Category Archives: Dan Branch

Stormy

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After listening to the morning’s forecast for high winds and heavy rain, I gather Aki from a cozy corner of the living room and lead her to the car. Outside. the trees in our yard dance awkwardly in a twenty knot wind. Rain obscures the car’s windshield. We must rush to get in a walk before the bad weather hits. 

            I choose the Rainforest Trail this morning for the storm protection it offers. But we must be out of the forest before the wind becomes strong enough to snap the trailside hemlock trees. The forecast only called for forty-knot gusts, which shouldn’t have to power to down old growth trees. But the grey morning light has made me a little paranoid. Sometimes weather forecasts are proven wrong. 

            The forest seems to absorb the storm’s power, we walk down to the beach unbothered by wind but still soaked by the persistent rain. The water between the beach and Shaman Island is empty of birds. I assume that the resident ducks are still feeding in the open water sections of our rain forest archipelago. Then a man fires his shotgun twice, flushing an eagle and several gulls into the air. The eagle joins two other eagles circling the treetops of Shaman Island. Aki whines and crouches close to the soaked ground. We return to the woods, hoping that the gunner is blown off the beach by the storm. 

Agility Over Size

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We reached Sandy Beach this morning at low tide. A bedraggled eagle hunches on the roof of the mine ventilator shaft. When I look away, distracted by a silver salmon splashing off shore, the eagle flies down the beach and over a resting murder of crows. Since the eagle is heading in the direction of its nest, I assume it is just returning home, tired of roosting in the rain. 

            Four other eagles are bickering with crows when we reach the little bay formed by the collapse of subsea mining tunnels a hundred years ago.  Dive-bombing crows forced one of the eagles off the beach and onto the top of a splintered piling. 

Apparently menaced by a crow a fraction of its size, the eagle takes off. The crow, a much more agile flyer that the eagle, grabs at the eagle’s tail and wing feathers as the eagle makes for a spruce tree roost just over my head. I look around for Aki and find her tucked away safely in the woods.  

Strangers in Our Own Land

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I didn’t know that they allowed dogs on board the ship? The question, coming from one of the thousands of cruise ship passengers trudging their way to Nugget Falls, stopped me in my tracks. Aki, who generally likes all people and most dogs, wagged tail as the women who posed the question rubbed her curls. It never occurred to her that we were locals. I looked around for a familiar face and found none. Aki and I had become strangers in our own land.

            I led the little dog onto an alternative path to the falls and pondered how Occam’s razor convinced the friendly lady that we were fellow cruise ship travelers. I’m wearing a battered Alaska Marine Exchange hat, so authentic that the bill edge has been tattered into threads. A blue hoodie with the logo for Sitka’s Sheldon Jackson’s College covered my torso. On a rainy day, when my little dog is wearing a stylish wrap, I’d blame her. But, thanks to the warm afternoon sun, she only wears a harness. 

            Over thirteen thousand people poured off one of five mega cruise ships today. We thirty thousand locals still outnumber them. But almost every Juneauite is taking the sun on less crowded land. We’ve yielded one of our most beautiful places to the visitors. From the happy tones of their conversations, they seem to be appreciating it.  

Flat Light

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This is going to be a frustrating walk to the mouth of Fish Creek. Aki and I came with expectations of sunshine, eagles, and ocean-bright silver salmon. The weather folks promised the sunshine. We have good reason to expect eagles and silvers. Their presence should be a matter of course this time of year. We will end up having to make due with eagles and aging pinks. 

            Two adult bald eagles roost in a spruce overlooking the pond.  The hump of a spawned out pink salmon male ripples the pond’s surface. With a little effort, one of the eagles could snag the salmon and fly it to a gravel bar for a feed. But they barely flinch when the salmon swims past their roosting tree. 


            Hoping that the eagles have already had their fill of silver salmon, I follow Aki down the trail to the creek mouth. We do spot a run of the creek full of frisky salmon. But we can’t investigate without disturbing two eagles perched on a driftwood branch. The mottled birds look dull in this morning’s grey light. 

            Low clouds obscure our view of the Chilkat Mountains and that of the glacier on the other side of Gastineau Channel. The sunshine currently bathing Admiralty Island should reach the glacier and Fish Creek in a couple of hours. Aki will be home by then, sunning herself on the back steps.  

A Last Color Rich Day?

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After the channel fog burns off this morning, I drive the little dog out to Mendenhall Lake. While she uses her nose to investigate I plan on searching for late blueberries. I’ll find less than a handful. This may be one of the last color-rich days we will have until the monsoon season begins. Then we will have to wait for winter to bring clarity.

The lake is swollen with rain and glacial melt water, covering the beach path we normally use. Instead we use the little path between camp ground and lake that the little dog prefers With the temperature holding at 60 degrees F. I find myself sitting often in the sun to enjoy the glacier reflection on the lake’s surface. I take a few pictures of it, aware that I have many similar shots on my computer. It still thrills to capture the image with a click. 

            Displays of fall color could divert me from glacier gazing. But most of the lake foliage is still summer green. Only where the Mendenhall River escapes from the lake do I find a cottonwood in fall yellow. It stands out like an unnecessary candle on this warm, bright day.   

Do They Ever Smile

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Aki and I are walking down along the north bank of the Mendenhall River. The rain and grey of yesterday have given way to sun and blue skies. You would think that the eagles in the trees above us would be happy. 

