Shoup Bay Trail

From top to bottom. Photo 1:The beach. Photo 2: A butterfly. Photo 3: Down the path we go! Photo 4: Bog Adder's Mouth. Photo 5: Our class. Photo 6: Myself

Numerous trees and grasses including: alders, dandelions, chocolate lilies, stinging nettles, ferns, horsetails, salmonberries, devil’s club, (some pretty large) cottonwood, false hellebores, bog adder’s mouth, cow parsnip, yellow paintbrushes, peat grasses, daisies, shooting stars, rockweed.

Animals: Slug, ravens, seagulls, swallow, mussel and clam shells, barnacles, a crab’s leg.

It was a beautiful day for a hike! Today we’d head down the Shoup Bay trail. It’s a trail west of Valdez leading all the way to the Shoup Bay glacier. We wouldn’t be going that far out though, as it’s a “two-day hike”, and I myself didn’t bring enough Wheat Thins.

The first thing I’d noticed was how the all the plants and trees came made the path seem more like a green tunnel. I could stretch my arms out and touch the plants on both sides of the path. Due to the presence of bears in the area, we had bear spray which Dr. Julie and I carried. There were plenty of alders and ferns on this path, with quite a few chocolate lilies, salmonberries, false hellebores, and cottonwoods as well. We’d seen the salmonberries on Dock Point, but it still took us a second to identify them and NOT mistake them for raspberries. Our group made sure someone was constantly talking or making noise, this would make our presence known in the area and bears are less likely to attack if they hear you coming. (I’m still a little skeptical about that rule. Are they sure that making noise doesn’t just make yourself easier to find?) The mosquitoes on this trip were unbelievable! The bug repellent that people in our group were using had sun block in it, and I never use sun block, so I didn’t use any…Boy did I pay the price…We came upon a clearing with an excellent view of the mountains. There’s was evidence that a bear had been in this clearing, as there was a hole dug as if someone (or something) had been looking for food, and there were plants that had nice sized bites out of them. In this clearing was an orchid known as a “bog-adder’s mouth’ as well as some cow parsnip and yellow paintbrushes among the common grasses.

We passed over a creek as we came out of the “green tunnel” and into a large opening just before the beach. Words can’t describe the beauty of this area! This opening had green grass growing up to our waists, and an EXCELLENT view of the mountains behind us and the mountains across the fjord as well! There was a still wind blowing, and there was a swallow flying left and right into the headwind. The ground was wet under the grass, and despite our best efforts, our feet still got wet. There were daisies and ‘shooting stars’ among the grasses. It was a slow and careful trek across the grass towards the beach. The beach itself was very muddy and littered with rockweed and other seaweeds. We found some clam and mussel shells, a crab’s leg, rocks with barnacles, and worms that live under the rocks on the surface. Alaska’s tides move very fast, and that prompted us to start heading back towards the path and back home. We were a little lost at first, but everything turned out fine, and all of us exited the path safely!

Shoup Bay Trail

1. Shoup Bay Trail, July 1st, 2008, 1-3:30 pm
2. Winds light and variable, sunny, high 60s.
3. Terraine- thin, winding, woodsy trail, thick vegetation, opening out into small meadows, then into expansive peat marsh, leading to sandy shore inlet.
4. Plants identified: alder, dandelions, red elder, willows, stinging nettle, devil's club, ferns, horsetails, salmonberry, chocolate lily (pictured),starflowers, wild celery, nagoonberry, valerian, wild geraniums, yellow paintbrush, false hellabore, cow parsnip, shooting star, beach pea, irises, dwarf dogwood, daisies, rose avens, some type of chickweed, beach greens, rockweed, and witches hair seaweed, sedge grass, peat.
5. Animals identified: mosquito, an orange slug, humans, white butterfly, bees, caterpillar, gulls, swallow, crows or ravens, muscle shell, clam shell, barnacles, the leg of a crab, bear scat, and the singing of many small birds, including a hummingbird, red mites, sand worms, a tiny shrimp-like creature.

field trip to shup bay.

Today 07/01/08 we went to shup Bay trill at 1:3o pm.

Temperature was 65 to 70 degree celcus, it was sunny and beautiful.

winds coming from the west moving to the east.

The trees along were bloomy and so green and beautiful.

for the wild folwers we saw denda lions, willows,red alda,stinging nattle, wood ferns. the rasp berry we saw was green but it will have to produce its fruits coming this july. also was the devils club which we also have seen at the Valdez Glacier and dock Point but at the shup Bay, the devils club sprung up flowers.

we saw and amazing slug fighting it was out of the foot path inorder not to get steped by us. to add, we saw a cotton wood tree but no flowers at the top. also at the shup bay we saw beautiful chocolate lily,sitka valaria,coastal paintbrush, shooting star, beach pea, wild iris,dwaf daywood, arctic daisy, pacific silver weed.wild geranium cranesbill. All the above wild flowers mentioned, are mostly found in meadows through out the southern half of Alaska including the Alaskan rang.their blooming time are almost similar that is june july and august.

while at the shore we also found sea weed that were washed to the shore by the ocean current othe words known as tights, at the shore were dead clam shells, crap hand and so on. the field trip was an interesting one and very educative. interesting in the sense that we had to walk and shout inorder to scare away any near by bears from thinking of attacking us. below are pictures of some of the wild flowers and the crew.