Has anybody seen a juvenile eagle around?

Yesterday we went to see the eagles again, no sign of the young one. Both parents were still around. The nest had totally fallen apart.

Exactly two weeks ago, it was still there, looking good.

Now Don and i only observe them for a half an hour or so, when we go there. The young one could have been flying around elsewhere exploring the world, who knows.

We have seen a lot of raptors lately, it seems to be a good year:)  in the yard there are the  4 Northern Goshawks. Recently we have seen Kestrels, Peregrine Falcons and we are not quite sure what this is, it was flying over the Mendenhall Meadows

an eaglet in the aerie

Seemingly one eaglet, but we don't know, not much activity today.
A few weeks ago, (we go look once a week) we did see an eaglet poop, that was pretty cool; it lifted up it's bum and shot a white stream ( of poop) over the edge of the nest.
Maybe one more week for it/them to start thinking of leaving the nest.

incredible eagles

"Oh dear" today we made it out to look at our family of bald eagles again; we only saw one adult sitting on the nest, motionless the whole time we were watching 10 minutes. It seemed if the nest was smaller, as if the bottom had fallen off. I feared that all eaglets had fallen out and the lone parent was grieving. Don said, "no she/he is just sitting on them" as it was raining a bit, "to protect them."  I was all sad though, i couldn't imagine those big eaglets all underneath her/him.
an hour later on our way back, i went to check again.
I saw two adults, and! at least one eaglet.
Now looking at the photos from last week too, it is actually obvious that a whole addition was build onto the nest. The shape of the nest not as round but more rectangle, which had give ( for me) the impression that it was smaller, but in fact it was twice as big.

Incredible!

agility

reposted from my facebook page:
Yes, maybe still looking pretty good, and staying fit.. but for a year now, i have been waking up ( and getting out of the car) rather stiff, stiff legs. I know i am getting older too, but i wonder if anybody has any suggestions. When you are my age or older and are still totally agile, i would love to know what you think could be your secret. Thanks!

laying back in the reindeermos

ancient sand dunes covered in lichen

Bald eaglets

Today we will go look at the eaglets if they are okay.
Last week after the rain the nest look a little precarious.

There seem to be two eaglets

According to the research, incubation is 35 days ( 5 weeks)
and the eaglets being nestlings 56 till 98 days ( 8 to over 12 weeks)

We first saw the Eagle on  Jan 13 2017
We saw them together on Jan. 29 2017
We saw them standing on the nest  and  close to the nest in February and March. (March 26 they were not yet sitting on the nest)
We saw one Eagle sitting deep into the nest on April 15
and from then on.
 and June 3 we saw Eaglets!

Now assuming that they were sitting on eggs  before April 15
plus 35 days
is  before May 20

Assuming that they were hatched before May 20
that could bring us to them being fledglings before July 15 or as late as August 15, 2017

Still a ways to go

And last week the eaglets  were big but still grey and not standing up in the nest yet.

today

All is well! 

a very peacefull family

so according to what i am reading, and saw today, they could be 5 weeks old.

right on.

spot land applications

In the last few days something kind of became clearer for me.

Not in a good way.

In Whitehorse there is an idea that spot land application are BAD
with spot land application i mean, what it means to me:

residency in the the middle of nature...well it is already by law established you can't be right in the middle, you have to be close to an existing road.

The story goes, all these people wanting to live outside of the city limits, create a very large footprint on the environment. the story goes that they demand government services. Hence which would create a very large footprint.

As does our new water well here in the community, which i was dead set against.

I can only speak for myself, but i am sure there are more who think the same

I came to live rurally, to be without many amenities.

Like one thing of the problem is that the government feels it should provide all these amenities.

Like there is a statement "to give everybody clean water/ internet access" etc etc

I think they/we confuse two things.

There are people who are born and raised in poor conditions and are suffering because of that and yes, i do think my government has a responsibility to provide accessibility to education, water etc.

But hence, it seems to me, that now under that rule of looking after, they impose upon me that i be looked after.

I am not asking, i am not even wanting all these services.

I CHOOSE to live they way i do.

bears have long tongues

I did not know that.

 And this bear might like oranges, it plonked into the water behind me as i was peeling my orange. It definitely was coming to us ( Don and I) . We were having our lunch on an island in the river, and had been eating ham sandwiches  half an hour earlier.
Quickly we jumped in the canoe and paddled/motored away. The bear did stop it's approach after we kind of yelled at it "whoa bear" kind of thing. Leisurely it climbed back on shore and traveled the same direction as us.

But talking about food, so yes no more plastic packaging or any packaging for that matter.
Since last post, i did not buy anything in a package yet. Oranges can be bought without being in a bag, i can bring my own to the store. Bread, same. Ham, maybe when i buy it from the butcher in Porter Creek.  I am not particularly interested in ham , i can live without it. And i actually do not eat much bread

I have to say, in my household my husband does most of the shopping, so it is going to ask for some self discipline to only eat  foods that come whole without being packaged. I am weaning myself off slowly.

