One goal during our Alaska trip was to take lots of nature photos. We were especially excited by the prospect of brown bear (aka grizzly), whale and bald eagle sightings and photos. I can now say that we were generally disappointed by either the frequency of sightings, or the quality of my photos. Part of the problem can be attributed to poor wildlife lens availability. At least that’s my main excuse. During the first few days of our trip north, we had an additional crew member who is an avid amateur bird photographer. She seriously indulges her hobby and has the lens to prove it. That lens alone would ordinarily require most people to make a choice between owning a house or that lens–both would require a similar mortgage. I am also the first to admit that equipment is not everything. In fact, most people with that killer lens get far less use of it than our guest Sharon who is nearly constantly using her camera. Her dedication combined with the right equipment results in some stunning wildlife photos.
For our trip, priorities dictated that we use our resources to acquire things like radar, charts and fuel for the engine. A wildlife-friendly lens dropped off the bottom of the pre-trip purchase list. Nonetheless, we figured that spending months in Alaska and BC Canada would present opportunities for some good wildlife photos even without a killer lens. Overall, I think that has proven true, but there are two stories here. First, regarding brown bears–we now joke about the very existence of the beast up there given an absence of sightings on our trip. We now realize that at the time of our arrival in early April, most of the alleged brown bears would still have been snoozing–aka hibernating. That is a pretty good excuse for not venturing outside of the lair for a photo op.
Our trip into Misty Fjords National Monument was supposed to put us in the middle of brown bear heaven and yet we saw none. The single other cruising boat we passed during our week-long visit claims to have seen a brown bear immediately after passing paths with us. In the last fjord, we passed up staying on a park-service mooring because we were feeling overwhelmed with the beauty and decided it was time to keep moving. That other boat stayed the night on said mooring where their alleged sighting occurred. I can’t tell if they were messing with us or serious.
Our first probable brown bear sighting happened about a month later. We were anchored in the guide-book perfect spot in Chapin Bay. Chapin Bay is on Admiralty Island which is also known as “Fortress of the Bears” because of its exceptionally high concentration of brown bears. So, I was anticipating bears. Lots of bears. Late in the day, a cruising trawler arrived and tried, but couldn’t squeeze into that guide-book perfect location where we were–not enough room for two large boats. They headed towards the end of the cozy little bay and as the trawler got smaller and smaller in the distance, we realized that Chapin was not as cozy as we had initially thought–it’s very big. Just before dark, I saw movement on shore towards the end of the bay where the trawler was. Using the binoculars, I could just make out a brown fuzzy butt walking away. That was not even worth picking up the camera for. Brenda still doubts that it was a bear sighting.
Many bear-less anchorages later, we were near Hoonah waiting for just the right moment to zip over to Glacier Bay National Park so that we would arrive there at the start of our park permit period. We saw something moving on the “near by” shoreline. Getting out the binoculars, we could see that the little brown speck was probably not so small. The grass around the brown furry thing was so tall, however, that the scale would be right for that brown thing to be a squirrel, but the shape was all wrong for a squirrel. We decided two things: first, that size and distances in Alaska are extremely hard to judge–stuff that seems to be nearby and small is actually way distant and huge; and second, that this was actually one of the famous Alaska brown bears. I took some photos, but I knew that they would be classic in the sense that any viewer would have to be coached “see that little brown speck there” … “no over there” … “that is an enormous brown bear and that green stuff around the bear–its grass, only its at least 6 feet tall” and I caught it all in this photo only no one will know unless I coach them. Well with a Sharon lens, that photo could have been good.
As time in Alaska wore on, I became increasing concerned that I had no decent bear photos and that was due to having only had one marginal bear sighting. We had a bear bell which is a noise maker that one should wear when walking in the woods where bear are known to exist. Bears with their notoriously poor eye sight might inadvertently stumble upon a human whereas if said human is wearing a jingly bell, the bear will head off in another direction long before coming into visual range of the human. Since bad bear encounters can be really bad, the idea is to avoid all encounters. But, I wanted to see and photograph a bear, and I was increasing becoming suspect that there were any bears to be seen. So I would go off on walks without the bell and with my camera ready to shoot at a moment’s notice. We also took Mahdee to places that bears were known to haunt. Taku Harbor has a pier that we tied Mahdee up to which has a warning that bears may walk out onto the pier and even board boats to get things they want–like food or garbage. We don’t want a desperate bear on Mahdee so we are not stupid enough to leave out food. Shortly after our arrival there was a commotion about a distant brown speck and one of the other boats launched a dingy to go investigate. Other than that speck in the binoculars, there were no bears. So, we next went back to Admiralty Island with its famous population of brown bears. Several days at an isolated anchorage which to my un-bear eyes seemed to be bear heaven resulted in no further sightings.
At the other end of the wildlife sighting spectrum are the bald eagles. I can recall when seeing a then-rare bald eagle was a life altering event. I confess to being a little jaded after living and canoeing around our nation’s capital which was noted at the time for having one of the healthiest recovering bald eagle populations in the country. Still, I was unprepared for the sheer numbers of bald eagles in Alaska. Up there, they seem to outnumber crows and black birds and if it can be believed, are even more annoying.
Actually, they are more than just annoying. Alaskans can be divided into two groups: those that are really worried about it, or who have already lost a pet cat or small dog to an eagle versus those who insist that eagles have plenty of “natural” food and would never go after a pet. There are so many eagles in Alaska that I am convinced that the population numbers have way overshot the sustainable level and that something like a food shortage is imminent for eagle population control–especially given their federally protected status. Given that belief, we limited our cat Beryl’s access to the deck for times when Brenda or I were also on deck as an eagle deterrent. Even so, we almost lost Beryl to a bald eagle at Swanson’s harbor.
