Search This Blog

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Winter Wildlife


This winter has been a harsh one for the animals living outside on kodiak. Everytime I go skiing I see a bunch of eagles hovering around the open water at the outlet to Buskin Lake. They are feeding on the spawned out salmon still doing their thing in the frigid water there.

The bears too have been feeding on the salmon. I saw fresh bear tracks near Buskin Lake just two days ago, but the bears should mostly be hibernating by now (the cubs and sows hibernate earlier than the old boars - and bears will not hibernate at all if they have a ready supply of food). I believe some of the winter killed deer I saw had been eaten by a bear.

Soon when all the spawned out salmon are gone all the eagles and ravens migrate to the dump and to the roofs of the canneries for the slim pickings available there. Today I also saw the tracks in the snow where a snowshoe rabbit had been snatched by a raptor (probably an eagle) - so not all our birds are dump scavengers. (PGS)

No comments: