Friday, February 29, 2008

The Palisades (at low tide)

The Palisades are about a mile south of us. We got there walking along the beach from the house. These cliffs face out to Ikatan Bay and rest at the foot of Sentinel Peak. As boats enter Isanotski Strait they are greeted by these towering rock faces. We speculate they were formed by the movement of ice and or water and now continue to be altered by wind.











Numerous waterfalls fall to the beach on the walk from Stonewall to the Palisades.




As we were about to turn around a snow storm came upon us. We had to walk back with our heads down to avoid the strong winds.







California Mussels Mytilus californianus

Much of the shoreline, including Stonewall reef, is covered in mussels. We attempted to have some one night. Fearing Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning (PSP) we had only the tiniest piece. I think the possibility of getting sick made me paranoid and I felt the tell-tale signs of tingling tongue. Whether or not I really did we stopped right there and haven't tried any since.
We later learned that Kodiak Island (about 500 miles away) is the PSP capital of the world! Yikes!




Monday, February 18, 2008

Otter Cove & Ikatan Village




A couple of weeks ago the temperatures warmed up to around 40 degrees and melted all the snow. Winds were mild and we had the opportunity to get out and explore a lot. On one day we skiffed over to Ikatan Peninsula again. Our goal was to walk across the narrow isthmus and get to the Pacific. It was such a beautiful day! When we landed the skiff we found two sets of wolf tracks walking down the beach side by side. Unfortunately no wolves were seen, but those are two eagles resting on the roof.



Looking back towards Ikatan village.










Otter Cove...The Pacific Ocean




Emperor Geese (Chen canagica)

These geese are looking true to their name. Nearly all emperors winter under harsh conditions in the Aleutian Islands, on the western and south side of the Alaska Peninsula, and on Kodiak Island. So we regularly see them in the coves and flying past the Stonewall bight. Emperor geese are sometimes called “beach geese.” As the name implies, they are rarely found far from marine waters. In late fall and winter emperors feed heavily on seaweeds and animal matter, such as clams and snails. The emperor goose population declined from an estimated 140,000 in 1964 to 42,000 in 1986. Low first-year survival of young, periods of high nest predation and out-dated levels of harvest contributed to the decline. An intensive research and conservation program begun in 1984 has promoted an increase in population to over 71,000 in 1993.




Perhaps a victim of the wolves? or fox?



Sunday, February 17, 2008

Laminaria and fucus in the soil...w/Jen!




One of our jobs here is caring for the greenhouse. We have been gathering and distributing seaweed on the beds since fall. The seaweed washes up in large amounts every few weeks or so. With buckets or tarps we haul it to the beds. We have been either leaving it out to let the rain rinse the salt off or washing it off ourselves. The salt is not good for the soil.










Then we spread it all over the beds inside the greenhouse and out and dig it in. There are many kinds of seaweed. The most important are the laminaria, also called driftweed or kelp. These are high in potash-especially the stems. Another is fucus or bladder wrack. It's potash content is low but grows well in sheltered waters where it is harder to find lamenaria. A third seaweed is ulva or sea lettuce. This weed is very rich in nitrates.




Seaweed in general contains approximately 7 pounds of nitrogen compounds, 2 pounds of phosphoric acid, 22 pounds of potassium, 36 pounds of sodium chloride and about 400 pounds of organic matter--per ton.




This photo was taken in the early fall and is a good example of how much seaweed washes up on shore.

Monday, February 11, 2008

Yum Yum

Many of our family and friends have asked, "so what are you eating up there?" This posting is an attempt to show you some of the variety. Meal production requires a bit more improvising when the Whole Foods isn't 4 blocks away. But we're getting really good at it. Besides all the dry and canned goods already here, we have had bounty from the tundra, the greenhouse and outside beds, fresh eggs, a shipment on Coastal Transport from Seattle and various snacks from family and friends. The small store in False Pass is keeping us stocked on onions which I just hate to go without.



Barley for barley malt, step one in beer making.



Siphoning finished beer into bottles for our drinking pleasure.



Our beer making adventure (well mainly Bob's--I just drink the stuff) went well. We ended up with about five gallons of mighty-fine Broken Bushrat Amber.



Beer, chili and rhubarb cinnamon rolls make for a fine winter lunch. The garden was overflowing with rhubarb in the fall and the thought of letting it go to waste seemed ridiculous. We gathered it all up and froze it. And now we can enjoy such wonders as rhubarb rolls and rhubarb pie (below) any day of the week!







My first attempt at sourdough. I was thoroughly inspired after reading Margaret Murie's "Two in the Far North"-where she made sourdough every other day in the wildest of conditions. And yes it really wasn't hard at all. Why did I think it was for so long? Perhaps it had something to do with letting it "fester" for 5 days...Well the end result was quite good and now we have sourdough starter, forever (if we want it that long).



Spaghetti and Neatballs-yes I said NEATballs. That's when instead of using meat you throw in any old thing that sticks together and bake them.



Not the purttiest carrots but they tasted great!



Our friend the Peter Pan watchman, otherwise known as John, gave us some of last years King crab catch. The thought never crossed our minds to save some for later hence there was some pain afterwards. But my were they delicious!

Tuesday, February 5, 2008