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Duncan Murrell - A Whale of a Time

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Duncan Murrell - A Whale of a Time

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  • I became involved with the campaign to stop the excessive and heavily-subsidised logging, clearcutting and roadbuilding in Southeast Alaska in the 1980s. The Tongass Timber Reform Act, enacted in 1990, significantly reshaped the logging industry's relationship with the Tongass National Forest. The law's provisions cancelled a $40 million annual subsidy for timber harvest; established several new wilderness areas and closed others to logging; and required that future cutting under the 50-year pulp contracts be subject to environmental review and limitations on old-growth harvest. Alaska Pulp Corporation and Ketchikan Pulp Corporation claimed that the new restrictions made them uncompetitive and closed down their mills in 1993 and 1997, respectively, and the Forest Service then cancelled the remainders of the two 50-year timber contracts<br />
Unfortunately it is under threat once again. The Forest Service is currently preparing its largest auction of the Tongass in a decade to logging companies. In nearly six decades, loggers have cleared more than 700 square miles of the Tongass. Furthermore, the Forest Service has bulldozed more than 4,500 miles of roads through the forest for the logging companies to use.<br />
Legislation working its way through Congress could allow a single corporation, Sealaska, to log some of the best, oldest, most biologically-rich areas left in the Tongass. Sealaska Corporation, which has a history of clearcutting its lands, is seeking ownership of some of the most ecologically and biologically diverse parts of the Tongass National Forest. In fact, the lands targeted by Sealaska have more than ten times the habitat value of other Tongass forest land. Ketchikan lumber mill applied and was granted access to clear-cut 381 acres in one of the Tongass’ pristine roadless areas.
    Alaska-Tongass-National-Forest1.jpg
  • The most controversial logging in the Tongass has involved the roadless areas. Southeast Alaska is an extensive landscape, with communities scattered across the archipelago on different islands, isolated from each other and the mainland road system. The road system that exists in the region is in place because of the resource extraction history in the region, primarily established by the Forest Service to enable timber harvest. Once in place, these roads serve to connect local communities and visitors to recreation, hunting, fishing, and subsistence opportunities long into the future. However, installing roads in the vast wilderness areas of the Tongass is also a point of controversy for many in the American public, as reflected in the roadless area conservation movement, which has opposed further road construction on the grounds that it would promote habitat fragmentation, diminish wildlife populations and damage salmon spawning streams; they argue that existing roads are sufficient. <br />
Native Corporation Lands were designated by the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1971 (ANCSA). This Act conveyed approximately 44,000,000 acres (180,000 km2) of Federal land in Alaska to private native corporations which were created under the ANCSA. 632,000 acres (2,560 km2) of those lands were hand-picked old growth areas of the Tongass and are still surrounded by public National Forest land. These lands are now private and under the management of Sealaska, one of the native regional corporations created under the ANCSA. <br />
Transference of public National Forest land to a privately owned corporation removes it from protection by Federal law and allows the owners to use the land in whatever way they see fit without regard to the effects of the use on surrounding lands and ecosystems. This fact has caused much controversy involving the business interests of Native Regional Corporations and the personal interests of local Native and non-Native residents of Southeastern Alaska.
    Alaska-Tongass-National-Forest2.jpg
  • Chicken of the Woods or sulfur shelf (Laetiporus sulphureus) shelf fungus growing on decaying tree in temperate rain forest, Southeast Alaska, USA.Striking even from a distance, this mushroom usually grows in large clusters of overlapping bright orange and yellow shelves on conifers. Shelves can exceed 12 inches in width, and a cluster can extend over several feet. When fresh, the fruitbodies are soft and somewhat fleshy to fibrous, but later they become tougher, and, eventually, fade and become soft and crumbly. Shelf margins are rounded and plump when young, becoming wavy and lobed with age. The pores are bright yellow when fresh and fade in age. Considered choice by many, but usually only the soft young outer portions of the shelf are worth eating.<br />
This fungi was one of my regular wild foods that I foraged for to supplement the food I carried with me. It was also one of my favourites because it is so tasty and versatile for cooking. As a lifelong vegetarian it was like a meat substitute for me because it has a meaty texture like chicken, and a similar flavour. It's difficult to overcook and it absorbs flavours; I particularly enjoyed cooking it in pasta sauces with plenty of herbs. It is an ideal wild food for many reasons, including that it's bright orange colour makes it easy to locate in the forest and it has low perishability so I could carry it with me inside my kayak with my other less-perishable vegetables. The other fungus I commonly foraged for was Pacific Golden Chanterelle (Cantharellus formosus), but that is much more perishable.
    Alaska-chicken-of-the-woods1.jpg
  • Western hemlock (Tsuga heterophylla) trees festooned with moss and usnea or old man’s beard (Usnea longissima), Tongass National Forest, Southeast Alaska, USA.
    Alaska-Tongass-National-Forest5.jpg
  • Striking even from a distance, this mushroom usually grows in large clusters of overlapping bright orange and yellow shelves on conifers. Shelves can exceed 12 inches in width, and a cluster can extend over several feet. When fresh, the fruitbodies are soft and somewhat fleshy to fibrous, but later they become tougher, and, eventually, fade and become soft and crumbly. Shelf margins are rounded and plump when young, becoming wavy and lobed with age. The pores are bright yellow when fresh and fade in age. Considered choice by many, but usually only the soft young outer portions of the shelf are worth eating.<br />
This fungi was one of my regular wild foods that I foraged for to supplement the food I carried with me. It was also one of my favourites because it is so tasty and versatile for cooking. As a lifelong vegetarian it was like a meat substitute for me because it has a meaty texture like chicken, and a similar flavour. It's difficult to overcook and it absorbs flavours; I particularly enjoyed cooking it in pasta sauces with plenty of herbs. It is an ideal wild food for many reasons, including that it's bright orange colour makes it easy to locate in the forest and it has low perishability so I could carry it with me inside my kayak with my other less-perishable vegetables. The other fungus I commonly foraged for was Pacific Golden Chanterelle (Cantharellus formosus), but that is much more perishable.
    Alaska-chicken-of-the-woods2.jpg
  • Southeast-Alaska-pussy-willow1.jpg
  • Beaver dam flooded area of western hemlock (Tsuga heterophylla) and Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis) temperate rain forest, with devil's club (Oplopanax horridus) and western skunk cabbage (Lysichiton americanus), Kadashan River Valley, Chichagof Island, USA.<br />
The Kadashan River valley is one of my favourite places for many reasons, and for a variety of habitats: it has a beautiful beaver dammed flooded area in the forest not far from the river: avenues of birch trees: and there are very extensive grass meadows and mud flats at the mouth of the river. It is an excellent place to watch brown bears catching salmon in the fall. The Kadashan River flows into Tenakee Inlet where I always used to end up in September to photograph the bubblenet-feeding humpback whales. It provided a beautiful break from my high-octane pursuit of the whales up and down the inlet, as did soaking in the hot springs in the small town of Tenakee Springs opposite.
    Alaska-forest-beaver-pondAlaska-vege...jpg
  • The Kadashan River valley is one of my favourite places for many reasons, and for a variety of habitats: it has a beautiful beaver dammed flooded area in the forest not far from the river: avenues of birch trees: and there are very extensive grass meadows and mud flats at the mouth of the river. It is an excellent place to watch brown bears catching salmon in the fall. The Kadashan River flows into Tenakee Inlet where I always used to end up in September to photograph the bubblenet-feeding humpback whales. It provided a beautiful break from my high-octane pursuit of the whales up and down the inlet, as did soaking in the hot springs in the small town of Tenakee Springs opposite.
    Alaska-forest-beaver-pondAlaska-vege...jpg
  • Tongass National Forest, temperate rain forest, Chichagof Island, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
<br />
This is a definitive view of the Southeastern Alaska temperate rain forest; you can almost hear the ravens calling from high up on a massy branch. Southeast Alaska is a place that is defined by rain, lots of it, and at any time of the year. Sometimes it doesn’t stop raining for weeks and you can count the days of summer on one hand. If the sun breaks through the pervading clouds then the warmth releases misty serpents that weave their way across the branches and evaporate into the sunshine. It can be a dark and shadowed land but the mercurial interplay between light and water is always there, if you are prepared to wait…..
    vegetation-13.tif
  • Temperate rain forest bordering river flowing into Port Houghton, the mainland, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
<br />
The temperate rain forest of Southeast Alaska seems like such a dark impenetrable place, even along the banks of a river, like here at Port Houghton. The vegetation is often thick and impenetrable with spiky devil’s club, blueberry and salmon berry bushes, and the floor is littered with dead and decaying timber that further impedes progress through the forest. Usually the only way to get around the forest is by the animal trails that have been kept open by wild animals for thousands of years.
