#alaska salmon program

[blackseafoam]

Alright this is for my followers who liked my Alaska posts. My friend Jason, who I met at Lake Iliamna, makes a jaw-dropping video every year documenting his experience working in Southeast Alaska with sockeye salmon. I am so lucky to have such an amazing video to remember my experience by, even though I wasn't even there when most of the footage was taken.

[jasonsching]

Alaska 2014 in Summary

2014 saw relatively large returns of fish to their spawning grounds in Bristol Bay.  This led to excellent underwater photography opportunities of large schools of sockeye salmon and made our annual sample collections of adult sockeye measurements around Iliamna Lake a breeze.  

Going into the season I was all amped up, with a new quadcopter I had been working on for 4 months, two working camera trap rigs, and a new underwater housing setup.  

The season started off well at Lake Aleknagik.  From June to the beginning of July I was getting aerial shots and footage of sampling events and spectacular locations around the lake, shots of juvenile and resident fish species were pouring in (the salmon weren't in yet) and I was even getting shots of critters (mainly foxes) on the camera traps.  

When July rolled around it was time for us to head over and open up operations at Iliamna Lake.  The underwater photography would continue to be excellent throughout the year, with tons of salmon and willing resident fish getting right up to my camera. I did fly my quadcopter around a bit more until one sunny day on Chinkelyes Creek when the salmon were just coming in. I was taking some footage and then I, well lost it in the woods...R.I.P.  We searched for it for a a half an hour or so and then I said "screw it" and threw on my wetsuit and went to taking pictures of salmon.  Nothing would ever be captured on the camera traps again the rest of the season, bears in general were hardly spotted by anyone we talked to either at Iliamna or at Aleknagik which was quite unusual.  All in all it was a great year, just more successful in certain ways than others.

[blackseafoam]

(by NirupamNigam)

[blackseafoam]

Undergrad class Finger Bay (by Jason S Ching) Hey look it's me!

[blackseafoam]

Grass pond (by Jason S Ching)

[blackseafoam]

Just settled in from coming home from Alaska. I don't even know what to do with myself. I feel the vacation-depression setting in already. Also my Kjell got fat while I was gone xc It feels weird to be separated from my classmates. We became like a little family, we were together every single day for seven weeks. And all it took was a quick round of hugs at the airport and now they're gone. Not forever though. We have more classes together in the fall. I just miss them already.

[blackseafoam]

8/12/2014

We're moving to Lake Illiamna tomorrow! I am currently packing up about 1/3 of my stuff because our plane has a weight limit, the other 2/3 I am going to leave behind to be shipped back to Seattle in October.

It's really exciting to be moving on, Aleknagik is an amazing place, but our camp is right next to a popular boat launch so sometimes it's hard to remember you're in such a remote place, especially on the weekends. Our next camp is on an island in the biggest lake in Alaska. I'm going to miss the people here at Lake Aleknagik, we've all become kind of a big family. 

I'm really happy to not have to chuck 2000+ dead fish out of Hansen Creek every day either, it was an amazing experience and I learned a lot (about science and my tolerance levels), but we are all getting to the point where the work is just monotonous and the creek smells so bad because of the maggots. 

Happy travels, my friends!

~Kaili

[blackseafoam]

7/24/2014

Today is a lazy day. Finally got to sleep in and we are all just working on our first paper for the class. 

Even when it is gray and cloudy, the view from camp is impeccable and breathtaking, even though the landscape around Nerka was even more so. The people here are so fun to be around, that is a good chunk of the reason I am having such a good time. 

Yesterday we tagged salmon by catching them in a beach seine, then drugging them up so they wouldn't flop around while we pinned a plastic disc through their back. Aleknagik isn't proving to be as exciting as Nerka was, but I'm still having fun. Learning about how insanely complex these creatures are really puts all of nature in perspective. I can't help but keep thinking about how beautifully complex the whole world is and how I am so lucky to be going in to a career where I get to try to understand this complexity and discover it's secrets.