Adventures with Scout

 On Sunday I had a great start to my work day at the wildlife center.  Doug Lindstrand stepped in while I feeding the lynx some of their daily meal.  While he was photographing Kaltag; I took a few snapshots of him in action.

 We threw a piece of beef in a good spot for photographing.  Kaltag was crouched just behind the spruce tree.















 Then Venetie started to get curious.  They both jumped up onto the logs and were slowly approaching me for food.  Of course I was placing it around the enclosure...I'm not gonna hold onto their food for very long!
Notice how large their paws are.  A 30 pound lynx has larger paws than a 200 pound mountain lion!

 photo courtesy of: Doug Lindstrand

Doug graciously sent me these next 2 photos of me feeding the lynx.  These were the first photos that I have of me with the lynx.  Not only am I very lucky to be able to work so closely with so many animals; but Doug can capture these memories that will last a lifetime!  I have only been in Alaska for a year; but I already know that this past year has become a huge part of my life. 

 After we fed the lynx, we headed over to the black bears which have woken up about a week and a half ago from hibernation.  Because of the record snowfall; it delayed our bears a bit longer than usual from waking up.  It also delayed the bears in the wilds as well.  However, the bears in the wild are now waking up.  Just 4 days ago, on my way to Anchorage, I saw a brown bear that seemed to be about 3 or 4 years old.  She was just hanging out on the side of the Seward Highway nibbling on a tree branch.

Speaking of brown bears; Doug also sent me this picture of Taquka while he was getting a bit of training and some snack.
If your ever interested in getting an autographed book of Doug Lindstrand's work; we do have them available in our Gift Store.  He just dropped off another stack of books.  I own one myself and love to show people where I work since some AWCC animals are in the book.  For my Lower 48 friends (and Hawaii); I'm sure I could send ya a copy if your ever interested. 

                                                      Photo courtesy of: Doug Lindstrand

Anyways, back to my day at work....
It was a very productive day.  There was a pile of Pussy Willow that was dropped off at the center a few weeks ago that has slowly been given out to the animals.  I loaded up the last load and drove around delivering it to some hungry animals.  If you live in the Anchorage area and do a bit of hedge trimming we love to take branches as donations for our animals.  Especially for our Moose and Musk Oxen.  Moose can eat about 70 pounds of vegetation a day!  Because of this; Moose do have a very strict diet that can sometimes be hard to maintain in captivity.  

 Of course I had to stop and throw some to my favorite 2 moose calves.  Don't worry, I didn't forget about Jack as well.  He just layed down in the back while the calves went a little crazy.  He has been getting along very well with Gilly and Nelson (the moose calves).  Or should I still be calling them moose calves?




Kat and I made a visit to Jewelie.  Remember, Kat's mom sent a $10 donation for treats for the animals.  We have been making that $10 last.  Jewelie had some of the watermelon that was bought added to her grain that day.  I think you can say she liked it. :)

 I have been house/dog sitting for the past few days now.  This is Scout.  I did house sit him last year and introduced him in a blog.  Here he is with Kat; he was taking a break from hanging out in the ticket booth with Meredith, another AWCC employee. 


Thanks again Meredith for letting him hang with you!










Then it was back to work.  Once Sunday was over, Scout and I headed into Girdwood for our daily walk and dinner!
 

I Started my 2 days off with an awesome morning walk to the Grind.  One of the few local coffee shops located in Girdwood, Alaska.  It is just across the street from the local mercantile and post office.  So I thought I would mail a few goodies to my family in Texas, and my brother and sister in law in Arkansas.   It is so nice staying in Girdwood.  Having that luxery of just waking up early and walking to get a cup of coffee and enjoying the scenery....I could live this life. 

On the way to the coffee shop here is the scenic view I get to see every morning...

 This is a creek that runs through town; notice that the ice is finally breaking up around here!

It's about time!

 In the same spot I took the creek picture I just turned 90 degrees and took this shot of the Ski mountain and the Alyeska Highway that runs through Girdwood. 

 Another 90 degree turn and the sun is rising over the mountain....

Just a few paces up the road; a local street sign....

 At the end of my walk I have reached....The Grind!

