Did You Ever See A Stickleback Asking For His Money Back...?

On Wednesday, June 10th, Kat Shaw (you can read her field blog here)and Jeff Huenemoerder arrived for their summer field season in Alaska. Both study behavior of male threespine stickleback, so they are well-suited for collaborating in the field.

Noffer (our Forester) took a turn for the worse. His taillights wouldn't turn off, so we traded him in for a beautiful powder-blue Toyota Highlander that immediately became known as "the sexy beast." The Beast seats four people plus all of our equipment rather more comfortably than Noffer could have, so all is well with the world.

Lauren observes Kat and Jeff snorkeling in their dry suits. Willow Lake.

With more people around (Lauren and I no longer have to make dinner every night - woo hoo!), we have a little more incentive to go out and do fun things together. Lauren and I are an efficient trapping machine, but as our collecting winds down we've been looking for other things to fill our time. So we all took a trip up to Talkeetna!

They have an annual decorate-the-moose contest in Talkeetna. Don't worry; he's with the band.

Kat, Lauren, and Jeff.

Of course we're good scientists; we did our fair share of work up in Talkeetna while we were there. Re-trapped two Benka Lake and Trouble Lake (much to Jeff's mosquito-prone chagrin) and did observations in Y Lake. (Yes, there is an X and a Z.) And then we rewarded ourselves with a walk through the tourist traps and a fabulous dinner at the West Rib Pub and Grill.

Of course, we just wouldn't be us without a funny story to tell. So when Lauren and I showed up at the access to the trail leading out to Trouble Lake and saw some conscientious citizen's posted sign about two grizzly bears seen in the area... We decided to be very loud as we walked down the trail. Which is how we ended up singing multiple stanzas of "Down By The Bay" with biology-related lyrics. (See title of this entry.)

Other fun things we do: a stickleback pie we made for Kat and Jeff's arrival!
I promise we didn't cook any fish. It was peaches and blueberries.

- Rachel

Planet Earth

Swans at Beverly Lake, 2008. One example of the waterfowl we often see at collection lakes.

Most of the wildlife that we are exposed to while we work in the field up here in south central Alaska is seen in fleeting glimpses. Long enough to scramble for a camera, take a few shaky shots, and then exclaim over the incident. More often, that wildlife is seen at a distance - our grizzly on the Kenai, for example, or any one of the number of moose we see browsing from our seats in the car.

However, we are often witness to the daily lives of the birds that live on the lakes we visit. Red-necked grebes, loons, ducks, terns, Bonaparte gulls... I've gotten to the point where I know many of them by sound as well as sight.

So we thought the sounds of grebes and loons calling together was maybe only slightly more interesting than normal when we walked down the dock at Lalen Lake to pull our traps. Our contact, Paul, was sunning himself on the end of the dock.

"Oh yeah, they're putting up a fuss because there's an eagle hanging around," he told us. We nodded sagely, knowing this was certainly cause for smaller waterfowl to put up a fuss, and set about our business.

Eagles aren't exactly adored by their avian fellows. (Anchor River. Sorry about the blur from the digital zoom.)

A few minutes later, the loon's calls were becoming a bit raucous and we all looked up. There was one loon and two red-necked grebes out in the middle of the lake. The loon was hooting wildly, slapping its wings against the water and stretching out its long black neck. It seemed to be attacking the smaller birds. (We've never heard of this happening before, but we have heard some of the locals tell us that a loon will surface beneath or close to other birds to startle them.) Both grebes dove. One resurfaced about thirty feet away from us on the dock closer to shore. The other grebe resurfaced next to the loon, flopping back against the choppy waters, its wings moving weakly. The loon trumpeted and smacked the water as the grebe struggled with its own injured weight.

We stood on the dock, eyes wide, wondering at the unusual attack we had just witnessed. A second later, a shape streaked out of the sky. The eagle was diving with its wings folded about three-quarters of the way and its yellow talons out. It snatched the grebe and winged off silently over the lake as the loon repeated its triumphant calls of victory, a high and haunting sound.

I didn't even have enough time to swing my camera around and try to get a shot.

As a biology student, this was basically the coolest thing we'd ever seen in our lives. Paul said he'd never seen anything like it in his fifteen years living on the lake. And Lauren merely stated the obvious: "Planet Earth [the famous BBC documentary] right in front of us."

- Rachel

A pair of red-necked grebes. Last year, I watched slack-jawed as a mother grebe laid an egg in her nest right in front of me. So I've been lucky enough to have seen both the creation and destruction side of things.