    vegetation-10.tif
  • Ponds created by beaver in temperate rain forest, Kadashan River, Chichagof Island, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
<br />
The Kadashan River on Chichagof Island, that flows into Tenakee Inlet, was my other favourite place for vegetation, particularly where there are many beaver dams, that serve to open up the forest and allow more light in.
    vegetation-16.tif
  • Ankarana National Park in north-west Madagascar is a spectacular eroded limestone fortress of sharp ridges, interspersed with patches of dense tropical rainforest, deciduous forest, gorges, deep caves and underground rivers. About 100 kilometres of cave passages have been mapped within the massif. It is a small, partially vegetated plateau composed of 150-million-year-old middle Jurassic limestone, with an average annual rainfall of about 2,000 mm that has led to the erosion that has created the classic “karst” topography, or locally known as “tsingy”.<br />
Ankarana contains one of the highest densities of primates of any forest in the world. Its dense forests supports large populations of crowned lemurs and Sanford’s brown lemurs, in addition to Perrier’s sifaka, northern sportive lemurs, brown mouse lemurs, fork-marked lemurs, eastern wooly lemurs, western lesser bamboo lemurs and fat-tailed dwarf lemurs, and also ring-tailed mongoose, fossa, tenrecs and Madagascar striped civet. There are almost 100 bird species, 50 reptile, including some endemic and threatened snakes and geckos, and 10 species of frogs. Inside the huge labyrinth of caves there are 14 species of bats, along with local endemic blind shrimps and the world’s only cave-living crocodiles.<br />
More than 350 plant species grow in the park; the luxuriant forests around the gorges are always green and are the richest in numbers of species.
    Kayaking-Madagascar-journey47.jpg
  • Skunk cabbage, Port Houghton, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
<br />
The skunk cabbage is probably the definitive understory plant of the Southeast Alaskan rain forest along with devil’s club. Its musky smell permeates the darkest, wettest corners of the forest and its giant shiny leaves seem to belong to prehistoric times.
    vegetation-9.tif
  • Birch and other deciduous trees near Haines, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
<br />
Although much of the Tongass national Forest is made up of conifers like western hemlock, Sitka spruce, red and yellow cedar, there are plenty of deciduous trees, particularly in wide open river valleys.
    vegetation-14.tif
  • Skunk cabbage is the definitive plant of the damp Southeast Alaskan terrain. It's large leaves and thick stems can be found anywhere where the ground is saturated enough both inside the forest and outside. Apart from its prominent appearance its distinctive musky smell is a prevalent feature in and around the forest. The distinctive odor attracts its pollinators, scavenging flies and beetles. The plant grows from rhizomes that measure 30 cm or longer, and 2.5 to 5 cm in diameter. The leaves are the largest of any native plant in the region, 50–135 cm long and 30–80 cm wide when mature. Its flowers are produced in a spadix contained within a large, bright yellow or yellowish green spathe 30–40 cm tall; it is among the first flowers to appear in spring.While some consider the plant to be a weed, its roots are food for bears, who eat it after hibernating as a laxative or cathartic. The plant was used by indigenous people as medicine for burns and injuries, and for food in times of famine, when almost all parts were eaten.
    Alaska-vegetation23.jpg
  • Flower meadow bordering a river, Port Houghton inlet on the mainland, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
<br />
As a keen gardener and amateur botanist Port Houghton was my Shangri-la. It is a very deep inlet and it ends with a salt chuck surrounded by high mountains. On one side there is a river that goes directly into the tidal inlet, as can be seen in this photo. Between the river and the salt chuck there are beautiful, colourful, flower meadows and closer to the forest there are extensive patches of richly vegetated “muskeg”, sphagnum bogs, dotted with dwarf trees heavily festooned with moss and lichens. It was like a botanical garden that had beautiful features of all facets of the rich vegetation of Southeast Alaska. Because the rainfall there was so high and the conditions usually overcast, the colours always seemed to be particularly saturated and resplendent so that the red of the Indian paint brushes literally seemed like wet paint that had just been applied to them.