            We pass two adult bald eagles sharing a tree, like mates will after fledging chicks. Each fiercely stares across the river where mallards are cackling away like residents of Bedlam. Aki keeps close as we walk under their tree. She need not worry. They seem too self possessed to even notice a ten-pound-poodle-mix. 

            One eagle, the one lower down the tree, flies off first, darkening the grass at our feet with its shadow. Minutes later the other one launches itself up, pumps its wings to gain altitude, and glides over the forest until out of sight. 

            We will flush several more adult eagles on the walk downriver to Fritz Cove. Each will look fierce or disgusted or frustrated or merely bored. I will search unsuccessfully for a memory of an eagle expressing joy or happiness. Do they ever have a laugh with their friends? 

            On our way back up river we pass under an immature bald eagle digging its beak into its chest feathers. Then it spreads wide its tail feathers and stares at them as if searching for fleas. The beach grass beneath its roost is dotted with soft feathers. When it spots the little dog and I, it raises its beak as if it smells something foul.

Eye Wide Open

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Today’s heavy rain must have dampened people’s desire to hike. The little dog and I have the Outer Point Trail to us. It leads us through a silent forest. No birds or squirrels break the quiet. Storm clouds have grounded the airplanes that usually fly over our heads on their way to one of the Admiralty Island villages. The quiet is a reprieve from the noise of airports with their multi-lingual amplified announcements and over-loud conversations that hammered me during the return home from Sweden. 

            Rainwater swells the forest ponds and streams, which threaten to flood low lying sections of the trail. Fat raindrops turn the broad skunk cabbage leaves into a percussive orchestra. The rain forest drought is broken. 

Aki hurries me toward the beach, now partially flooded by a high tide. Half a kilometer away, at the mouth of Peterson Creek, two bald eagles hunch to avoid aerial attacks from a gang of gulls. The eagles screech out protests and then launch a counter attack, abandoning the salmon carcasses they had been scavenging.  

            Late arriving pink salmon fly out of the water, making a noisy splash on their reentry. The heads of two seals and a sea lion appear and disappear above the surface of the water. One of the seals swims close to the shore and lifts its head up and out of the water for a better view of the little dog and I. 

I think of the seals that I saw performing a Lofoton aquarium; how they had their eyes squeezed shut in every photo I took of them. I know that when I look at the pictures I took of the Outer Point seal, its eyes will be wide open. 

Agents of Change

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The narrow channel that once flowed water into Crystal Lake is now just a muddy trough. Wide beaches have formed around the lake. 

          Aki shows no desire to cross the channel.  We follow it until finding the culprit—a well maintained beaver dam. Fall rainstorms should raise the level of the channel until water can flow over the dam and into Crystal Lake. Until then we will have to put up with the beaver’s muddy mess. 

          Beavers and their dams are the greatest agents of change on the moraine. Water backs up behind the dams to flood and then kill forests. Eventually grass and reeds clog the lakes to create wet meadowlands. Our local land managers call the changed land “improved habitat.” I can’t argue. But, as once crystal lakes are dulled into meadows that can no longer reflect the surrounding mountains, I will let myself mourn just a little for the loss of beauty.    

A Good Day to Shout the Blues

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It was sunny yesterday morning but now it feels like it has been raining for weeks. Aki and I just have to get used to it again. A storm that started on the Russian Steppe traveled across the Gulf of Alaska to end our recent drought. We have been praying for rain. Now are prayers have been answered. There will many more rainstorms before the snow arrives. 

       The little dog drags me down Gold Street, past the Episcopal Church, and up Gastineau Avenue. We pass sunflowers with yellow petals drooping with rain. Copies of a missing cat poster decorate light poles along Gastineau Avenue. I wonder whether one of the neighborhood eagles carried the poor feline away. 

        An older homeless man walks in the middle of the avenue, shouldering a boom box that blares out a John Lee Hooker tune.  The man shouts out the lyrics with the assurance of one who has earned the right to sing the blues. When he reaches the refrain, he smiles and says “hi” to Aki. The little poodle-mix wags her tail and gives the man a doggy smile. She never shies away from our city’s homeless. 

Neighborhood Bad Boys

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      Ravens seem to beg to be anthropomorphized. Aki and I happen upon a gang of the teenage-like birds gathered on a beach dotted with pink salmon carcasses. One of the purpley-black birds crouches over an eyeless salmon body, ripping flesh from the fish’s back with its massive beak. The other birds cackle criticism at the eating bird and then take off, making enough noise to scare nearby gulls into flight.  

          The ravens don’t bother a green winged teal or a brace of greater yellow legs that feed in a shallow pond. They ride rising wind currents up and over Fish Creek and then break off into head first dives like WWII fighter pilots descending on enemy bombers. When even this becomes too mundane, they dive bomb a bald eagle, driving it off its spruce tree roost. While the eagle had no stomach for a fight, a crow rises to the occasion and drives off the much larger ravens when they get too close to crow country. 

          The little dog and I walk up the stream, surprised more than once by the loud splashes made by male pink salmon as they fight each other for spawning space. We startle to flight a pair of great blue herons hunting the little fish that thrive on salmon flesh. Squawking like barnyard geese, they move to a nearby pond where another heron is already feeding.