sorry Dave and Mrs. Connie

well well well..... it has been entirely too long and I am embarrassed how long I let this post go before posting.  Where do I begin?

babies so far that we have had this summer:

2 musk Oxen: see how big they have grown! Tsuni and Nami!
  But wait they were born on May 12th and May 26th which means now they are nearly 2 months old!  They are now getting 4 bottles a day starting at 8AM.  8am 12pm 4 pm and 8pm.  We give them a mixture of milk matrix and foal lac formula.  when they are about a year old we re-introduce them back to the herd.

Photo credit: Doug Lindstrand 

next up...Richtor and Tectonic.  Well Tectonic wasn't being very photogenic.  

Richtor came from Willow,Ak when he was caught by people, placed on a chain and put in the back yard!  Please, please, please, leave wildlife alone even if you think it is injured or orphaned.  Call your local fish and game and let them handle the situation.  90% of the time you see a baby animal; the mom is somewhere nearby.

Moose calf bottles are held daily at 9am 1pm and 5pm (subject to change once older)

photo credit: Doug Lindstrand

but wait there's more......3 elk calves, 12 mallard ducklings, 26 bison calves, and even 1 sitka black tailed deer named "solstice".  Solstice was born to "Solo" and "Leia"  on the longest day of the year in Alaska 6/21.  Leia has been a great mom and we are very excited to have our first Sitka Black Tailed Deer calf born in captivity.  He turned 1 month old yesterday.

 shows you just how good nature's camo can be...

When fawns are born they spend around 2 weeks just laying in the tall grasses in order to conserve energy and hide from predators.

Solstice really enjoys laying on the hill in his enclosure.

all 3 previous photos credit to Doug Lindstrand......where would my blog be with out him.....








just an update on the yearling musk ox calves from last summer.  Remember Chugach and Wrangle?  Well this is Wrangle 1 year 3 months later and about 250 pounds heavier.  Look at those horns!  also do I need to say....photo credit Doug Lindstrand

 Well I can't do a blog without updating you on my fur baby "Zelda".  She must have weighed in at 30lbs the last time I posted about her.  She is at least 55lbs now (the scale broke so I can't weigh her)  and a handful.  how do people raise human babies?  I mean seriously!  Credit to my parents I must have been a handful!

This picture was taken in front of Virgin Creek Water fall.









our next adventure together was hiking up Northface on Alyeska in Girdwood,Alaska.  We were a little tired in the end....

 Then I took my cousin, Lindsay, up to Portage pass hike in Whittier, Alaska.  We did some yoga poses at the top.  ok, ok, so we only did one yoga pose for this picture.  But we look like pros right?

Next adventure....hiking to Barber Cabin.  If you live in Alaska you have to reserve this cabin!  It is amazing!  It is only like a 3 mile hike in and you stay in a cabin on a lake that you can fish for trout in , have a campfire, and a stove fireplace in the cabin.

Our group was a little excited to say the least.

Talk about excited...Jade the red fox was a little excited for intern Hanna to be giving him a snack.  

Today I snapped a few photos of the elk browse feeding.  A daily chore that we do is to cut browse (branches from trees like cottonwoods, alder, and willow), and then feed them to the Elk, musk Oxen, Moose, sitka deer, moose calves, musk ox calves, reindeer,  and porcupine.

This photo was the before the elk noticed we added fresh branches.

still the "before"....but the ducks new something was going on....
















                                                         "after"!!!!!

We also gave our local celebrity his share of the browse...

Well that was a mouthful of a blog and I apologize to Dave at Bird Treatment and learning Center and to Mrs. Connie in Wisconsin for not posting a blog in so long.  I have let yall down and will get better at it now that I have a new house that I am  living in and the baby animals are doing much better.

Goodnight Lower 48,
Erin and Zelda

fur babies

Skies are blue. babies being born left and right. bottles being made 6 times a day.
yup.  summer is here in full blow.  The bison are still calving and we are at around 30 calves running around in the field together.  It is really hard to actually get a correct number on how many we have now!

   This time of year we also rotate the bison on pastures.  You can see this pasture was ready for a break.  The bison are grazers so of course we get free lawn mowing at the center when needed.

We always have 2 or 3 pastures available with fresh green grass so the others can recover when the bison are rotated.

Every year someone gets the wonderful job of "dragging" the fields on a four wheeler.  Dust is everywhere!  But I am sure you aren't just covered in dust if you think about what else is in the ground......yuck!   However if blood, fecal, and whatever else animal related grosses us out, we may be in the wrong profession.

Sarah had to drag all the pastures so she could then spread grass seed on it to get it growing again.

So reindeer are just domesticated caribou.  They are currently growing their antlers which are covered in velvet.  The velvet is supplying the antler with nutrients causing the antler to continue to grow.  These are just about done growing for this year.  When we notice a white coloration appearing this means the velvet has already started to die off and eventually the velvet is shed and we see the common antler appearance that most of us are familiar with.    Sven is sitting in the front.
He is a 2 year old reindeer that we use in education programs.  He gets his daily walk at 10:45am every day to meet visitors and teach them about reindeer.  they are also shedding their winter coat which is why he has a bad hair day.

The moose don't want their winter coat anymore either.

now onto the fur babies!!!!!!

  

 We had a musk ox calf born on 5/12.  We wait about a month nearly before introducing them to the public.

Meet Tsuni

This picture was when she was 2 days old.

She may not seem to thrilled to be getting this bottle and she wasn't.  However we still offer them a bottle and just the presence of us gets them use to us sooner.

Tsuni was more interested in trying to nibble my chin.

Tsuni was very excited to see Doug Lindstrand taking photos of her.

She isn't camera shy.

Oh did I mention we have another calf?  

Meet Nami.

Nami was born on 5/26 and definitely see Tsuni as her big half sister.

Intern Allison Dahl from Fairbanks, AK was lucky enough to have Doug Capture a feeding she did.

All the photos in today's blog were captured by Doug Lindstrand.

Thanks Doug!

more fur baby photos coming soon.









Now for a picture of my fur baby.

goodnight lower 48,
Erin and Zelda

Trails and puppy dog tails

If this blog title would have sounded good with bison tails in the title I would have added it.  However, it just couldn't roll of the tongue.  May 1st brought us our first calf of the season!  Since then we have had at least 13 Wood bison born!  luckily we don't have to bottle raise these critters.  Their moms do a great job.  We just sit back and literally watch.  We are expecting around 40 calves this summer!

                                                       PHOTO CREDIT:DOUG LINDSTRAND

 Meanwhile the new interns have started rolling in.  Kara was showing newbie intern Jeremy Brooks how to walk a reindeer.

Jeremy is from Montana.  We also have interns this summer from Ohio, Florida, Minnesota, Georgia, New York, and even one from Canada!

I left a few states out but off the top of my head that's all I can remember.

PHOTO CREDIT:DOUG LINDSTRAND

 The black bears are finally awake!  These 2 slept in for nearly 6 months!  I was actually surprised at how long they slept since we didn't have much of a winter.

They must have really liked their new dens.

Kuma was enjoying his view from the top of one of his dens when Doug Lindstrand snapped this photo.



This is a view of one of the bison herds we have here at AWCC.  This herd consists mainly of pregnant females.                              PHOTO CREDIT:DOUG LINDSTRAND

 Meanwhile I still needed to have some summer adventures with the puppy.  The weather we have been having since nearly Easter has just been amazing!

It has been in the high 60's nearly the past 2 weeks!

Zelda and I have really been enjoying the trails opening up early this year with there being hardly any snow on the trails.

You can sort of see the mountain fading out behind us in this photo.

On monday we packed my truck full of backpacks, interns, water, food, and 1 dog; and set forth to conquer Bird Ridge trail.

This 5 mile round trip trail proved to be worth the work when you get paid in views like these!

This photo on the right shows Turnagain Arm directly behind Beth.

2 newbie interns Connor and Jeremy also joined Beth and I on their day off.











 Don't worry she isn't a close to the edge as she looks.....

On wednesday I wanted to stretch my legs on my day off.  I also was VERY sore from that Bird Ridge hike 2 days prior.

After having some coffee I took Zelda out with Tug (my bosses dog).  They immediately jumped into Placier River.  Did I mention that we don't have sand beaches.....they are mud flats!  So I had one dirty dog!

After cleaning Zelda off we loaded up a vehicle once again and went to do a short but scenic hike over in Whittier,AK.  Other than me the other 4 people on the hike had never been to Whittier.

You literally drive through a one way tunnel to enter Whittier.  The tunnel only opens on the half hour to enter.  It opens on the hour to leave.

Talk about literally getting stuck in a town!  the tunnel closes every night at 11PM.

Well we couldn't leave without getting a group photo!  Portage glacier is directly behind us.

We were lucky enough to even see the glacier calve 3 times!

What is calving?  Calving is basically when a glacier has pieces of ice break off it into the water.





Before we even left Whittier; Zelda was passed out in the car and ready for a nap.  We both were!
Tomorrow all the interns and I are off to Seward,AK for some interpretation training.  we only have to leave at 6AM!

