Pound for pound, Alaska mosquitoes pack punch

Pound for pound, Alaska mosquitoes pack punch By Ned Rozell, In mid-June, while standing deep within the northern boreal forest, it’s possible to feel a sensation similar to one felt in mid-December at the same spot. It’s a sting to exposed skin, delivered in December by bitter air and in June by [...]

Streaking, Manmade Lights in the Sky

Streaking, Manmade Lights in the Sky By Ned Rozell I slept outside a few nights ago. Lying a platform of packed snow, my face looking upward from the sleeping bag, I squinted at the Big Dipper. Within a few minutes, what appeared to be a moving star slanted across the dipper. Then another. And another. [...]

Alaska Hit By Major Earthquake, Again

Alaska Hit By Major Earthquake, Again By Ned Rozell What’s this? Another aftershock? That’s hundreds now, each more faint than the last. Sorry, I guess I’ve moved on. I should pay more attention, given that you - a 7.9 deep in the seafloor not far from Kodiak - are the most powerful earthquake on the [...]

What Eats What: A Landlubber’s Guide to Deep Sea Dining

This is a great piece from the NY Times of a study off the coast of California about the eating habits in the deep sea: "You’ll never go to dinner in the deep sea. It’s dark, vast and weird down there. If the pressure alone didn’t destroy your land-bound body, some hungry sea creature would [...]

Alaska Salmon Complete a 1,000-mile Journey, and Life

Alaska Salmon Complete a 1,000-mile Journey, and Life By Ned Rozell MOUTH OF THE DELTA RIVER — On a morning with biting air in the single digits Fahrenheit, this river smells like sulfur and is splashy and loud. Bald eagles and ravens swoop in the updraft of a nearby rock bluff in what looks like [...]

California Governor Brown Stops Off In Alaska To Talk Climate

California Governor Brown Stops Off In Alaska To Talk Climate By Ned Rozell A few Alaska researchers recently accepted a surprise assignment of giving Jerry Brown a tour of the Seward Peninsula. The California governor was stopping in Nome on his way to a meeting in Russia. The 79-year-old environmentalist and leader of a state [...]

Finding far-north lynx den part of cycle study

Finding far-north lynx den part of cycle study By Ned Rozell In her study of one of the farthest north lynx populations in North America this summer, Claire Montgomerie used her ears. While looking at the satellite tracker a female lynx was wearing, Montgomerie saw the animal was hanging around a hillside north of the [...]

Discovering A New Dinosaur In Alaska – Pachyrhinosaurus Perotorum

Discovering A New Dinosaur In Alaska - Pachyrhinosaurus Perotorum By Ned Rozell There's a new kind of dinosaur out there, and it lived in Alaska. Its bones, long turned to stone, are part of a cliff in northern Alaska. That's where dinosaur-hunter Tony Fiorillo brushed dirt away from a portion of its massive skull - [...]

NOAA releases new population estimate for endangered Cook Inlet beluga whales

From a NOAA Press Release: June 22, 2017 Marjorie Mooney-Seus Julie Speegle Beluga whales in Cook Inlet. Credit: Chris Garner, U.S. Army JBER NOAA Fisheries released today its biennial population estimate for the endangered Cook Inlet beluga whale. Scientists determined that the population size is between 279 and 386 animals, with a most likely estimate [...]

Introducing “Nanuq,” the mini tyrannosaurus of Alaska’s North Slope

Introducing “Nanuq,” the mini tyrannosaurus of Alaska's North Slope By Ned Rozell [fusion_dropcap]S[/fusion_dropcap]eventy million years ago, the baddest predator on top of the world was a pygmy tyrannosaur about half the size of Tyrannosaurus rex. The creature became known to the world in mid-March 2014, when Texas-based dinosaur hunters Tony Fiorillo and Ron Tykoski unveiled [...]