In Which We Try Many Things and Only Sometimes Succeed

Riddle: What happened here?

This morning dawned a bit cooler due to the rain, but we made ourselves french toast on the camp stove and packed our tents without complaint. We planned to move down to Anchor River today, but only for one night as there are only three places that we really needed to trap (instead of our usual four of five in a day). Having a little extra time, we decided to go for a hike on Skilak Lake Road where there are many trails with excellent views of the lakes in the area. We'd already heard about one trail from our campground hosts.

After packing up camp, we set off down the road and found a nice little trail marked at 1.5 miles.

Rachel.

It was a beautiful walk at first. The lupines and roses were all in full bloom, and we had a nice view of lake and mountains off to our left. The trail was easy enough, and there was no one else around to interrupt the peaceful morning.

And then we came across this:

Bear scat. In the middle of our hiking trail.

We both stopped and looked at each other for a few minutes, weighing our options. There are plenty of black bears in the area; we saw a few of them last year and have heard of other people seeing them this year. The omnipresent issue of how to deal with wildlife is something most people deal with in Alaska. Even Anchorage has more than a thousand wild moose living within the city limits! Anyway, we decided to hike up the trail a little longer, talking a little louder, being a little more aware.

Cue second pile of scat.

"Well, I'm pooped! Let's head back to the car!"

Yes. And we hiked all .5 miles of it. Honestly.

Off to Anchor River we went.

On the way, we picked up the traps we'd thrown the day previously and found something very unusual at Encelewski Lake (in answer to the above riddle).

Lauren: "Um, I don't think this is going to catch anything."

Seems some moose decided to take a little walk on the shoreline, and... well... The moose is a rather large animal. Needless to say, only nine out of ten traps caught at Encelewski.

We moved on down the peninsula, threw traps at Deep Creek, Anchor River, and Mud Bay, toured around the city of Homer for awhile (because it is gorgeous and nothing like the other cities on the Kenai). We set up camp quite close to the beach at Anchor River. I fell asleep listening to the roar of the ocean, the rush of the wind past my tent, and the calls and cackling of bald eagles along the waterfront. It was glorious.

In the morning, I stumbled bleary-eyed to the bathroom and ran into the campground host on my way back to the car to fetch a peanut butter sandwich. He tilted his head at me and asked if I hadn't been a little cool last night. I laughed it off (thinking of our Kenai trip last year where we experienced MUCH lower temperatures) and told him I was used to it. ...and then I found out that Lauren had slept in the car because the wind whistling around her camping hammock had frozen her out. Oops.

At least it turned into a wonderful day with the sun shining, the eagles flying, and little kids fishing in the river with their parents. We ended our Kenai camping trip on a high note by camping Resurrection Bay and hanging around the city of Seward which I had never been to. But of course, we were glad to be back in Anchorage where the showers and beds were, and even happier that more of our lab members will be coming up to join us in short order.

Anchor River beach front. Apparently the locals will take old trees and bury them with the roots up for eagles to land on. I saw plenty of crows sitting in the gnarled twists of wind-blasted wood, but all of the eagles were out in the middle of the marsh grass, stealing scraps left by the weekend fishermen.

- Rachel

Rain and Roses

The view from a giant rock about thirty feet through the sparse woods surrounding our isolated campsite at Hidden Lake. We both sat up here our first night, reading and working for hours until the sun finally disappeared into the hazy twilight that passes for 'dark' in an Alaskan summer.

Today has given us a new appreciation for how beautiful the weather has been up until now. When we woke up in our tents this morning we found that it had rained. No problem, we thought. The skies looked to be clearing while we ate breakfast (some very tasty home fries from the camp stove). We drove down Skilak Lake Road picking up the traps we'd thrown the day before, humming along with our CDs, contemplating a relatively easy day of throwing only four lakes not too far down the road from Soldotna...

And then it proceeded to rain. All day. Whee!

Fortunately, it did not get that cold so the wet was all we really had to deal with. And since we were only throwing traps in lakes for the rest of the day, I didn't have to complain about getting Sharpie all over my hands from the running ink on our collecting bottles.

Unfortunately, this morning one of our traps got very stuck on a dead tree at Lower Ohmer Lake. Lauren, who is talented at these things, was not going to leave it there by any stretch of the imagination. She was immediately navigating down the short, steep slope full of wild rose bushes in an attempt to find out what was wrong. Her dedication is admirable. She took one wrong step and sat right down on that short-steep-slope-full-of-wild-rose-bushes with one hand clasped tight around another rose bush. I could only watch in dismay as she picked herself up and started prying thorns and prickers out of her palm. It took the better part of this week to get them all out.

