Dall Sheep on Rocks through Snow

When we took a trip up Turnagain Arm to Girdwood the other day, we were lucky enough to spot a couple Dall sheep on the rocks fairly close to the road. In this first view I got with a quick point-and-shoot while driving past, the two sheep look like dots of snow. (Can you spot them?)
We turned around, came back to one of the usual sheep-viewing spots, and found them again. They were moving uphill, rapidly disappearing from sight.
The lower of two Dall sheep bounds up a small talus slope.
One sheep blends into snow patches behind it. Where is the second?
The second one is barely visible behind the one overlooking the cliff – or maybe that's a patch of snow.

Where in the West: Matanuska River, AK

The terraces on the Matanuska River, Alaska, (mentioned toward the end of my last post) can be seen at and near the Matunuska Glacier. These photos, shown from the glacier and then west along the river towards Palmer, were actually taken in reverse order during that late February day back in 2007; that's why the sun angle changes in the wrong direction in this photo sequence. All locations are shown on the embedded map below.

The first photo was taken from Long Rifle Lodge, looking almost due south, with the glacier just out of the view to the east (left).
This second photo looks about southwest toward Monument Creek, where you can see some of the craggy peaks of the Chugach Mountains and some of the terraces along the south side of the Matanuska River.
At an overlook above Long Lake, I took this zoom photo of some hilly, lumpy-looking terrain north of the river. I'm not sure what these landforms should be called - they appear to be linear in Google Earth.
Matanuska River terraces looking southeast up Coal Creek.
A closer veiw of some of the lower terraces right along and above the Matanuska River, looking southeast, in the early-afternoon shadow of Pinnacle Mountain.
And finally, we arrive back at our starting point (well, this is where my photos of the Matanuska River started, a little after noon). This is an official pullout on the Glenn Highway, just north of Palmer, overlooking the braided and sometimes frozen Matanuska River. This view looks back upriver to the northeast to east toward the Matanuska Glacier, which can't be seen in the very far distance. The pullout is on one of the terraces above the river; Palmer is on what is referred to as Palmer Terrace.
Looking due east across the icy river, this shot shows the six or seven Holocene terraces above river level.
I couldn't climb down onto the loess and dune deposits on the slope below the pullout because of overhung snow, although I did once during a 1997 UAA field trip. The upper sand and silt beds overlie bedded, cobbly river deposits, which overlie poorly sorted cobbly till.
Looking to the southeast from this same overlook, you look downstream along the Matanuska River. Beyond a southward bend in the Matanuska River, you are looking up the Knik River drainage. The Knik River is a wide braided river coming off the Knik Glacier on the eastern arm of this major draingae and the Cloudy and Lake George Glaciers on the southern arm of the drainage. That's probably Pioneer Peak in the distance on the far right of the photo.

I was told while on the UAA field trip not to camp down at river level or on any of the gravelly islands out in the braided rivers. The water level in glacial meltwater rivers rises and falls with a diurnal cycle. The glaciers upstream melt during the day, causing higher flow levels. With nightly cooling, river flow diminishes, and the rivers dump their bedload. The next day, the rivers will use different channels, and if you've left your tent on one gravelly area, you might come back (or wake up) to find it in one of the channels, or flowing downstream with the river.


View Matanuska River in a larger map

References and Links:
Alaska Glaciers Case Study

R&M Consultants, 2005, Glennallen to Palmer Spur Line Soils Studies, Volume 1 of 2, Main Report: Alaska Natural Gas Development Authority (ANGDA). See Section 2.0 Regional Studies, p. 8-20.

Williams, J.R., and Ferrians, O.J., Jr., 1961, Late Wisconsin and Recent history of the Matanuska Glacier, Alaska: Arctic, v. 14, no. 2, p. 82–90.

Where in the West: Matanuska Glacier

The March 2010 version of WITW was won by Cannibal Panda, who blogs at Lift is like a rock - just lick it! She correctly identified the Matanuska Glacier, which heads in an ice field in the Chugach Mountains about 80 km (50 miles) east of Palmer, Alaska. This view, similar to the one shown a couple days ago, was taken in late February, 2007, from a pullout on Alaska S.R. 1, aka the Glenn Highway. The approximate pullout location is shown below on a Google Earth image.
The Matanuska Glacier is a fun one to visit. In winter or summer, you can stop and have lunch at the Long Rifle Lodge, which overlooks the glacier and should be considered, in and of itself, an Alaskan Experience. In summer, you can drive to a parking lot located about 0.4 km (0.25 miles) from the foot of the glacier, depending on current melting or retreating conditions. It's a very neat glacier – albeit a slippery one – on which to walk. If you find a used roll of Kodak print film from 2001, it's mine.


As for glacial features visible in these few photos I shot three years ago, you can see the lumpy and disorganized terminal morraine in the first photo, and a little bit of one lateral morraine in the last photo, just to the right of the glacier. The low hills behind the glacier in the last photo show the beginnings of Holocene river terraces that continue down canyon (west) all the way to Palmer. The terraces have formed on older till and outwash plain deposits.

References and Links:
Alaska Glaciers Case Study

R&M Consultants, 2005, Glennallen to Palmer Spur Line Soils Studies, Volume 1 of 2, Main Report: Alaska Natural Gas Development Authority (ANGDA). See Section 2.0 Regional Studies, p. 8-20.

Williams, J.R., and Ferrians, O.J., Jr., 1961, Late Wisconsin and Recent history of the Matanuska Glacier, Alaska: Arctic, v. 14, no. 2, p. 82–90.

Where in the West: March 2010

The March, 2010, version of Where in the West (WITW) is really just an excuse to post a glacier picture or two. You can tell me the location or name of this glacier in the comments, and identify any glacial features you might see. As per all WITW's, the location is somewhere in the western U.S.

Two Years Ago Today: Things in My Truck

Two years ago today, I was on my way to work one early and frozen morning, having the usual things in my truck: coffee mug with hot coffee in a nearly worn out turquoise "cool cup;" old bottle found somewhere in the field; plastic acid bottle with white lid; bright orange and yellow safety vest with multiple pockets; a "Life is Good" bag filled with miscellany including an extra fleece overshirt; a blue day pack, hidden behind the LIG bag; and brown winter jacket, long and warm for cold days. A roll of duct tape sits around the shift lever. An inverter lies part way under the seat, easy to reach from either side of the truck. Binoculars are in the glove box. A small ice chest carrying my lunch is on the floor below the glove box. Extra shoes and boots, a folding chair, a fire extinguisher, and a first aid kit all live behind the seat. My hand lens is probably dangling from the rear view mirror. There are untold, countless items in the back of the truck, enough things to camp with for a couple days if need be.
When I got home that night, two years ago today, I felt like fiddling around with colors and came up with these two versions of part of the early morning interior view.