    AlaskaRescan-8.jpg
  • Skunk cabbage is the definitive plant of the damp Southeast Alaskan terrain. It's large leaves and thick stems can be found anywhere where the ground is saturated enough both inside the forest and outside. Apart from its prominent appearance its distinctive musky smell is a prevalent feature in and around the forest. The distinctive odor attracts its pollinators, scavenging flies and beetles. The plant grows from rhizomes that measure 30 cm or longer, and 2.5 to 5 cm in diameter. The leaves are the largest of any native plant in the region, 50–135 cm long and 30–80 cm wide when mature. Its flowers are produced in a spadix contained within a large, bright yellow or yellowish green spathe 30–40 cm tall; it is among the first flowers to appear in spring.While some consider the plant to be a weed, its roots are food for bears, who eat it after hibernating as a laxative or cathartic. The plant was used by indigenous people as medicine for burns and injuries, and for food in times of famine, when almost all parts were eaten.
    Alaska-vegetation24.jpg
  • Skunk cabbage is the definitive plant of the damp Southeast Alaskan terrain. It's large leaves and thick stems can be found anywhere where the ground is saturated enough both inside the forest and outside. Apart from its prominent appearance its distinctive musky smell is a prevalent feature in and around the forest. The distinctive odor attracts its pollinators, scavenging flies and beetles. The plant grows from rhizomes that measure 30 cm or longer, and 2.5 to 5 cm in diameter. The leaves are the largest of any native plant in the region, 50–135 cm long and 30–80 cm wide when mature. Its flowers are produced in a spadix contained within a large, bright yellow or yellowish green spathe 30–40 cm tall; it is among the first flowers to appear in spring.While some consider the plant to be a weed, its roots are food for bears, who eat it after hibernating as a laxative or cathartic. The plant was used by indigenous people as medicine for burns and injuries, and for food in times of famine, when almost all parts were eaten.Streptopus amplexifolius was used as a food plant by Native Americans in Eastern North America and as a medicine. The plant was referred to by early settlers of Eastern and Western North America as "wild cucumber" and as "scoot berries" for the mildly laxative effects of the berries if they are eaten in excessive quantities.<br />
Twisted stalk or wild cucumber is one of my favourite plants in Southeast. It is a very elegant plant with its ornately arranged lanceolate leaves attached to each kink in the stem. It has delicate little ivory flowers that hang down like fairy's hats.The tender young shoots of this plant were eaten by some aboriginal peoples as a salad green, but most considered the plant and berries poisonous.The shoots are sweet with a cucumber-like flavor. The berries are juicy and sweet, with a watermelon-like flavour. The juice of the berries was used as a soothing treatment for burns by American Indians.
    Alaska-vegetation25.jpg
  • Colourful grass and false lily-of-the-valley in wet meadow bordering the forest, Port Houghton, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
I was particularly fascinated by all of the different species of wild grasses in Southeast Alaska because in my own country, England, so many of the native wild grasses have been displaced by the all-consuming modern agricultural practices.<br />
This was one of my favourite species because the pink colour change in autumn perfectly complimented the colour transformation of the surrounding sphagnum bogs. I always called this “the Party Photo”, because the colourful grass seems to be erupting from the ground like party poppers.
    vegetation-6.tif
  • The unusual and dramatic lighting was created by a forest fire hundreds of miles away in the Yukon Territory. The smoky haze drifted across Southeast Alaska during a rare period of clear weather, intensified the lighting and created a luminous band of light along the horizon.
    Alaska-humpback-whale-sounding8.jpg
  • Port Houghton is a deep inlet on the mainland just to the north of Petersburg. It was one of my favourite peaceful retreats to find solitude in Southeast Alaska, and to enjoy and photograph the beautiful vegetation. It was my favourite place for vegetation because it has such an array of consummate displays of all the lowland, coastal vegetation habitats: flower meadows bursting with blooms and colours: muskeg resplendent with colour and minute detail, especially in the fall, dotted with inky ponds, and lichen and moss festooned dwarf trees: before the surrounding primary old growth temperate rain forest extends up the flanks of the surrounding mountains. Foraging bears frequent the meadows in the summer or dine on salmon in the rivers in the fall. At the head of the inlet there is a salt chuck  with a rock where harbour seals haul out.
    Alaska-vegetation1.jpg
  • Some of the herring they are catching are clearly visible above the lunging whales. This was taken during a period of clear weather when there was a forest fire hundreds of miles away in the Yukon Territory, which created the unusual lighting.
