Friday, July 19, 2024. Mark and I take small live traps with us on our adventures, and this was second morning with a sprung trap. Mark walked with me the short distance to the trail where I’d left the trap the night before. I ran video as a vole slowly emerged from the trap, onto Mark’s arm and onto the ground, where it disappeared quickly into the tundra. We’ve caught and released quite a voles over the years and they have all been amazingly gentle. And adorable.
The photo to the right was taken as a snapshot from the video. Check out this video of this vole–you will see how it has red on the top and gray on the sides. We believe this is a red-back vole. Most voles live less than one year.
After the vole was released, I went about my morning walk and finally got a couple of good shots of a spotted sandpiper. I’d seen a few sandpipers earlier in the week, but never got a good shot.
I also saw this juvenile arctic tern. I n fact, I saw three arctic tern babies and saw several adults hovering over babies from the air and several adults landing near the babies. Occasionally, an adult would seem to mob a baby tern, which seemed cruel and odd, but perhaps a defensive strategy to protect its own baby, or perhaps an adult giving their own baby some ‘tough love’ to prepare them for the real world. It was very strange to witness. And the babies I saw looked almost stunned.
This is an adult tern.
Mark, Manny and I took off in flat calm waters and rode for about an hour to the XFiles.
En route, every time we saw flock of birds on the water, Manny slowed down so I could snap photos. We saw black-throated loons, which are shown above, and below.
And we saw surf scoters, females (above left), and males (above and to the left).
While the birding was fun, the fishing was very slow.
We fished all morning without success. But we saw another muskox. This one was on the opposite side of the lake from the herd we’d seen. And he was by himself.
I noticed as I zoomed in from my zoomed-in photo–which was shot from way out in the lake–that this muskox’s left horn was busted. I wondered if it had been in a fight and had lost, and perhaps that was why he was by himself. Totally guessing, of course.
Below is a photo of the muskox’s domain.
I took a liking to the orange lichen on this rock.
Mark and I had mastered “the walrus,” a nifty maneuver we probably didn’t invent to plop onto the bow of a boat so as not to get one’s feet wet. Manny took the move to a higher level.
This was the lure I dragged all afternoon, loaned from Manny. It was giant, and I kept waiting for my arm to get yanked off by a giant lake trout. But I got nothin’ all afternoon. It was a loooong afternoon.
I looked forward to my late afternoon walk.
And another. Adults were hovering over them, but not mobbing them as much as the day before.
It was a bit rough to have nothing to report after another long day on the water. But Ina and Brent had had a good day. They saw the white board with everyone’s catches on it, and saw Jed–the doctor–had caught many fish over 30 and 40 pounds. So we asked Jed what he’d used to catch his fish. It turns out Jed had used the same lure–a spoon–all week. And the little store at the lodge had two more. So, Ina and I each bought one and a contest was hatched for the next day.
Meanwhile, I found solace in my walk around. I saw another baby arctic tern.
Nearby, with no visible parent around, was this tiny baby bird, which the American Birding Association FB experts told me in August 2024 was a baby semi-palmated plover, less than a week old. Over 200 people on the ABA What Bird FB page gave the photo to the right a thumbs up.
This chipping sparrow had found a juicy insect to eat.
Another arctic tern, with waves crashing behind it.
I posted a photo of my tennis shoe next to a moose track earlier in the week, but after looking for Mr. Moose throughout the week and not seeing him–I found myself taking a better photo of the moose track, this time, in relation to my boot. If he’d only shown up, you wouldn’t have to suffer so.
I took this photo at 8:21 p.m. after a dinner of chili, cole slaw, and corn bread with honey butter. Afterwards, Ina and Brent showed us how to play a card game called 99. It’s not worth mentioning who won. Well, it is, but I won’t.