me and four other workers went to the Musk Ox farm in Palmer. We had a behind the scenes tour and learned how the musk ox were used for their Qiviut (pronounced kiv-ee-at).

This musk ox is "Safety" she is a 3 year old female.

This is the vehicle they use to herd the musk ox. The dents are from the bulls hitting the truck during rut. Rut is the time of year when all the male animals will be fitting for dominance over the females. The time will be here in a few weeks.

We then went to a book store. If there is one type of place that I miss having around it is a good ole used book store that I can spend all day in finding new reads. After I purchased a couple of novels, one being "The Help", we headed to lunch. When I woke up that morning I discovered a 20 dollar bill in my pocket! Don't you just love it when that happens....
So what did I get for lunch? Some good ole Mexican food. Oh it was so delicious!
We headed into Anchorage to run a few errands. I wanted to look at cameras. Since I will be living in Alaska now I will be needing a better camera. We had been in the mall for an hour or so when we got a phone call. There had been a terrible wreck on the Seward Highway. 3 cars were involved with 1 fatality, 2 critically injured and 14 total injuries. Please pray for the people involved in the wreck. Because of the wreck, the seward highway was closed until 7pm. So we were stuck in Anchorage. We decided to eat dinner and just hang around to kill time. So when 4:00 rolled around we got another call that the highway was closed till 10pm! So we went to see Cowboys vs. Aliens. Finally it was time to head home.

Saturday was a very busy work day! The moose calves were hungry....as usual. The bears were out and about.

Last night we had our end of the year work party. It is really sad to see people leaving already.

Today I had a friend visit from Russia! She brought her family and I gave them a behind the scenes tour.

Inga was one of roomates in the dorm my freshmen year of college.

There was also a lady visiting that brought along a few pets with her....

This is a Taiwanese Beauty Snake named "Mercury". Sarah conqured her fear of snakes last year.

This is "Tiamat" who is a Argentine Tegu. Tegus are known as "beaded" lizards because of the way their skin feels. That's all I really know about these types of animals.

Vanessa is posing with her new friend who is An Alaskan Husky.

Well I will try to keep up better on the blogs!

Goodnight Lower 48,

ErIn

6 months, a birthday, and some camping

2011-08-03T20:12:00.000-07:00

here is a little clip of Taquka in training.....

Let me catch my readers up....

Let's start at 3 days ago....

A nice normal day at the center......started off with feeding the moose calves.

Next, we decided to walk the reindeer....yes, that's what I said....the reindeer. Hershey, the reindeer, needs to be walked 2 times a day. I finally was able to walk him myself! I never have walked him until this day. He did very well, and just in case he gets antsy we have treats for him. He likes bread, apples, and carrots.

Later, I had to go pull a few hours over at the bears.

Patron was passed out in front of the cabin....They were fed a road kill moose carcass a few days ago and she is still sleeping off the big meal...

I ended with another behind the scenes tour for a couple of people. I had to go home and get packing for Homer,AK!

We headed out to homer on Monday night after work. It is about 3.5 hours away from Portage. Homer is the capital for Halibut fishing. It is also the town where one of the boats from deadliest catch, the Time Bandit, docks out of.

Driving out to our campsite we knew it was going to be a rainy next few days....but that didn't bother me at all. We camped out on the spit. Which is basically a piece of land that is just narrow enough for a few shops and a beach to camp along.

When we got there we parked the car at our campsite and went to dinner at the Salty Dog. The Salty Dog is a famous restaurant/Bar that is a historical landmark. It used to be a lighthouse. It's tradition to leave a dollar bill on the wall somewhere....I forgot to do that ;(

After the salty Dog we camped out for the rest of the night.

There was a pair of Bald eagles along the beach that we spotted when we were walking.

The next day was a very nice and relaxing day. We had absolutely no plans and that was fine by me. When we woke up we had an enormous breakfast that was delicious. I had a king crab omelet....yummy! For the rest of the day we walked around Homer on the Spit and just enjoyed taking in the scenery. For dinner we had really good oven baked pizza before calling it a night and heading back to the campsite to listen to music.

There is also a memorial to all the lives lost at sea.

Wednesday we headed back to Portage and now I am finally able to check my facebook and make all the phone calls that I needed to make. I had an awesome birthday just hanging out with friends in Homer and camping. It has been 6 months as of August 1rst that I have been here! It has gone by so fast! I am now staying until Decmber 15th! A 3 month internship has turned into 10 months and getting a full time job helping out until december. I can not wait to see what else comes next....Next adventure...Tomorrow we are going to the Musk Ox farm in Palmer,AK.....stay tuned....

