Richard:

I double clicked on these with my 17-inch screen lap-top. Wow. Vivid!

….like Bierstadt and Church with a color camera; and examples of what the aesthetic philosophers were talking about when they spoke of sublime scenery inspiring awe.

Is it normal for Virginia Creek to be so reduced in flowage, post-Spring freshet, by mid-May?

I couldn't really tell you Russell, but I think this is a bit unusual for this early. This was a different spring though. Tons of snow came late then it warmed fast and the snow went away faster than I've ever seen. I'd guess that normally it's a tad higher than this at this point. It doesn't have a huge catchment area though. All the rivers and creeks out there are pretty tamed down already, and some remarkably so. I don't take these with a fancy camera; just a 12 megapixel Canon S100 PowerShot point n' shoot that fits in a shirt pocket.

Flew down to the lower Wood River today and helped a friend clear trails around his moose camp. This is what moose browse on when they're hungrier than normal and browse is scarce. I've never seen this before. I think our late and deep spring snows drove them to munch on these aspens.

That’s very common Richard, in the Northeast here. In Vermont where I hunt I see it all the time but especially on maples, both sugar maple and red maple about the same size at those on your picture and maybe up to 8”-10” in diameter.
We have poplars, often referred to as quaking aspen, though I don’t know if they are the same species as yours, and rarely if ever do I recall any sign of moose stripping like they do the maples. They do that to get the nourishing cambium between the bark and the wood... same thing a beaver gous after.
However, moose will stand on their hind legs and grab the tops of poplars and maples with a stem size of between 1” and 2” and break them off, leaving them attached, and eat all of the buds on the tips.

Thanks for showing thise pictures Richard.





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The moose here seem to be only interested in the aspens when they're young shoots; they don't seem to browse bigger trees, even when I cut them down and they're on the ground. They do a good job of trimming the young aspens around the edge of my pad every winter. The rabbits savage the bark on the downed trees, but the moose seem to much prefer willows and birch, which they break branches off as you describe, and when I cut one down in winter I leave it whole until the moose have had their way with it. It's fun to watch out the window. I have never seen them browse aspen/poplar bark like this, and there's a LOT of this aspen around this region. I've seen wild horses do this to mountain cedar in Utah in the summer... they had to be pretty hungry to do that!

I'm told by a botanist friend in Anchorage that he sees a lot of this barking of aspens by moose in the local parks around the city. The "city moose" down there have much more limited forage than here in the Interior.

Speaking of moose and critters. A friend just sent me this from Anchorage. He lives on the hillside flanks of the Chugach Range on the edge of town so gets frequent wildlife visitors. This little bear ran across his deck yesterday afternoon then into the woods where he got this picture. The cow and calf seem to like his lawn and like to lounge there. This is a great moose shot. Life in the northland, eh?

When my son, and his wife were living at Fisher House, at Elmandorf AFB in Anchorage, last year, this moose delivered her calf, literally 15 feet from the their bedroom window. He was born the same day as my grandson, so they named him Junior

My fishing and hunting pal Lenny, who lives in Denmark, ME. was turkey hunting this morning and almost tripped over this little fella.


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Here's a fresh calf following mom down the wild and wooly wilderness streets of Anchorage this morning. Probably on their way to the corner store for some willow browse bars and baby formula.... This is a very common sight in Anchorage. On the left side here is a blooming mountain ash tree that they love to "trim".