More Budding Plants

 

Cow Parsnip a.k.a. Pushki

I have not been able to stop myself from taking blueberry blossom pictures.  I also have not taken any better ones than the ones I did a few weeks ago.  But I'm still experimenting.  I have been playing around with the 'green select only' filter on my camera, and I really like how it isolates the plant buds.  I've also been playing around with the fuzzy areas in the background - trying to make pleasing patterns. Anyway these are my recent 'budding plant' pictures. 

Patrick

Willow Catkins

Budding Lupine

The Archaeology of Kiliuda Bay

 

An ulu knife once used to process fish

In a nutshell, on the North shore of Kiliuda Bay we found a relatively large number of big villages and the sites were mostly in good shape.  

Back in the day a lot of people lived in Kiliuda Bay.  And this makes sense from an ecological standpoint as the bay is rich in resources.  It also matches what the Russians first reported on their arrival to the island.  Their early maps show numerous villages in the bay.  I've actually been trying to tie the villages on the maps (often depicted with their name in Alutiiq) with the actual archaeological villages on the landscape.  This is a bit tricky because the old maps do not exactly match the modern USGS maps.

The survey was funded by the BIA, and they wanted to know about the sites on BIA private allotments.  So at the sites we found on allotments we dug small holes or test pits to help us characterize the subsurface deposits.  We also collected charcoal so we can later actually date how old the deposits are in radiocarbon years.  We did not collect artifacts and reburied any that we found.  

We found a surprising amount of really old sites - including one on the order of at least 5000 years old.  I think we found so many old sites for the same reason that the sites are mostly not eroding very badly - the land seems to be rising relative to the sea.  In many parts of the archipelago rising sea levels associated with global warming are causing increased erosion.  But inner Kiliuda Bay is near the center of the island, and I think that like Womens Bay near the city of Kodiak this part of the island is rising long term.  It is why there are mountains in the middle of the island. 

Unlike in many other parts of the archipelago we found beach ridge complexes at the heads of all the small bights. Through time these beaches are building outwards.  As a consequence you find the youngest sites on the beach ridges close to the sea and the older sites on the berms further from the sea.  We found some sites that are now almost a kilometer away from the ocean. This is exciting because it means there is the potential to find really old sites in the area.  

But this is not easy! The older inland sites are also more deeply buried (see test pit photo below) and are not as easy to see.  You have to get a bit lucky or dig a lot of holes and still get lucky to find them.  But the geologic evidence that we found on this survey strongly suggests that they are there.  We found a few of the really old sites, but I'm sure there are more out there.  This is not true of other parts of the archipelago where sinking coastlines mean that the only sites left are right on the coastline.

Patrick

Charcoal stained gravel at the bottom of a test pit - the very definition of a 'positive' test

5000 year old bayonet lance found in a test pit

Large house depression

Close up of cod bones in an eroding midden

Eroding shell midden - this was one of the few sites we documented that was eroding

An adze for carving wood

1000 year old village

Flake of basalt and worked slate found in a test pit

Transport and things we encountered

 

As is usual on these surveys we used my Innova inflatable kayaks for this trip.  I bought them way back in 2013 and they have been used on coastal archaeological surveys ever since.  Their color has faded and there are some worn spots, but both kayaks seem to be going strong.  I like them because they carry a lot of gear, can handle dragging over rocks and repeated beach landings, and it is easy to get in and out of them.  They  are perfect for surveys because I go to shore a lot to check for sites.  A more traditional hard shell kayak with a sprayskirt - even if you could get it on a plane to take to the field - does not carry as much, nor is it something you'd want to beach all day long repeatedly.

On this trip we did not have much wind - so the water was pretty flat - but there was often a big swell.  At one point we both swamped our kayaks getting off of a beach with breaking waves.  But no problem, we pumped out the boats and continued on our way.

While paddling along we saw lots of foxes and bears, but, strangely enough, only one deer.  We often saw sows with their cubs walking along the beach, and we tried not to alarm them because they would then run up the steep cliffs and hillsides behind the beach.  This is a sight to see, but I fear it puts undo stress on the bears.

Patrick 

Tanner crab shell molt - there is no crab in there!

Herring eggs in the intertidal zone - good eating!

Gumboot chiton - these things are HUGE

Avalanche chutes at the head of the bay - while we were there we heard 2 avalanches and one even got most out of the way down the slope behind Philip

This avalanche chute has created a sort of moraine by repeatedly bombing down the same path

It's hard to get a sense of scale and neither Philip nor I wanted to pose on top of the debris!

Salmonberries and dandelions

 

It's time for the annual 'first salmonberry blossom' post.  And this year I noticed my first salmonberry on May 9th - er rather Nora pointed them out to me!  It's the same set of bushes against the fence at the end of my driveway that seems to blossom early every year.  The fence faces south and creates its own microclimate.  I think May 9th is about long term average for the first salmonberry blossom, but late for the last 10 years or so. Last year they actually bloomed later (click here for 2021 post, and here and here for some other posts).

This year I was away in Kiliuda Bay for the first dandelion blossoms and the cliffy south pointing roadside downtown are already a wash in yellow. But dandelions are not something I celebrate. I have not seen any blooming in my yard yet, but clearly it is time to start the annual morning 'pull dandelions from the lawn' routine.  ughhhhh.

Patrick

No More blueberry blossom photos - I swear!

Buskin Beach

The skiing is still very good but no more skiing to the road

Kiliuda Landscapes and Camp

 

Kiliuda Bay is pretty wild and vast.  There are not very many cabins and people out there.  We did see a number of bear hunters, a fishing boat prospecting for dungeness crab, and a couple of over flights of a flotilla of helicopters carrying the Arctic Care team on their way to provide health care in the villages.  But that's about it.  Mostly we were very much on our own - just us and the landscape.

It's early spring and everything is brown.  Only a few plants have sprouted.  So everything looked a bit bleak.  But even while we were there we noticed signs of spring.  We heard our first golden-crowned sparrow - 'oh save me' - and a migrating grey whale fed along the shore a mere 50 meters from our tent (Just past the teepee in the top photo).  The whale surfaced every minute or so with a huge gasp of air.

The bottom few photos show our camp set up.  It is always nice to travel by kayak because you can bring along the bulky extras that make for a pretty cushy camp.  Fresh rather than eggs in a box, the big frying pan and teepee.  We had it pretty good looking our meals on the woodstove. 

Below is a link to the video Philip made of the trip.  It captures our life on survey pretty darn well.

(Click here for a link to Philip's Video)