Brenda had cat watch but was on the dock talking to the owners of an adjacent fishing vessel. Beryl has always tended to hide/sit under the canoe when alone on deck. From under the canoe Beryl likes to watch what is happening. When Brenda or I come near, she waltzes out from under the canoe and is happy to be around our feet without the canoe overhead. Prior to this trip I though this was unfounded cat paranoia. On this particular day, Brenda was on the dock and I was in the charthouse when a bald eagle came swooping right at Mahdee. My first thought wow what an amazing picture this would be, but that once again, the camera was too far away from me to get in time. Then I realized what was really happening. Before I could even move in reaction, the eagle veered away passing just over Mahdee’s gunnels. I ran out the door to make sure Beryl was OK and she was still sitting under the edge of the canoe. I don’t know if she saw the eagle or not, anticipated any danger or not. I do know now that the eagle’s last instant veering off was because the eagle suddenly saw the small black amsteel removable guard wires/life lines on Mahdee that were between it and Beryl and there wasn’t room for a bird as big as that eagle to get between the guard wires to reach the cat. We are now very vigilant to ensure the guard wires are up when Beryl is on deck and that the human with cat watch duty is closer to Beryl. Unfortunately for her, Beryl didn’t get as much deck time after that incident, but we didn’t want to lose her.
Despite the fact that bald eagles are becoming nearly as populous as cockroaches, everyone still wants a great bald eagle photo. I read in the news during our visit that there were two midwestern visitors who ventured out onto an alluvial mud-flat for a bald eagle photo. One man sunk into the mud and became trapped so that the coast guard had to rush a rescue boat to the scene in advance of the incoming tide that threated to drown the stuck man–all for that bald eagle photo. The glut of bald eagles and a fear of one getting Beryl had tempered my immediate enthusiasm for an eagle photo. Nonetheless, I did want a good bald eagle photo to commemorate the trip.
Bald eagles, however, are clever at avoiding portraits. They seem to know how far away to stay so that my camera will only resolve a dark blur. They use their piercing eye to note when the camera is put away or out of reach and then, they swoop in and do amazing acrobatics and dart off before anyone can get a camera pointed their way. Nowhere was this more evident than in Taku Harbor where a bald eagle was sitting on one of the most distant pilings making up the pier where Mahdee was moored along with a large recreational trawler. I was sitting in the cockpit when the bald eagle swooped towards me and plucked a fish from the water just 50 feet away. I knew that any attempt to dive for my camera was futile even though it was only about 5 feet away. I decided to just enjoy the moment. A woman on the trawler, however, grabbed her camera and spun to get the shot and the eagle flew off to its distant piling top to eat. We both figured the show was over and she put down the camera. The eagle once again came between our two boats and snagged another fish. The woman on the trawler spun to get another photo and the eagle spun off in an evasive course that took it back to the piling while avoiding the camera. I again thought about getting my camera, but knew that the eagle had eaten two fish and had to be full. Wrong. Again it came at me for a third fish and later a fourth. I don’t know how many fish that eagle could have eaten because a shore-party of hikers returned to the pier scaring off the eagle from its glutinous perch.
Every time I was excited about an eagle photo I had taken, Brenda and I would display it on the big monitor and see the brown patch with the white–the white was a signature feature of a bald eagle. We would blow up the photo until the brown and white was big and blurry and Brenda would console me by saying that my lens just isn’t a Sharon lens and that I need not be disappointed. My acquiescence to the diabolical cleverness of eagle camera awareness certainly resulted in several lost photo opportunities even considering my modest lens. I like to think I got the upper hand on two occasions. The first was shortly after leaving Juneau when an eagle decided that Mahdee’s main mast was the perfect moving vantage point to hunt from. I came out of the hatch which was directly under the eagles butt–probably an eagle blind spot–and got some photos of an unconcerned bird with its claws dug into my precious weather station staring down at me while I snapped some pictures. Actually, I am not sure who had the upper hand there.
The second event, however, was more in my favor. We were tied up to Papkes Landing in the middle of the Wrangell Narrows which was a great staging spot for us to take advantage of an ebb tide which would occur at first light the next morning. I was in the chart house when a bald eagle landed on a piling next to the boat. To be fair, that eagle could not have been expecting us there. I am pretty sure the locals didn’t want us there because everyone we spoke to told us we would be hard aground at low tide. Odd since I knew we would have 2-3 feet so I am pretty sure transient boaters are discouraged from stopping there. Thus, the bald eagle wasn’t expecting anyone aboard Mahdee. I slid open the hatch, poked my head out and got a couple of photos before the bald eagle realized its predicament and flew off. Finally a bald eagle photo that wasn’t all blurry–a clear victory for me.
In general, it was tough getting close enough to wildlife for a good photo with my limited lens. I knew that was going to be a challenge before starting on this adventure. Whales and birds where plentiful, but tough targets to capture. Part of that toughness was my philosophy not to harass the wildlife. We never altered course to “chase” a whale and on several occasions had to put Mahdee in neutral to mitigate an evolving potential collision with a whale–fortunately for both parties no collisions ever occurred. I had an unexpected photographic success when a black oyster catcher flew by right next to me. It turns out that there was a nest somewhere nearby and the black oyster catcher wanted me to chase after it so I could be lured away from the nest. I was happy to oblige it for a photo opportunity in return. I got my shot and then left the area so that the eggs or little ones could be tended by the parents.
All in all, I am happy with the wildlife photos we took. We barely scratched the surface of places to visit and see, so we know we will be returning to Alaska and BC Canada. On that next trip, I hope to have a better wildlife lens–maybe not an uber lens like Sharon’s, but one that will extend my photographic capabilities.
Bald Eagle atop Mahdee’s Main Mast
Black Oyster Catcher
