Orcas! Otters! Bears! Oh my!


Local pod of Orcas
We often see this pod of Orcas as we fish the Bay of Alaska outside Yakobi Island. The big bull is especially impressive as we can see his very large dorsal fin from quite a distance as they bear down on our fishing boat to enjoy the feast they think we have gathered for them. I am always thrilled and dismayed to see them in the distance. Thrilled by their grace and power thru the ocean but dismayed that they will chase away or eat any fish that are following the boat before we can harvest them for our livelihood.


Otter checking us out
Otters are a common occurrence on the outside coast. We often see them floating around in many anchorages. In Sitka Sound earlier in the season we saw a raft of them that was made up of several dozen. I enjoy watching them floating along on their backs, often cleaning their next meal or carrying their little ones on their stomachs.

We have seen several brown bears (but not nearly as many as last year at this time). Twice we’ve had a bear swim near the boat to get from one island to another. It is always remarkable to see the ease with which they cross fairly large bodies of water. The bear in this picture is just climbing up the bank after
After the swim
crossing a large bay we were leaving early one morning. The bear show in this bay (Sukoi) was impressive. We stayed there several different nights in June. One night, and early the next morning, we saw at least 2 dozen deer on the beaches within the bay. A few days later we stayed there again and this time no deer but 7 bear! I guess the word was out in the bear community that there was prey in the bay. 
We saw one run a 2nd bear off from its kill that we then saw him feasting on.


Grazing at our anchorage

 He patrolled the vicinity all night and the next morning so although we couldn’t see what he was eating it must have been fairly large for him to feast on it for that long. I hope it wasn’t the fawn we saw there a couple of days before, but we often see the cycle of life played out here – one life given up to sustain another.


Comments

  1. Lee KeimAugust 27, 2019 at 5:09 PM

    I love following your wildlife encounters

    ReplyDelete

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