Cook Inlet Beluga Days--First Session at the Point



Suzanne of BWA stands watch.

I stand along the fence at Beluga Point scanning the murky waters of the Cook Inlet’s Turnagain Arm for signs of beluga whales.  I use my naked eye aided by old 10x50 Sans and Streiffe binoculars handed down to me after my grandfather’s passing nearly 40 years ago.  In today’s gentle breeze, the Arm’s waters lightly ripple, a change from the normally wind-driven, white-capped seascape.  The sun shines brilliantly, another departure from the overcast to rainy conditions we would expect at this location this second day in September.  Teamed with Suzanne, leader of the recently formed Beluga Whale Alliance, BWA, I will be on station for the next three hours.  If we sight beluga,  the team will observe and record the time and duration of the sighting, the number of beluga, direction of travel, the formation, an estimate of the age of each whale based on size or color and other behavior and environmental conditions. 

A near perfect day at Beluga Point

Circumstances for sighting the whales--the flooding  tide, time, wind, sunshine, and earlier numerous sighting around Turnagain Arm—fuel my expectations of success.  Sighting beluga would be a great outcome for my first session in BWA’s citizen science initiative, launched earlier this summer.  Except today, the belugas do not put in an appearance.  We see no signs, not even so much as a telltale spout or momentary flash of white as a whale breaches.  But today, the only beluga I will spy is on the interpretive sign for the visitors.  But ours is not a wasted effort.  While I maintain lookout, Suzanne engages the visitors with information about the whales and why BWA is enlisting  citizen-scientists in the reconnaissance effort. For today's three hours, “Beluga Point” should be designated “No Beluga Point.”  



Beluga Point is listed on the National Register of Historic Places because of its significance as a prehistoric site.  The Point may be the site of the earliest recorded human habitation in Anchorage, dating back at least 10,000 years. It may have been used as a site for hunting beluga.  Nowadays, the Point is a prime spot for seeing them.  I have seen the whales here before today just as have countless thousands of visitors who have stopped here to explore among the rocks and beach or admired the dramatic scenery of Cook Inlet from an Alaska Railroad passenger car on its way to Seward or Whittier.  It is a fine tradition.   Perhaps numerous times I have missed their presence hiding in plain sight indiscernably indistinguishable in the whitecapped sea.  I have also counted them by the dozens starkly stanidng out against the cobalt blue Arctic Ocean as an observer during the Bowhead Whale Aerial Survey Program flights I flew more than a decade ago.  



One of two spotter scopes for the public at Beluga Point. 
This one was out of commission.

So why am I out here on this fine autumn day and how did I end up involved in this effort?  That will be the subject of the next few installments of this blog.  In part, it results from my close up and personal encounter with a beluga whale calf, Tyonek, earlier this year at the Alaska Sea Life Center, which I described in an earlier post.  September 2 is my first day on station.  Others have followed and will continue.