Went out on a point count route with a Fish and Wildlife
friend this morning, along the South Fork of Eagle River on
a hiking trail. Beautiful day, starting cool and zooming towards
80 by midday.

The area is fairly open and alpine with scattered stands of
willow, hemlock and alder. White-crowned and Golden-
crowned Sparrows predominate, along with lots of Hermit
Thrushes (who taught us some new sounds). On the way
in we saw a bull moose in velvet antlers bedded down below
us. When we got up higher I was scanning the slopes opposite
for sheep and glassed onto two brown bears, either a sow
with a very large cub or two 3-4 year olds, grazing and moving
fairly rapidly in the right direction (away from us).

On the way out we saw a mama moose with two fuzzy
reddish calves in a little puddle lake below us. I rarely see
moose standing in water, despite the usual artistic
renderings on gold pans. We watched until they departed
into the surrounding shrubbery.

Maureen spotted a raptor coming down the valley and it
turned out to be a male harrier carrying prey. Suddenly
a female harrier loomed up from below it and got the
"hand off." First time I've seen that. They must be nesting
in the vicinity. Sad thing is, I now can't describe this to
school kids when I do a bird program because the Northern
Harrier I show just died suddenly this week. Seeing
them in the wild helps put things back in perspective.

Last treat of the day as we approached the trail head -
two Spruce Grouse chicks standing nervously in
small spruce trees, while mom stood on the ground,
grousefully practicing her chief strategy, i.e. total
denial.

With a tip of the binoculars to my mammaling friend, Andy,
Chris Maack
Bird Treatment & Learning Center
Anchorage, AK
CMaack at compuserve.com