Dock Point

Top picture: A young Sitka Spruce sitting on the edge of the cliff.

Middle picture: "Impressive" Emmanuel explains the squirrel dens.

Bottom picture: Emmanuel, Wendy, and Dr. Julie examine an eagle's remains.

Dock Point. Valdez, AK

Rain (heavy sprinkle, off and on). Temps ranging from mid 40s to low 50s.

Plants (that I identified):

Sitka Spruce, Salmonberries, Devil’s Club, Arctic Willow, False Hellebore, Chocolate Lily, Dwarf Cornel, Yarrow, mosses and lichens, False Solomon Seal, Shell fungus

Animals:

Arctic Tern, Slug

Today, we went to Dock Point. It’s a little spit of land next to the small boat harbor. I’ve walked this trail before: twice during winter, once during the “melt and breakup” and twice after all of the snow melted. If someone didn’t tell you, you wouldn’t think that just a few months ago, this lush green and flowering point was completely dead and covered in snow. Only Alaska’s state tree, the Sitka Spruce was green during the winter. I walked this trail a couple weeks ago, and it wasn’t nearly as green as it was now. It’s like it grew overnight….

I think it started sprinkling as we left our car. The first thing we noticed was a (of the many lining the area) Sitka Spruce sitting on the edge of the rocks. Many of the plants at Dock Point sat on top, or on the sides of the rocks. They’re able to do that because moss and lichens break down the rocks and make a layer of soil just deep enough for the trees and plants to root.

As we walked down the path, we came upon these beautiful pinkish-violet blossoms, which were (after a couple minutes of research) identified as salmonberries. The point’s red alders, arctic willows, and Sitka spruce made the path look like a canyon of green (if you will).

Now you can get to the top of Dock Point two ways: You can go around and follow the curve that goes up the hill, or you go up a steep hill that brings you right to the top. For time reasons, we chose the hill. As we went up, we noticed how the many plants went from covering the ground, to being up towards the tops of their trunks and branches. Those plants are “reaching for the sun”, meaning that since the sunlight doesn’t really reach to the soil surface, the plants have to adapt. We identified the Arctic Willow and Devil’s Club on our way up, and I identified the False Hellebore once we got to the top. After the snow had melted, I noticed that the false hellebores were the first plants to start growing here at Dock Point and around Valdez.

The mosquitoes and bees weren’t as pesky as they have been when I’ve walked up here to the top. One day, a bee followed me all the way from the top of the hill to the beginning of the path. Not today, though. A couple curious bees flew around us, but didn’t follow us. As we strolled around the high part of dock point, we identified a Chocolate lily as well as dwarf cornels (probably known to you as ‘dogwood’). Further down, we identified some blossoming blueberry plants, which most of us plan to try out once they bear fruit.

Dock Point has an outlook path that is shrouded in Sitka Spruce and gives an amazing view of the harbor, mountains, Aleyska oil terminal and the eastern end of the fjord that Valdez sits in. As we walked along the path and took in the views, Giggy noticed a young Sitka Spruce growing on the edge of the cliff, and I took a photo of it. The temperature dropped a little during our walk on the outlook, I remember ‘seeing my breath’ at one point. Emmanuel came upon some squirrel dens and did an excellent job of explaining them to us; he then found the remains of an eagle. He was impressive on this trip! Also impressive was the role moss and lichens played on a dead spruce. They broke down (and are continuing to) break a dead tree which allowed for new trees (or ‘baby spruce’) to start growing. It’s like nothing goes to waste in nature.

As we headed back toward our car, the rain picked up. It picked up enough that we tried to make our way down the hill as fast, yet as safe as possible. It was nice to go to Dock Point and actually be able to identify the plants that were unknown to me before.