Behind the Scenes Tour at the Sealife Center

2011-07-30T00:58:00.000-07:00

Today was a day off for me. As an intern trip they were sending us to the Sealife Center in Seward. Yesterday, 2 interns from the rehabilitation branch at the sealife center came to spend a day with us.
We first took a behind the scenes tour about the history of the sealife center. Next, we met up with the interns from yesterday to help them with a few chores. They also introduced us to the harbor seals that are currently in rehabilitation. This year's theme for names is wines and cheeses. The first seal that we met was named "Port".

Port was not feeling very well today. They had him separated from the normal group, and put in quarantine. We had to take his temperature, feed him, and try to get his temperature up by adding water to his tank. By the end of the day his temperature had risen to almost a normal temperature. They will be watching him closely for a while.

We went outside and met the other seals. They called this big pool the graduation pool. Once, the seals are big enough and they are eating fish on their own; they are moved to the graduation pool.

I think this seal is Brie. There were 3 seals in the graduation pool so it made it hard to tell them apart. The other names for all the seals in rehabilitation are: Parmesean, Gouda, Merlot, Pepper Jack, and Bleu.

After we met the seals we needed to take their measurements. One of us would hold the seal while the other measured their nose to flipper, around their upper torso, mid torso, and back torso. We did this for 4 seals. We also had to wear gloves and overalls. This was for the quarantine part. They are so young and vulnerable to illness; they take special precautions when handling. Also, because the seals need to be released they must not have ANY human contact. These measurements are the ONLY time a seal is handled. Even when feeding they try not to let the seals associate feeding with humans.

We helped with the cleaning of the condos. They call them condos since each has their own pool and resting area in front.

It was lunch time!

We were each handed a container with fish for a specified seal. We would throw the fish in each enclosure and make sure they were all eaten. Don't worry.....it wasn't lunch time for me..... yet.

Sarah and Scott are 2 other interns at the AWCC that went to the sealife center with me.

I also got to help weigh a duck! They have 2 ducklings in rehabilitation right now. Both were brought in from 2 seperate people that found them and couldn't raise them.

On the way home I wanted to stop and take some pictures in the Fireweed. Every time I would pass by the fireweed it reminded me of back home in the Texas bluebonnets. This fireweed is only going to last a few more weeks. Once the fireweed starts dying it means winter is only 6 weeks away!

It was about 9 pm when we finally made it home. I suppose I should get some sleep now. I have a long day at work tomorrow and have a list of things to do.

Goodnight lower 48,

ErIn

2011-07-28T14:30:00.000-07:00

Yesterday morning I was walking the bear enclosure for the 9AM shift. It was a cloudy morning. I love the way the mountains look with the clouds covering them.

These Mountains looked beautiful with the Wood bison in front of them.

The bears were already awake for me! I didn't have to do any hoot and hollering to get them up. Joe Boxer is on the left and his sister, patron, is on the right. We got a new pallet of fruit donated a few days ago so I giving them strawberries. They also had peaches, and grapefruits.

Again, I just couldn't get enough of the mountains!

Patron was picking at some left over watermelon from the previous day.

Since I was going to Cooper landing for a presentation later that night; I only had to work half a day. As I was laying in bed, and being lazy, a friend came and dragged me out of bed to go walk to Byron Glacier. It is just a quick .8 mile walk.

http://www.ktuu.com/videobeta/c6767319-1a53-4001-b26a-0756d9f4c1f5/News/Day-Trippin-The-Alaska-Wildlife-Conservation-Center-

This link should send you to the news video clip that was filmed when they came to visit us.....

2011-07-27T01:59:00.000-07:00

Today, I started my day again with the best 2 moose calves ever! Gilly and Nelson probably weigh around 60 pounds or so now! I cannot wait to see how big they are by september.

Next, I cut up some hamburger meat and headed over to wake up the big bears. I was stationed at the bears for 3 hours, then I headed in for a quick lunch break.

I recieved a few more pictures from Doug Lindstrand of me training the cubs...

Shaggy is my favorite animal at the center....but don't tell any of the other animals.....

Taquka was doing his "up" command very well as usual.

We also cleaned the moose calve enclosure, and then replaced their straw. Since it has been raining the past couple of days their bedding gets gross really fast. Later, I ran down to the ticket booth to cover for someone's lunch break. I definitely like working outdoors much better....even in the rain.

Around 3:30pm we had a Behind the Scenes Tour. These tours are a new addition to the center. Each person pays $100 a piece. With this, they are able to meet our porcupine up close, feed the moose calves, and also see behind the scenes. The behind the scenes includes seeing our kitchen where we prepare everything, our Sitka Black tailed deer (which is off exhibit), and even walk behind our bear enclosure. And, of course, they get a guided walking tour from their very own intern. Today, I was giving a tour. The tours last anywhere from 1.5-2hours. That was basically the last 2 hours of my work day. Boy, does time really fly when your having fun...I mean working.

Around 9pm or so, when everyone was off of work and back at the center, we loaded up the yukon and went into Girdwood to play a friendly game of ultimate frisbee. My new favorite sport! Well I am exhausted.....

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

Dinner for the Bears

2011-07-25T17:36:00.000-07:00

The past 2 days have been filled with bear training, going to a concert, and rain, rain, and more rain. The rain part was very much needed. This was probably one of the first actual full days of rain. The ground was getting really dusty with all the wind we have. So this rain was a huge help. 2 days ago I started off my day by going across the street to pick some fresh fireweed for the moose calves. This picture on the left is what you would call your neighbor's yard. The dead trees that you see are from the 1964 earthquake. The ground sank 10 ft. in portage. That salt water came in and basically petrified the trees.

I also gave Snickers some fireweed and an Alder branch.

The moose calves got their daily willow. They buried their faces in the branches as soon as I put them in there.

Gilly is on the right and Nelson on the left.

At the end of the day we were asked to feed the big bears. I have been here almost 6 months and never even thought to ask if I could feed the bears! We loaded buckets up some donated Salmon that we got that day, and headed over to the enclosure. Just as we got there a tour bus happened to be unloading. The tourists really enjoyed watching the bears eat the salmon.

Joe Boxer was waiting very patiently for me to throw him some fish.

I had a huge chunk that I had a hard time getting apart.

There was also a really big salmon head that I knew they would love.

Yep......they loved it.

We also had a load full of Crabapple branches that were donated at the end. We loaded up the truck and distributed the branches out. First stop, the musk ox!

Doug Lindstrand, the photographer for our center, sent me some photos that he took around the center.

He also wanted to get some photos of me training the bear cubs. Shaggy and Taquka were doing very well in training.

The three biggest elk are just hanging out. In a couple of weeks they will be in rut. Which means they will be fighting all the time for dominance over the females.

Taquka knows the command "up". This helps us check out their stomach if we see anything unusual.

number 100!

2011-07-22T20:19:00.000-07:00

This is number 100 for the blog!

So a lot has happened since my last blog. For instance, I went to Hollywood....no big deal though ;)
A friend of mine is a grandson of Joe Simon, the creator of Captain America. I was invited to tag along to the premier. We left Sunday night at 11:45pm and arrived to our hotel around 8am on monday morning. We were so exhausted that when we finally made it to the hotel room we crashed! Later, we met up with my friends family for a dinner. We capped the night off really early since we had to get our rest for the premier the next night!

Tuesday morning we went to Madame Toussads Wax Museum.

Charlie Chaplin and I posing....

Julia Roberts and I chatting it up.....

Alfred Hitchcock.....

So the night was finally here! We got ready and this is us actually walking down the red carpet! Or, I guess I should say the red, white, and blue carpet....

We saw a handfull of actors and actresses. Here is the list:
Vanessa Hudgens
Samuel L. Jackson
Robert Downy Jr.-AKA Iron Man
Hayley Atwell- in Captain America
Neal McDonough
Dwight Howard-Orlando Magic
Oscar Nunez (plays Oscar from the television show "The Office")
Chris Evans-AKA Captain America
Chris Hemsworth-AKA Thor
Francia Reisa-Secret Life of the American Teenager
Zoe Saldana-she was in Avatar
Steven Broussard-Producer of Captain America
Derek Luke
Sebastian Stan-AKA "Bucky" in Captain America
Jamie Alexander-My new favorite Actress!

After the amazing movie was over we headed over to In and Out burger.

In and Out burger was delicious! It was also really nice to get out of my high heels and throw on some converse.

I just couldn't leave Hollywood with out getting a few pictures of the hollywood stars walk of fame. I even stopped to get a picture with Mickey Mouse.