Dinner tonight; chili made with beans,  and wild herbs and rhubarb from the garden,

plastic

And  a snow goose told me;

When you care about me,

- stop buying  plastic-

plastic or things that come in plastic, or if there is no way around , leave the plastic packaging in the store.
and NOT replace it with something else, something equally (or just differently) wasteful.

and obviously, it is just me asking you, using the goose.

When you care about the environment let's just  -en masse- stop the plastic craze.

I  am here now trying to think how that will look for me....
 firstly i have a lot of friggin plastic laying around the house to reuse
I will get back to you when i come to a point were i have to make a choice, to either stop doing altogether what i normally do (an action which includes plastic), because for me the problem is not that simple as using paper bags, we have been there and done that. We all now have our reusable grocery bags with us.

Thank you

and...something else... it being 6-6-2017 Alexander turned 26 today! Happy Birthday beautiful son.

snow geese

Takhini saltflats

 straggler snow geese

June 4 2017

And for that matter there were still 9 swans at mendenhall landing the day before.

I had never seen snow geese before, what an awesome big bird!

It rained!

And now everything is bright green
my forest enclosed me in a most dramatic way
kusawa lake is open, to see that much water, made me gasp.
and not least and neither last
all sorts of plants popped up and ones that were there hugging the ground grew a foot, and are blooming all in two days.

and oh yes nothing to do with the rain 

the bald eagle has at least one chick!

Using less, enjoying more

 Again, what i have tried to talk about before.

Yesterday i listened  to an you-tube video of an interview with Peter Wohlleben.
He talks about how trees communicate with eachother.  In the interview  someone asks, what can i do for the forest? And he clearly says something like " by using less natural resources".

Why is that so hard to say, or not being said very often?

Here this morning on the radio it is 'Climate Change' again, we apparently have our own Yukon example now, Kluane Lake.  No we don't need to dig out the lake to make it deeper ( it's for real, a yukon politician is suggesting this)  And  YES (to another politician), we need  government regulation and incentives. But i keep thinking

-We need to use LESS-

Not so simple.
Today and tomorrow i will drive the 100 km into town, with a jeep, that uses lots of gas.  After my Jetta broke down, we opted not to buy an even smaller car (more efficient), but I use the old Jeep, that we already own. Do i need to drive twice this week?

It is all those decisions
USE LESS
and ENJOY MORE

I think that is the essence.

Looking at what I do ( what resources I use) and look at the intention behind it. And keep it up till it becomes a habit....And i have found often my body will crave that new habit, in a good way.

Can I reach my goals in a simpler way, using less?
And actually get more out of it.

Often i do get more out of it.

Staying close to home for my walk

I found this

yellow anemones

They actually bloom close to my home. In the last few days I found two locations that i did not even know about.

This gives me great JOY:)

and do you see these horsetails beside it, they apparently make a nice meal, i did not try them yet.

spring horsetails

and i recently read a good rule for harvesting in the wild

take 1 leave 20

Collecting spruce tips at the moment i do not have to worry about that, there are millions around here.

I dry them for winter use

and use them sparingly in stir-fries

i will add one or two cooking rubarb

ha! Intention: to eat healthy, what grows right in my back yard, for free in a natural way,  and to think of  Peter Wohlleben, I am sure i keep the spruce trees happy. They love being nibbled on, i am sure.

I found a river crossing,

but it got over my thighs deep, and i had to turn around a third of the way across. And the water was so pleasant surprisingly not too cold. It had traveled ...how do you measure a river that meanders, as the crow flies it came from a lake 70 km away , Dezadeash Lake.
Instead I walked the banks and found indeed, some elf he told me, that the Platanthera obtusata, an orchid, is almost blooming

 Cross my fingers let her live.

I do spend a lot of time, positively identifying flowers, call it an obsession. getting to know their names.

What it is all about for me, is that every flower is an unique being. Some flowers/plants thrive anywhere, but some not, they need moisture soil, light temperature and who know what else, to be just right.

Like this  bog orchid, it just needs everything to be just so, otherwise it won't grow.

And walking for hours along that river, i was fortunate to find just that place where she thrives.

What i am trying to say

lets me/us be conscious of my/our actions.

When i sit here behind the computer, this computer is made somewhere, places.  from something,that was taken from places. It had to travel here over places.

places places 

one of those places might just that particular place where that one particular flower could grow.

Doesn't  every flower have the right to bloom?

And just what if my existence depends on it?

Let's always be aware which river we want to cross.

summer birth

 a new born Canadian Tiger Swallowtail!

And all sorts of summer today

a hummingbird

windflowers blooming

and me

tripping over 

blues

 butterflies

cross foxes

How awesome to watch some cross foxes

 here it was doing a leap in the air

while watching them for probably a half an hour, the bigger one was hunting all the time and made several leaps in the air. 

 they were aware of us watching, but we kept our distance, and maybe as luck had it, some talking bicyclists passed above them the same time we arrived, as we stood motionless . the foxes visibly aware of both us and bicyclists, but no way to flee, we blocked one way and the bicyclist the other. The bicyclist had not seen the foxes and kept biking, they being gone and we standing still, the foxes resumed their activities.