They are actually getting ready to open their own roastery?  Does that sound right?  Either way; they are about to make their own coffee grounds.  Boy, when I first arrived to Alaska the thought of drinking coffee with a tiny bit of soy milk would have never crossed my mind.  However, after a day of working outside or simply looking out a window to see snow....coffee warms ya right up!  I remember when I was drinking half coffee/half hot chocolate....oh was I so silly then....

 Later, Kat, picked me and Scout up to teach me a little bit of driving manually.  Sooooooooo....that lasted about 30 minutes until I was close to a mental break down.  Let's just say Kat still has a klutch, but I am not so good at starting the car.  I can get into 1rst and 2nd fairly good now.

We took a break from my short lived driving lesson to go check Virgin Creek out.

It is one of my favorite places to visit in Girdwood.  Only locals really know about it since it is located at the end of a road in a neighborhood.  I like to take my mom here whenever she visits.  When she and a good friend of mine come in July; this will definitely be on the list of places to check out. 
Yes, of course we took Scout with us!

















Kat was giving Scout some loving....he wanted to be in the front the whole time we were walking around.  Eventually we had to tie his leash to a tree.  He was getting to excited and the snow melting around the edges would make me nervous with this lunatic dog running around crazy!

 The sun was peaking through the trees at us.  This time of year last year we would have been able to actually see the Virgin Creek trail; however, due to record snowfall this winter we still were following footprints in the snow!  Eventually we had to stop walking close to the creek since we couldn't tell how close to the edge we were.






Well ending my blog with a sign off from Kaladi Brothers, the coffee shop that I am hanging out at today, on my day off.....I think I'm officially addicted to my morning cup of Joe...

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

quick shout out

Ok, ok, so I feel kind of bad because I totally forgot to mention a key person in our Easter event.....
After I posted my last blog about Easter; I was told that I left out our hot dog griller...Jeremy Coleman.
So, Jeremy, here is a thank you for all the help grilling 200 hot dogs for over a hundred hungry kids!

Also, I would like to mention that Jeremy donated 3 of his bananas that were going bad to our animals....now when I say "going bad"  I mean they are just right for 2 moose calves named Gilly and Nelson.  Jack the moose however prefers his bananas to be more on the green side.  When ever we get fruit donations it is always appreciated since we are a non-profit organization.  It is also very helpful since some of our animals, like our porcupine and moose, are used for hands on presentations and we can train them using treats for these programs. 

 Kat Jacobs, another employee, received a $10 donation from her mother on valentine's day to use for the animals.  I finally was able to make it to the grocery store and buy a few special treats with the donation.  Thanks again for the donation Mrs. Jacobs! 

 Here is Jewelie with a donated grapefruit and carrots....

 I think she liked the grapefruit...what do you think?












Of course Snickers knew he was getting something special as well; once the calves got their bananas...

 He actually preferred the carrots over the grapefruit first!  Now don't get me wrong; he still ate the grapefruit...just after his carrots and walnuts.  We are also giving him ample willow supplies, along with the moose, since the willow is budding and the wild porcupine and moose are starting to eat brush this time of year as well. 

 Today is another day off.  The weather has been kind of yucky the past few days; which explains an absence of blogging.  I am finding that I am getting pickier and pickier with taking my camera out on days with the sun missing.  I guess when you have a hard drive filling up as fast as mine is it is hard to keep pictures that even have a tiny bit of fencing or blur to them.  Kat works at a coffee shop in anchorage a few days a week.  I decided that it would be nice to spend a day at a coffee shop blogging, emailing, and maybe a quick trip to REI next door...(That could be dangerous)  Well, maybe I should try to get some work done will the coffee kick is going strong....

Tomorrow should be a sunny day in good ole Portage, AK.

 Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn

Easter with a nice weather day...

 Whew...now that Easter at the wildlife center is over I can catch yall up on what has been going on these past few days.  I am gonna sleep good tonight...after dying eggs, feeding bears, stufing hundreds of eggs, puppet shows, and much more I am exhausted.

Well first thing is first, we always have Easter at the AWCC for anyone that wants to join.  We have an annual easter egg hunt, hot dog cookout, puppet show, and we even give our bears eggs!  So that brings me to my first point.  I dyed a total of 30 eggs for our 3 resident brown bears.  There was also an additional 4 eggs dyed for our lynx.  I didn't boil the lynx' eggs since they enjoy them raw.  Kelly Miller, our education director, also dyed an additional dozen for the big brown bears. 
 (Notice the cantaloupe in the back ground of the picture, that the lovely Kat Jacobs donated to Snickers and Jewelie)


So I made sure to give Snickers and Jewelie their special sweet treat ASAP.  I think Snickers enjoys cantaloupe...what do you think?