Captain America posters where everywhere!

We left on Wednesday afternoon. I was ready to get back to good ole Alaska. I missed the scenery and relaxed attitude of Alaska. On the drive home to the center there was such a beauitul sunset!

The next day back to work I was ready to go! We tried to walk Hershey. This is his brother York that was getting in the way. In the end, Hershey just didn't want to go on a walk.

Snickers was happy to get some orange slices for dinner...

Ok, well you know what time it is.....

Can't find My camera for the time being.....

2011-07-13T00:23:00.000-07:00

Well, last night I mostly didn't blog since I could not seem to find my camera. So, I thought that I would give it another night. I still could not find it today. Don't worry, I know it is somewhere in the house...it's just a matter of finding it. Although, it did give me a good excuse to clean my room.

Yesterday was a hectic day. Jordan was in Anchorage for business so I was training the bears for the day. I loved it! The bears are getting so big! Taquka weighs around 175lbs, while Shaggy is about 150lbs. Around 11 am was the first bear training demonstration. I also received a call that there would be a national geographic representative for brazil! So after the training for the public at 11 I also did an interview for the representative and camera man. It was so cool! I introduced them to the bears and did a private training session for them. They also asked me some questions in front of the camera to get some better shots for the background. Anyways, it was a lot of fun; but it was back to vacation...I mean work. So I went to the bear enclosure for an hour or so to do a little talking. I had to be at the moose calf enclosure for the 4 pm feeding. I was also meeting two gentlemen to get a picture of the moose calves. They had called ahead asking if they made a donation if they could get a picture of a moose calf wearing a hat. Ok sounds weird I know. However, these two guys travel around the world getting pictures with this same hat on a type of animal everywhere they go. They also have a website where you can see everywhere the hat has been. So they got their picture of Gilly wearing the hat. I soon finished the day around 8pm when I fed the calves again.

Today, tuesday, was another busy vacation day.... I mean sorry a work day. I started my day by feeding the 2 cutest moose calves in all of Alaska. Gilly and Nelson have doubled in size since we got them 6 weeks ago. I then moved on to work about 2 hours at the bear enclosure. Around 11 I headed across the street to get some fresh fireweed, horsetail , and willow for the calves and our Sitka black tailed deer. The calves were hungry and ready to go again for another bottle at noon. It was back to the bear enclosure again at 1pm until 3pm. The bears where out an about. Joe Boxer was even playing in the water. I did a trining session at 3 with the cubs and finally had to get myself to leave at 3:45 to prepare the bottles for the 4pm feeding.

Right after the feeding was over with a family of 4 came in for a private tour. The tour lasted about an hour and a half. I finished the day by feeding the black bears (I didn't go in), the eagle, and 2 owls. I did another feeding at 8pm and called it a day.

Tomorrow will be the longest day of vacation, I mean work, yet. I will be working from 8-6, and then we have the porcupine presentation in Cooper Landing at 8:15. I think I better get some sleep to get ready for the long day ahead of me...

Good night lower 48,
ErIn

Bison Pies

2011-07-09T23:59:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I had the AM bear shift. The bears were being very difficult to wake up. I had to yell their names, and throw food in for about an hour and a half before they finally made an apperance. Until then, our coyote was loving the hotdogs.

Joe Boxer and Hugo decided to hang out on the logs.

Here is a closer pic....

Joe Boxer came up to the fence to try and show off for a treat.

For a while all three bears were hanging out right in the front. Patron is in the back on the right. The day ended with out any bears or other animals escaping so I guess it was a good day. The weather in Portage could not be any better. In fact, we have had so much sunlight that we actually need a little rain to help with all the dust.

After working another AM shift at the bears; I was able to feed the moose calves at 4pm. I also gave them some fresh fireweed.

After the calves had their afternoon bottle they were down for a food coma. Gilly is on the right and Nelson on the left.

The first thing I did this morning was help another intern scoop bison pies off of the road path. We have been opening their pens at night so they can get the grass growing around the center. This also helps their enclosure to grow the grass back faster.

Harding Ice Field

2011-07-07T23:59:00.000-07:00

Last night we had another porcupine presentation in Cooper Landing. We decided that after the presentation, since we had thursday off, we would just stay and camp. So, we were dropped off by a hiking trail and we were picked up this morning at 9 am. Another employe also had his day off today so he picked us up and we headed to the Harding Ice field for a nice 8.2 mile round trip hike.

