Showing posts with label Bears. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bears. Show all posts

Saturday, October 29, 2011

Herring Cove - More Bears & Eagles - July 23, 2011

We couldn't stay away from Herring Cove and the opportunity to see more bears and eagles. We went here as often as we could. 

 This is Momma Bear. It gives you an idea of how close we were at times. The bears would come up from the creek, which is to the left. They would cross this road and go into the forest to the right. We were all close to our cars and it would have been a mad scramble if Momma Bear decided to come our way.

 But she just gives us a look and moves on into the forest. 

 This is Momma Bear in the forest with her cub.
 Momma Bear is nursing her cub.

Momma Bear is nursing her cub just inside the forest, right in front of this car. Our cars are parked on the other side of the road.

 Another view of Momma Bear and her cub.

 They finished nursing and walked further up the mountain and into the woods.

 This is the creek flowing into the ocean. It is high tide. At low tide we had walked all the way to the point of the trees and watched the salmon fishermen.

 At first we thought these were seals. Turned out to be scuba divers.

This eagle appeared to be injured as he just laid on the rocks and when he did move it was very awkward. We made several phone calls to report this. We had to go down the road a bit before we could even get a signal. Some people came out. They agreed he looked injured. They went to the owners of the property (the zipline and bear watch). They were told that they knew about this eagle. It has a club foot and they get regular reports about him, but that he seems to get along just fine.

 Some seals did finally appear and entertain us for awhile.

 The birds in the trees are all eagles.

 Another view of Herring Cove. The injured eagle is on a rock in the center of the picture. The boardwalk where we see all the eagles sitting while we watch bears is on the right. We would be watching from the other side of the creek. This is part of the bridge that crosses Herring Creek. The pictures above of the high tide area were taken to the left where the creek runs out into the ocean.

 Just one of the MANY eagles.

More of the eagles.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Bears and Seals - July 14

 Herring Cove


Momma bear and cub


 The eagles are always watching.


Crossing the creek.

 This is where we watch from. Usually someone is sitting on the edge and the rest of us stand behind with our cars parked right behind us just off the dirt road.


 Everyone gets a good view and there are sometimes more people here than this.


Fishing for salmon.

Salmon darting past the bears.

From the bridge looking upstream to where the bears are under the boardwalk. You can't see the area where we stand to watch as it is hidden by the trees.

From the bridge looking down stream to see when the creek enters the ocean. There are people fishing down there.




This bear is just across the creek from the people fishing. There is a momma bear and a cub.



The bears head up to the road. They are looking to cross to the other side.

Rather than cross the road they come to the bridge. We are right above them. They cross under the bridge.  Don't think they could do this if the tide were not out.

Coming out on the other side of the bridge.

Creek Street



These guys look so cute peeking their noses out of the water.

For awhile there seemed to be two seals. Later we saw four together.



This commotion in the water is one seal taking off after a salmon (I assume). It chased it for some time causing quite a disturbance. I can't believe how fast these seals can move.



The back of the Creek Street sign. Alaska's wildflower is the "forget-me-not."

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Mostly the bears and eagles at Herring Cove - July 14

Schoenbar Road is the steepest street in Ketchikan. There are gates at both the top and part way up that close the street to traffic when the weather is too icy/snowy.

 Going up.


 Going back down.

Herring Cove...
The eagles are perched and waiting.

Watching and waiting for salmon.

He got one! He has no intention of sharing it, so he is off to the forest.

These two eagles followed him and they are watching...










 This is the point we watch from. There are often several people here with cameras and others just to watch. This area is raised above the creek so we have a good view and don't have to worry about the bears. Or so we thought...
This is the momma bear. She was down below with her cub. Then she went into the forest and came out here on the road, just a short ways from where we park our cars. Thankfully, she ignored us and just crossed the road.






Chasing a salmon.


 

 He caught a big one. The innards spilled out on the beach as he brought it in. Then the eagles swooped in and fought over them.
 










It is so wonderful to be able to watch these awesome creatures.