 Yesterday, I was running around with Kelly getting the barn set up for the Easter even.  We never know what the weather is gonna turn out to be on easter so we always prepare for wind and rain; which is what we got last year.  However, this year was supposed to be a beautiful Easter day....well I guess we will find out on Sunday.

 We also set up our puppet stage the day before.  We do a puppet show about an Easter porcupine just before we do an actual porcupine presentation. 
And of course, you probably know that Snickers is the Easter porcupine....He doesn't mind at all...especially when he gets an apple, cantaloupe, and peanuts!




Kelly also has her own chickens that she brought to the barn.  She brought 2 chickens out for the Easter event. 

 Remember how empty the barn looked earlier....well it filled up!  We had nearly 100 people show up for the event!  It was an awesome success! 

 We even had a special guest show up!  The Easter bunny came for a visit to the wildlife center!

 The weather was amazing!  I don't think there have been many Easters at the center with weather as good as this!  It was definitely one of my top Easters...the only thing that could put it at number 1 on my list is if my family were here with me. 













Since the weather was so great we moved our Easter egg hunt to the empty land we had.  We placed hundreds of eggs everywhere!  Kids were having a blast; while parents were having a tough time not falling through the snow as the top layer was thawing because of the sun. 

 Yes, of course I had to get my picture with the Easter Bunny is such a gorgeous location!

 We then loaded everyone up with candy and hotdogs!  Later, we stuffed our hayride full of kids on sugar highs to go watch us throw eggs to our bears and lynx.  Jonathan even had to go grab our shuttle bus since we had so many people for the hayride.

 The bears were waiting for their Easter eggs....

 Jonathan and I stated chucking eggs all around the enclosure so that the bears didn't argue over who got which eggs. 

 We loaded everyone back up to top of the hayride with seeing the lynx get their eggs.

Kat's mom even donated some beautiful books and puppets to use for our Golden Eggs.  I had 4 golden eggs hidden during the Easter egg hunt that had a certificate in them saying they found a golden egg.  I used the donated Easter gifts as the prizes.  Thank you Mrs. Jacobs for the prizes!!!!


Happy Easter from everyone at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center!  Goodnight Lower 48!!!

a bit more shoveling and a birthday party......

 Well, just when we thought we were done shoveling; we had to shovel a bit more ice off of the back ramp. This way when they build the new roof over the ramp they won't have huge chunks of ice in their way.  At one point, the entire ramp was covered by a pile of ice and snow as tall as the pile to the left!







Now that spring has finally decided to show up in April; all the snow is melting but has no where to go.  Rick, our handy man, has spent entire days just driving the tractor around the center and plowing the roads. 

 Speaking of Rick, it was his birthday on April Fools Day so we wanted to have a party in his honor.  I had heard that he had never had red beans and rice.  So he held me to my word that I would cook it for him.  It started out as me just making dinner for the bunkhouse crew to the right and then it just seemed to turn into a celebration!  We also thought that this would be a good time to introduce the Portage area of Alaska to a little game that we play in the bunkhouse....Just Dance on Wii!


I think you could say everyone had a go at the game....even Rick was convinced to give it a try....

 Things did heat up when high scores were threatened.....

 By the end of the night the remaining people playing the game ended up being just the good ole bunkhouse crew.  I guess no one else could hang with us....










Today, April 3, I was in the ticket booth on such a beautiful and warm day.  Now the common temperature is about 35 degrees.  It seems like a hot summer day compared to 0 degrees!

 Rick, of course, has still been plowing away at the slushy roads.  As he was driving by I caught him in action. 

 He even posed for me....











We have the Alaska train go right by our center just about every day.  The good thing about being in the ticket booth today was that I was able to take a snap shot with the mountains and the train.

 It sat parked on the tracks for about an hour for whatever reason. 

Later, Jonathan threw in a bale of straw for the kodiak bears and Taquka loved tearing the entire bale apart and backing it into his house.  Well, I know they will sleep well tonight with that fresh straw in their house.  And just like them; I too will sleep great tonight!

Goodnight Lower 48,
ErIn