Alaska landscape loses a body, gains a spirit
Keith Echelmeyer paddles on a two-month wilderness trip through the Brooks Range and Alaska’s North Slope.
Photo by Chris Larsen.
Keith Echelmeyer has died at age 56. The glaciologist, pilot, mountaineer and fighter for life passed away last Saturday, with his incomparable wife Susan Campbell by his side and chickadees at the
Alaska heavy with summer insects
A beetle, species unknown, in a Fairbanks backyard. Photo by Ned Rozell.
In these days of endless sunshine and air that doesn’t hurt to breathe, life is rich in the north, from the multitude of baby birds hatching at this instant to the month-old orange moose calv
Accidental and intentional plastic rides the ocean
Dean Orbison of Sitka with the 130 floating toys he and his family have found on Southeast Alaska beaches. The toys include green frogs, yellow ducks that have faded to a cream color, blue turtles, and red beavers that have faded to white.
Photo courtesy of Dean Orbison.
Twenty-eight years after scientists spilled hundreds of plastic disks on ice in the Beaufort Sea north of Alaska to determine ocean currents, another one came home to roost at the Geophysical Insti
Polar bears of the past survived warmth
A polar bear near Barrow.
Photo by Ned Rozell.
An ancient jawbone has led scientists to believe that polar bears survived a period thousands of years ago that was warmer than today.
Wandering whitefish surprise biologists
A section of the Tanana River that is “boiling with fish” in the fall. Biologists recently identified this area as the spawning grounds for many whitefish.
Photo by Randy Brown.
Aaron Dupuis lost his fish. Last year, the graduate student installed radio tags on a few dozen whitefish in a maze of lakes near Minto, Alaska. Using a radio receiver, he followed some fish up the
Burned Alaska may cause more burned Alaska
A fire scar in the making near Venetie, Alaska on June 24, 2004.
Image courtesy U.S. Geological Survey and Geographic Information Network of Alaska.
The blackened scars that Alaska fires leave on the landscape may result in more lightning, more rain in some areas just downwind of the scars, and less rain farther away, according to two scientist
Discovering the secrets of the master divers
Ringed seals are master divers that can stay submerged in icy waters for longer than 30 minutes.
Photo by Craig George.
In the cold waters off northern Alaska, ringed seals dive for cod and shrimp. Sometimes the seals stay beneath the ice for longer than 30 minutes, which is about six times longer than the best huma
Did mammoth hunters warm the world?
A paper birch in springtime featuring beads of bitter resin on the twig.
Ned Rozell photo.
Could ancient mammoth hunters have warmed the planet? A trio of scientists presents the idea in a new study.
The far nor
Dangerous ice the focus of research project
UAF ecologist Knut Kielland checks out a mysterious hole in the ice of the Tanana River.
Photo by Ned Rozell
SAM CHARLEY SLOUGH — Winter travelers on the Tanana River can save a mile by taking the shortcut through this serpentine channel rather than following a lazy bend of the big river, but experi
Way back when, artist believed Alaska was a good deal
Frederick Whymper, in a photo taken by Bradley and Rolofson, San Francisco photographers. Copyright expired.
About 150 years ago, U.S. Secretary of State William Seward was taking some heat for his significant role in the purchase of Alaska. On the day the Russians received the $7.2 million check, a group