But hey! She saved the trap! She hasn't lost one yet.

One of the beautiful (and prickly) wild rose bushes.

- Rachel

And Away We Go...

...down to the Kenai Peninsula.

Some of you may remember my rather epic introduction to the world of threespine stickleback field collecting from last year when Lauren, Jana Loux-Turner, Sophie Valena, and I got to Alaska in mid-May and immediately set out for a week-long camping trip on the Kenai. (If not, you can read about the entire adventure starting at the beginning of the blog here: Four Girls and a Van )

The drive from Anchorage to the Kenai is quite beautiful and we took every opportunity to stop and take pictures. Here, Rachel takes in the view through her camera lens.

This year, we decided to set out for our Kenai camping trip directly after our Talkeetna trip - mostly because two more of our lab members are expected to arrive up here next Tuesday and we don't really want to be speeding up the Sterling/Seward Highways back to Anchorage in order to meet them at the airport. We are responsible. Go figure.

Of course we stopped in Girdwood for the giant snickerdoodles. They are an amazing confection of sugar and warm-baked goodness and procuring them is an essential stop along the way.

Some way down the Sterling Highway though...


We ran into this guy on the side of the highway. He was rooting around for food of some kind in the grass about twenty feet from the road. Stopped all kinds of traffic (including us). People were snapping photos and taking video and the bear just went on with his day, completely oblivious. It is always a thrilling sight to see wildlife so close, and this was the first time Lauren or I had seen a grizzly bear (though it was still small enough to be known as a brown bear) up here in such proximity. However, the minute he started walking toward our car... We both experienced a moment of heart-stopping, stomach-swooping panic, and then Lauren started the engine and the bear startled away in the opposite direction.

It was still one of the coolest things I've ever seen though. Despite the sheer terror.

- Rachel

The Dirty Kind of Clean

Rachel and Lauren in beautiful downtow(n) Talkeetna!
This was after three days of camping so don't judge us too harshly.

Lauren and I just got back from a three day camping trip. We spent Sunday night in the Nancy Lakes area (camping next to South Rolly Lake), and then Monday night up north in Talkeetna. this involved a lot of driving, and a lot of getting dirtier and dirtier. We'd attempt to get clean when possible - for instance, using hand sanitizer - but we knew this was mostly pretend. We were the.. dirty kind of clean.

Lauren creates fire at South Rolly.

Showers this evening back in the unit at Anchorage felt AMAZING, but they're not likely to last. Tomorrow we set out for the Kenai Peninsula. This camping trip will go until Saturday as we made a deal with Dr. Heins to pick up the traps he will throw in Tern Lake on Friday. Ought to be fun shotgunning two camping trips in a row!

As we are a bit wiped out from sleeping outside and would like to crawl into bed soon, this post will be rather picture heavy. Hopefully there will be more detaile d entries about the Kenai when we return this weekend. Until then, hope everyone in the lower 48 is doing well. The weather in Alaska has turned beautiful again, and there's nowhere I'd rather be...

- Rachel

A brightly colored male stickleback pulled from Lynne Lake.

Our campsite at South Rolly. Lauren has a hammock-tent that was interesting to try and figure out. She set it up a little more successfully when we got to Talkeetna. I was smart and decided to sleep in the tent. Haha.

Lauren contemplates the "beach" in Talkeetna.

A very Alaskan bus parked in downtown Talkeetna. Zero to sixty in ten minutes!

Brief Note.

Hello faithful readers of the Stickleblog! To keep everyone up to date - Lauren and I are heading out to South Rolly today for our first camping trip of the season. We will be back in a few days, so you can expect another update then. I also have a lot of pictures from the last few days, and as I mentioned I will have a post about the very interesting parasite that Dr. David Heins studies. Until then!

- Rachel

Remember our pristine, white Subaru? Not For Long has indeed lived up to his name.

I'm Only Happy When It Rains.... (Not)

Lauren trooping out over the muskeg at Pup Lake.

Well, we’ve had a spell of dreary weather out here--which makes the job no more difficult, just slightly less gleeful and photogenic. It started on Tuesday. Down in Point MacKenzie the sky was cloudless and bright and all a frolicking pair of stickleback seekers could want. However, as we headed north toward the Meadow Lakes an ominous, inauspiciously dark blanket of indigo was heading quickly toward us from Hatcher Pass. I’ll tell you, there’s nothing like the not-so-distant rumbling of thunder to motivate a field crew to push the limits of efficiency.