I better go get some shut eye!
Goodnight lower 48,
Erin and Zelda

200 hundred eggs, 1 swan, and a bunny on a bicycle

first thing is first. This next week is going to require some extra caffeine.  check.  don't worry I didn't share with Zelda.

Next on the to do list...pick up ducklings.
check.

Every year we raise mallard ducklings at the center.  When it is time they fly off with the other wild mallards and join the migration.

Zelda was very curious what the strange sounds coming from the box were.

For our easter event we placed them in the gift store so visitors could see them at 1 week old.

Jeremy and Linda- (gift store) were posing with these ducklings.

Ok so on Easter sunday we held one of our biggest events of the year.  We had all been preparing for weeks getting ready for the big day.

Starting early in the morning we each set up our stations.  Kayla and Teal are posing at the craft station.  The crafts included egg dying and making some bunny ears to wear as a pin on your shirt.

The egg dying craft required that we hard boil 200 eggs!  We figured better over prepare than not.  Plus; when you have a fox, brown bear, black bear, and lynx that enjoy eggs there is never going to be any eggs wasted.

Now onto the other type of eggs we had to prepare.  Of course we had to have an easter egg hunt!  Sarah and kara were hiding the eggs.  don't worry; the easter bunny helped hide them too.

We stuffed about 1,000 easter eggs!

They look like they are having so much fun.....I think they were just mad that they couldn't find the eggs themselves.

Thug life on easter.

We also took advantage of the beautiful weather we were having by adding the hayride.

We were also showing off our new neon hoodies that we started selling in the gift store.  We also thought that they would be good uniforms to wear on easter.  With hundreds of people it would be easy to spot us.

Everyone agreed....it was easy to spot us!

Funny photo.  How could we resist?











Time for the show to begin!  We started the event with a couple of stories.  Kelly, our education director, also had some of her chickens to show off.
We then followed this with our annual easter puppet show.  

We even had a special guest arrive.  The Easter Bunny!  He even stayed and enjoyed the puppet show.

Next up; the Easter bunny hopped all the kids down to the egg hunt area where they all found the hidden eggs.

I think the Easter bunny loved posing for the camera.

Eggs aren't just for the children on Easter.  At the center, many of the animals enjoy easter.  Some of these animals include the lynx.  We set aside 4 raw, yet dyed, eggs for the two lynx.

Teal was cracking the first egg in the photo on the right.

This photo was taken just before we had an unexpected visitor join us.

This crow was paying no attention to the 2 lynx that were very intensely staring him down.

I was afraid we were going to watch mother nature in action in the middle of a lot of kids!

Luckily, the crow got smart and ski-daddled.

Finally the lynx showed some interest in the raw eggs.  I think the vinegar that we used to dye the eggs were not their favorite.

I will make note not to use vinegar next year.









We even had the lovely Kat join us and grill hotdogs for all the visitors.

Kara was on porcupine duty.  This year we decided to let snickers run around on the observation deck once we blocked the entrance off with hay bales.  I think he enjoyed being able to move around.




So after egg dying, bunny hopping, candy eating, puppet skits, story telling, hay rides, chickens flapping, and egg hunting; Easter was a success!

With Easter; we also know animals are going to be arriving soon.

The first signs of spring is when the birds are returning.  Some of the first returnees include swans.


A few days before easter Doug Lindstrand noticed a young swan on the side of the highway unable to fly.  Kayla, Teal, and I went out to observe the swan.  We decided that it was in an unsafe area and therefore captured it.  Now anyone that has worked with swans know that if it takes about 10 minutes to chase and capture a swan in a large open field.....it must be injured, tired, or sick.

I called Bird Treatment and Learning Center in anchorage and alerted them I was on my way.

Basically we believe the swan may have just been tired from migration and simply needed rest.

So after 3 days of rest we released him back into the wild.
In the below photo the 4 girls: Sarah, Kara, Teal, and Kayla were walking the kennel to the edge of the pond for release.




I snapped this photo of moose scat nearby just because I am a nerd and was excited to see a sign of wild moose in the area.  ok back to the swan.....

Doug lindstrand was also there to capture the release on photo.  I wanted to get a photo of him at work.

I am sure Doug has thousands of photos of people in action but not many of himself at work.

These next 2 photos show how talented Doug is at photography.  You can clearly tell the difference between his photos and mine.

The swan is back in the wild and hopefully enjoying the company of other swans at this very moment.

Time for another pup photo!  Zelda has surpassed the kennel in the truck.  she has now climed the passenger seat.  

We also explored the creek that runs through gird wood for the first time.

Good night lower 48.....although it doesn't look like night as much these days.  It is already staying lighter out later and later.