They did leave when we moved. We know there are fox-sized animal made caves in the bank below, and i once flushed a fox while hiking on the hillside above. One went in the direction of the hillside, the other, i think, just stayed.

 Later close to home we saw the elk...A few days okay i was telling someone about my saskatoon berries...how i often get a good harvest, as long as the elk don't trim the bushes...we'll see. I don't mind.

Bears

She/he, what always gets my attention, moves so much like a human.

This is the fourth bear now that i know off ( and at least two different ones) this spring that visits my yard, and this one is NOT walking past, but obviously crossing right through it. Yesterday i did discover she did find my buried compost. So burying compost doesn't work obviously.
I am already eating more peels then ever, have little compost, and i am not willing to give up composting. I am a real advocate of looking after my own garbage, instead of giving it to the government to look after it.

I read Charlie Russel's work again this morning, after the encounter. He tells us to build trust, but also not to feed them garbage. hmmm

I do like the trust thing, this bear appeared very friendly

Although (looking at the path she took i assume she was here yesterday) In the photo the brownish new green is a willow tree, it had a ripped off branch,(two inches diameter) and bear paw prints underneath.

Why the willow? bees? who are non-stop buzzing around it's female flowers that are blooming. the new green? the flowers?

As you see in this picture, my yard could be more open, less  stuff.  ( openness is one of the things i believe in to keep wild animals from liking my yard too much.

???????
 Don ( my husband) is not too worried, he believes they will move on when Nature finally will explode into good  food to eat. And yes vegetation seems a little sparse for the time of year, possibly due to drought and cold nights.

But what do i do in the meantime? I DO NOT want to habituate bears in eating garbage. For my sake, theirs and my  human neighbours.

For today i keep the compost inside.
These bears here didn't  seem to have touched my dry heaps of compost...
I always do wet composting, maybe i change to drying it, draining it from all water, having it dried up a bit before i bring it outside.
and eating eating eating whatever i can myself instead of creating waste.... peels are mostly quite healthy!

Green leaves!

Yesterday and today we finally had some rain, and slightly warmer temperatures, meaning the highs are not much higher but the lows were higher,  above zero celsius the last few days...i think.

Here and there a wash of light green over the poplar trees, the leaves are coming out.

And  finally flowers!

Today May 13, 2017
the bluff cinquefoil, ( Potentilla arenosa)

beautiful jacob's ladder 

yesterday May 12, 2017 on the top of the mountain, she might already have been blooming for a while, the douglasia

lower down finally a Northern jasmine, very tiny ones

and on top again , we found one blackish oxytrope

Empetrum nigrum

Today i fell in love with Empetrum nigrum
an empress
of course i always loved her
her freshness, her darkness, her locale
recently she did reveal herself to me
but today meeting her
in the wild
in full regalia
i was swept of my feet
i tell you, you do have to kneel before her
deeply
because looking down on her, you won't see her

let me introduce to you
the tiniest of tiny
the moss berry flower

soapberry flower

and more

 bear berry

  a lichen

moisture

It rained once last month, when i look for the data of Whitehorse, it say 7 mm precipitation for April  2017. That sounds about right for here in Mendenhall.
My heart goes out to the people who have too much water now.

It did snow here this morning, it melted and made the surface slightly mosit
and i did find a flowering kinnikenick in that weather, i snacked on them.

and for lunch amazingly i found some coltsfoot flowers, they taste very good, i blanched them.

and yesterday i am happy to say, i finally found a blooming townsendia ( i don't eat those). I have been looking for it to bloom for a month, but with the weather maybe dry and sunny, the average temperature for April 2017  +3 C

I am also still winning birch sap.

When foraging i always do take care to take little of what there actually is.

and something else i don't eat but is blooming;

a cotton grass and juniper and a moss

free meal with a free drink

Another gorgeous spring day with many new sights/sounds/smells and tastes!
and a first yesterday;....the realization that this beautiful weather ....well one here in the yukon always has to realize that it could be quite different.. lets keep it at that
The free meal with free drink

no not spider legs

Aspen catkin in a stir fry and collected half a cup of Birch sap

readers

I am glad i do have readers here, :) as i don't track it, i never know.

I got this lovely note from a friend who also lives in the wilds along the Alaska Highway

I have enjoyed following your writings and photos of Spring in Keeper of Wild Places. Thanks.

We took what is probably our last walk across the river ice yesterday. It is darkening a lot and candling with some open places along the shore. We went to our "secret garden". We had avoided it because of the shooting blind. But we wanted to see what was happening with the plants. And we did see our first Crocuses in bloom there.

The day before we saw tracks in the mud of a black bear and a little cub on "highway one" across the river. Now we have to wait until the ice breaks up and clears and we can canoe across. The resident bald eagle pair are back at the farm.

The Farmers Market starts, May 18, 2017. I have all the jewelery I can possibly sell, but I am still making some items just for the fun of making them.

Let us know when the Townsendias bloom. Maybe we can all go back to see them at the salt flats then.

Blessings,

Sharon Wisemyn

Thank you Sharon and here a photo of the eagles farther up river, Don and I 'first' spotted one sitting on the nest at April 15, 2017