Since then the weather has been of a more mundane variety--drizzling, passing showers, shades of grey. Rachel and I stopped in at the Palmer office of Alaska Department of Fish and Game (it’s not wildlife here, it’s game) on Wednesday to introduce ourselves to Dave Rutz, the local area biologist in charge of the Mat-Su. The new person in charge of our permits is adamant about constant communication between researchers and the local area biologists, so instead of just calling the poor fellow constantly I figured I’d stop in and say hello--THEN call the poor fellow constantly.

Bad weather tends to cause scientists to... act strangely.

Dr. David Heins of the Tulane stickleback lab arrived Thursday night and has been in contact with us--we’ve negotiated communal breakfasting and had a tête-à-tête over collecting locations. As I understand it, Dave has been sampling out here for as long as Dr. John Baker and nearly as long as Dr. Mike Bell--although his focus is more on the parasites that affect stickleback, namely Schistocephalus. (Note from Rachel: I will have an extensive post on this parasite later.)

Dave will be heading down south to the Kenai Peninsula at the beginning of next week, whereas Rachel and I will head north to Willow on our way to Talkeetna. Once we’ve camped up there for a few days we’ll cross paths with Dr. Heins on our way down the Kenai to camp another few days and make our own collections at the lakes he won’t be visiting. Perhaps we’ll be able to meet up with him in Girdwood to chat over a dinner plate-sized snickerdoodle. But let’s be honest, I’ll have one either way.

- Lauren

Sweet Lorraine

Things have just been going splendidly for us in the field so far. Case in point: I wore a tank top the entire day today. Why is this note-worthy? Two reasons. First, it was warm enough in MAY in Alaska to alleviate the necessity of not only several layers, but also any sleeves at all. Second, despite the early and sunny spring, what few mosquitoes are around aren't biting yet. How could it get any better?

Lauren's outfit proves the warm weather.
She is pointing to the dead moose in the waters of Stephan Lake that drove us out of there pretty quickly both days we were there.

Well, I'll tell you that, too.

I've noticed a bit of development in south central Alaska over the now four summers that I've been out here. Mostly, new houses are built and a few lots are cleared for even more future buildings - but today I saw something much bigger (and relevant to me personally). Lorraine Lake is near the tip of Point MacKenzie which is the bit of land directly across the water from Anchorage. It is 15 miles further down the road from the next closest collection location, which, until today, was a dreaded drive over a gravel road with rocks the size of tangerines. Really, it was mor elike driving through a riverbed than a road. But now it is PAVED. The entire fifteen miles. I am sure that Avis will appreciate the dozen fewer dents in the undercarriage that this development has likely allowed. And I appreciate not having to drive 25 miles per hour while clutching the steering wheel with white knuckles and cursing after each rock-meets-metal bang.

Butterfly on the gravel next to Noffer.

I usually dislike making collections at public accesses during holidays, not for misanthropic reasons but because lake traffic firectly correlates to increased risk of trap tamperings (one trap today was found out of the water at Knik Lake). However, I was pleasantly surprised (as is the trend so far this year) to have had charming conversations with locals at nearly half the sites we visited over Memorial Day weekend. I even dropped the forbidden E-word (evolution) after testing out the waters with a local fisherman who proved to be very interested in our research.

- Lauren

Some typical Alaskan wildlife in a Fred Meyer parking lot.

In Which Rachel Really Appreciates Optometry

A fisherman at Dawn Lake shows off his catch.
We are impressed. Everything we catch is less than 6 inches long!

Today I discovered the importance of leaning away from jars of formalin. As we were picking out gravid females at Rabbit Slough, a drop of the stuff splashed up in my eye and I wound up doing my greatest impression of Cry Me A River. And of course i was wearing contacts and didn't have my glasses with me. Which meant I spent the rest of the day seeing the forests, roads, and lakes as big smears of different colors.

So we only threw three lakes today. My bad! Lesson learned. But seriously. I was so clumsy in the unit this morning, I kept expecting something to go wrong. Hopefully it is now all out of my system. Woof.

- Rachel

Lauren counting stickleback at Rabbit Slough. Yes, it really is that close to the Parks Highway.

P.S. from Lauren: I use my own formalin-in-the-eye story from the summer of '06 at Long Lake (which came after our advisor, Dr. John Baker, told me about his own formalin-in-the-eye story at a lake in Alaska from years before) as a chemical safety warning when I bring people out to the field, but I guess Rachel wanted her own (albeit a third-generation) story. Seems fair. I wonder whom her story will fail to warn in the future.