Mostly sunny, with thin overcast moving over later in the day. Calm, with light ot moderate winds developing in the afternoon.
Connor asked if I wanted to go over to Kruzof today. He was thinking Point Brown. I have wanted to revisit the river otter trail there, plus it’s just interesting to poke around.
We headed out around 10:30 this morning. Based on a conversation I heard from others at the Starrigavan boat ramp, it was just as well we didn’t get an earlier start. There was thick fog out that way.
We headed across in full sun with glassy water. Since it was so nice, and we headed out along the shore of Kruzof a bit further south, thinking we would go to Point Brown afterward.
Along the way, we stopped to take pictures of a pair of Ancient Murrelets – I think maybe one adult and a juvenile, but I’m not sure.
We decided to go ashore at Inner Point. We arrived not long after high tide (which wasn’t very high), but didn’t plan to be on there for long.
There are several shallow pools along the shoreline here. Much of the area seems to be at just the right level for upper beach vegetation to thrive.
We saw some ducks and Canada Geese, but few shorebirds.
We ended up pushing a bit further than we originally intended before turning around [oops].
Just south of the point, there is a small lagoon which seemed like it should be getting surge, but it wasn’t. I think this is probably where others I’ve talked to anchored (they said they anchored on that side of the point – I wondered how, since it seems to be facing the direction of the swell).
A dozen or more Black Oystercatchers were out along the edge of the water, and one Marbled Godwit was with them.
Among the plants growing on the upper beach, I noticed several introduced species. I was interested to see them doing well. Among them was possibly Hordeum jubatum (which maybe is actually native)? It’s the first time I’ve seen it.
A willow tree caught my eye. It’s possibly a Sitka willow (which is our most common larger willow), but it seemed a little different than I’m used to.
I found a new-to-me plant that I think is a buttercup [Update: It was alkalai buttercup]. Maybe another growing in shallow pool that might be in Pogamogetonaceae or possibly Ruppia, but I’m not sure.
Our choice of anchorage didn’t turn out to be compatible with the time we took walking during the falling tide.
There was still water around the boat when Connor got back (he had gone on ahead of me), but it was hung up on rocks. We tried a little to get it moved, but it wasn’t going anywhere until the tide came back up.
I had known it was flat, and mentioned it to Connor when we came in. However we also knew the tide was only going to fall around 3.5 feet over the 4.5 hours from the time we had anchored. It dropped a little faster and further than I think we were expecting.
In hindsight, we probably would have been fine if we hadn’t pushed on to the last point (which we almost didn’t). I’m guessing if our time away had been half an hour shorter, we could have made it out.
Instead, we had another two and a half hours until low tide plus an unknown, but probably similar length of time before the tide rose high enough to refloat the boat (fortunately the evening high was higher, or we could have been stuck overnight).
With the boat not going anywhere, and nothing to do but wait, we set out to explore.
There is an animal trail along just inside the woods which we followed until noticing a muddy game trail that went up a steep slope.
We passed through some (blow down) second growth and scrub forest above the slope on a meandering route that ultimately took us to a bog.
It was not as open as most other bogs I see around here, and we didn’t spend much time in it.
We crossed through a patch of woods to a larger bog. As we were entering, two cranes flushed, calling as they flew.
With hours before the boat floated, we were in no rush.
One small mound had exposed dirt, while other nearby mounds did not. I wondered if it was a place young deer liked to play (a question for a trail cam to answer, perhaps).
I rooted around in the crowberries and picked up some liverworts to look at later.
This particular bog had some interesting erosion patterns in places. I’m not sure how/why the there wasn’t peat that kept the water from cutting down into the underlying volcanic ash. For whatever reason, it was exposed with channels running through. I didn’t really try and follow them, though on a future visit it might be interesting to investigate more thoroughly.
A raven calling and flying in the middle distance was the first I had noticed today. I wondered if it was calling over where a deer was (perhaps in hope of getting a meal).
Connor was carrying a rifle and had hopes of seeing a buck (doe season doesn’t open until tomorrow).
As we neared the end where we planned to head back to the beach, he spotted a deer. It didn’t have antlers, but we gave it a closer look look.
Connor spent some time trying to confirm it was a buck – he ultimately did, but lost sight of it briefly while reviewing his pictures to confirm. Then he wasn’t sure if maybe a second deer was there as well. By this time the deer might have caught his scent with a shift of wind, in any case it pranced into the forest before he could take a shot.
I noticed what seemed to be a bit of trail beside a puddle, but then it didn’t seem to continue, so I moved on. Then I noticed more and realized I was seeing an otter trail. It was another well-worn trail that’s clearly being used by otters fairly often over years. The base of it is not much narrower than a deer trail, but the vegetation hangs over the edges, unlike with a deer trail.
I followed it back a little ways into the bog, but not too far.
As I had noticed on the Point Brown otter trail, it was utilizing ponds as part of the route. The trail fragment I had seen and then dismissed was where they went into (or out of) the water.
We followed this trail down to the beach. I can now say following otter trails through forest (at least this one) is not recommended for easy travel.
Any place there was enough of a downhill (and it didn’t take much), it looked like the otters were sliding. This was especially true on the last stretch that dropped down from the bluff. It looked like there may have been basically parallel uphill route that didn’t go where the sliding down did.
I think the cranes we flushed earlier had flown to the beach. They remained quite wary, and took off while we were still far away. We flushed them twice more before they flew off far enough to not be between us and where we were going.
When we got back to the beach, the boat was still well out of the water.
We walked another loop around the point.
We confirmed the lagoon we thought looked promising as an anchoring area remained with plenty of water. Next time we’ll probably go this side. There are still some flats to be wary of, but it’s a bit steeper.
I made some intertidal observations walking the shoreline on the way back
Sitting looking out towards the water waiting for it to rise, I saw a whale breaching repeatedly over by Gagarin Island.
Connor went up to get a bucket and on return mentioned lots of nettles.
I went to check them out. I found it interesting they weren’t elsewhere that we had been along the upper shoreline. There were certainly plenty of them in this section just north of the point.
When my phone’s sunset notification went off 20 minutes before sunset, the water was nearly up around the boat (though not high enough to touch the bottom).
We had a nice view of the moon rising to the southeast – I sure would have liked to have my 100-500mm lens. I made due with the 800mm and with my phone. Neither was very satisfactory (not that they would have been great photos anyway, but they would have been better).
It was around 20 minutes post sunset that the water was up far enough that we started trying to push it off the rocks. We had to wait a few more minutes, then it was floating. It was just over 6 hours after we had originally intended to leave and found the boat stuck.
By this time light was fading fast. A breeze out of the south had blown up some chop, but not enough for consistent white caps. Fortunately, since we weren’t heading into it, Connor could run on step without any trouble.
We had to take more care coming between Middle Island and Gavanski Islands, since there are rocks there and it was getting difficult to see.
We successfully navigated those with the help of the chart on Connor’s phone, then were able to cruise into the Old Sitka boat launch. Though not quite full dark, but was definitely close.
My iNaturalist Observations for Today