The Harding Icefield and its outflowing glaciers cover 700 square miles of Alaska’s Kenai Mountains in glacier ice. Created more than 23,000 years ago during the Pleistocene Epoch, the Harding Icefield was a small piece of the vast ice sheet that covered much of Southcentral Alaska. Indeed, at the time, ice blanketed one third of the Earth’s surface.
http://www.nps.gov/kefj/naturescience/the-harding-icefield.htm

As we started the hike the view was already going to be worth the work.

As we started the hike we were told that it would take about 6-8 hours. About every mile that we hike we are gaining 1000 feet in elevation.

We reached the top in about 2 and a half hours. I was exhausted. However, it was worth hiking almost 4000 feet up.

The ice field started to peak around the corner.

We soon saw miles and miles of icefield. Can you imagine what kind of fossils could be hidden under that ice? I wonder if there are any woolly mammoths ?

Parts of the last mile of trail or so was still covered in snow. By the end of the day my feet were soaked!

We made it back down the trail in a little over an hour or so. My feet were killing me by the end! We also did 2 more trails while we were there. We also did a short .5 mile hike to the bottom of the glacier. Total miles we hiked today was at least a solid 10 miles. So we rewarded ourselves with mexican food and icecream in seward when we stopped for gas.

We finally made it home around 8:30 and I took a hot shower and immediately climbed into bed to pass out. Until tomorrow....

Good night lower 48,

ErIn

Camping perhaps?

2011-07-05T21:39:00.000-07:00

I started my morning off with feeding the moose calves. Next, I went to feed the ducklings....or should I even call them ducklings? Their feathers are coming in, they are quacking, and they can't even slip through the fences anymore. I went to feed them and heard them coming before I even saw them.

Jordan had a day off so I was feeding the cubs today. I did a little bit of training with them, then I ended the sessions with fruit. I went in with them three times today. Along with the typical puppy chow; they also had mangos, pears, and cantalope. Here is Shaggy eating a mango.

Later, I went to pick some fresh horsetail and fireweed for the Sitka black tailed deer and moose calves.

Jewelie also had cantalope along with her grain and fresh brush.

It was such a beautiful day! The weather keeps getting better and better! We only have about 6 weeks left until winter starts to come around the corner.

Looks like a post card I know....

I went back in with cubs around 5pm and tossed a few cantalopes into their pool....Taquka was satisfied.

The day has ended and I may be camping just over in Portage.

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

5 months!

2011-07-05T02:21:00.000-07:00

It has officially been 5 months since I started my internship! Whew time really does fly when your having fun!

My family had a great time while they were visiting me. I was very sad to see them leave. My two brothers are growing up so much! One has grown a foot, it seems, since I last saw him. He even is learning how to drive! My other brother has recently just been engaged! My younger brother is getting married! But it was time to go back to work. Even though I had only missed 2 days in a row I felt like it had been a week!

I had the AM bear shift on Saturday. As I was walking the fence to check for any holes I was able to get a good view of the wood bison mothers and their calves. The calves have almost doubled in size since last month when they were born! The Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center is the ONLY place in the United States that has a Wood Bison herd. They are trying to reintroduce wood bison to the wild. They once roamed the wilds of Alaska before they went extinct.

It was a really overcast day. In fact some of the mountains that are usually in sight were hidden by clouds.

Patron was laying around all day long. She finally sat up when it started to get a little busy

Eventually my four hour shift was over and I finished the last half of a normal day of work.

On Sunday I was also at the AM bear shift. Our coyote has finally shed his winter coat. He looks like a totally different coyote.

We had a watermelon that was donated with other fruit by costco. We decided to give it to the bears. After Joe Boxer picked through it Patron decided she would get the left overs.

Later, we threw some lemons to our young bull bison.

Snickers got his favorite food....corn!

Monday was my day off and I went for a hike after luch at the lodge. I got the same thing I always get.....grilled cheese with sweet potato fries. We went to Alyeska in Girdwood to hike. It was the Winner Creek trail. We hiked an upper and lower trail. It was a total of about 7 miles of hiking.

There was also a hand tram that anyone could ride. They just get in a metal cage to hold themselves and pull the rope to get across.

There was also another small bridge that we crossed. It had a really nice water fall. There was also a really gorgeous blue pool to the side of the waterfall. If it wasn't so darn cold it would look very refreshing to jump into.

After everyone was off of work we headed back into Girdwood to play some basketball for a few hours.