    Alaska-humpbackwhale-bubblenet25.jpg
  • Port Houghton is a deep inlet on the mainland just to the north of Petersburg. It was one of my favourite peaceful retreats to find solitude in Southeast Alaska, and to enjoy and photograph the beautiful vegetation. It was my favourite place for vegetation because it has such an array of consummate displays of all the lowland, coastal vegetation habitats: flower meadows bursting with blooms and colours: muskeg resplendent with colour and minute detail, especially in the fall, dotted with inky ponds, and lichen and moss festooned dwarf trees: before the surrounding primary old growth temperate rain forest extends up the flanks of the surrounding mountains. Foraging bears frequent the meadows in the summer or dine on salmon in the rivers in the fall. At the head of the inlet there is a salt chuck  with a rock where harbour seals haul out.
    Alaska-vegetation2.jpg
  • Although the temperate rain forest of Southeast Alaska is evergreen there is never any shortage of beautiful autumnal colours in the understory vegetation such as the blueberry bushes and the sphagnum moss and miniature plants of the muskeg.
    Alaska-vegetation13.jpg
  • The unusual and dramatic lighting was created by a forest fire hundreds of miles away in the Yukon Territory. The smoky haze drifted across Southeast Alaska during a rare period of clear weather, intensified the lighting and created a glowing band of light along the horizon.
    Alaska-humpback-whale-sounding21.jpg
  • The unusual and dramatic lighting was created by a forest fire hundreds of miles away in the Yukon Territory. The smoky haze drifted across Southeast Alaska during a rare period of clear weather, intensified the lighting and created a luminous band of light along the horizon.
    Alaska-humpback-whale-sounding9.jpg
  • Although much of the Tongass national Forest is made up of conifers like western hemlock, Sitka spruce, red and yellow cedar, there are plenty of deciduous trees, particularly in wide open river valleys.
    Alaska-deciduous-trees-autumn1.jpg
  • Humpback whales (Megaptera novaeanglia) cooperative feeding using a bubble net, near Kupreanof Island, Stephen’s Passage, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
This photo was taken near the Tlingit town of Kake on Kupreanof Island and illustrates the problems of the practice of clear-cut logging that persisted during the 1980s and 90s when I was based in Southeast Alaska. The extent of clear-cutting was much worse around native communities because the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1971 (ANCSA) awarded approximately 148,500,000 acres (601,000 km2) of Federal land in Alaska to private native corporations which were created under ANCSA. Transference of public National Forest land to a privately owned corporation removes it from protection by Federal law and allows the owners to use the land in whatever way they see fit without regard to the effects of the use on surrounding lands and ecosystems. This fact has caused much controversy involving the business interests of Native Regional Corporations and the personal interests of local Natives and non-Native residents of Southeastern Alaska, such as subsistence hunting and tourism.
    Humpback whales-6-2.tif
  • Beavers open up the dark dense forests with their dams and ponds, creating a different habitat for other plants and animals to thrive in.
    Alaska-vegetation20.jpg
  • Dying trees around a pond created by beaver, Mitkof Island, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
Beaver can completely transform a forested landscape. They can create new habitats that can be exploited by other animals.
    vegetation-17.tif
  • As this beaver pond was quite near Petersburg I was able to observe them quite often here.
    Alaska-forest-beaver-pondAlaska-vege...jpg
  • Kayak-Madagascar-invertebrateNew-Mad...jpg
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  • I always called this my party picture because the coloured grass reminds me of party poppers or fireworks.
    Alaska-vegetation14.jpg
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  • KinabatanganRiver-4.tif
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  • Waterfall and large Alaska cottonwood tree in the autumn, Stikine River, the mainland, Southeast Alaska, USA.<br />
<br />
If I wasn’t kayaking at sea looking for humpback whales then the Stikine River was my favourite place to be. What an amazing, breathtaking river that is, that provides a valuable natural highway for wild animals from the interior and opens out onto  a spectacular river delta. When I remember Alaska, it is somewhere that I always return to in my dreams, to feel the vastness of open vistas that Alaska provides.
    vegetation-15.tif
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  • It was always important to know where the safest anchorages were because the weather conditions could deteriorate very quickly. Some weren't secure enough, and I spent many a sleepless night making sure that the anchor was still secure and that Avalon was being dragged onto the rocks.
    Southeast-Alaska-Avalon8.jpg
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