Animal Stories

For more than three decades, Anchorage-based writer Bill Sherwonit has written extensively about wilderness, the natural history of animals and plants, wildlife management, connection to place, conservation issues, and notions of wildness. He’s contributed stories and photos to a wide variety of national publications and is the author of over a dozen books about Alaska. He also teaches nature and travel writing in his adopted hometown of Anchorage. www.billsherwonit.alaskawriters.com.

Introduction/Author’s Note

I. Meeting the Neighbors
The Songs of Robins Stretch Across Time and Space
The Hidden Lives of Hares and Shrews
Living with Moose Through the Seasons and Across the Years
Watching Belugas
Point Woronzof’s Spectacle of Swallows
Squirrelly Behavior
Leaving the Nest
Ravens in Winter
Redpoll Serenade: Celebrating the End of Winter
Of Bears and Bird Seed
Listening to Owl

II. Along City and Highway Fringes
A Gathering of Swans
Called to a Primeval Presence: Anchorage’s Sandhill Cranes
Nesting Goshawks
Arctic Terns, the World’s Greatest Long-Distance Flyers
Campbell Creek’s Silvers
On the Trail, Finding Lynx
Valley of the Eagles

III. Backcountry Encounters
In the Company of Bears
Crossing Paths with Porcupine
Looking into Wild Eyes
Seeking Caribou, Touching the Arctic Refuge’s Coastal Plain
Fourteen Ways of Viewing Alaska’s Wild, White Sheep
Meeting a Legend: Wolverine
Paddling with Porpoises
Wilderness Music: Sharing a Valley with Howling Wolves

IV. Oddities, Surprises, and Dilemmas
A Gift of Halibut
Leonard Peyton’s Redpoll Project
Otter Catastrophe
“Nice” Weather Gets Seals Hot
Mystery of Alaska’s Deformed-Bill Chickadees
An Overlooked Marvel: In Search of Anchorage’s Wood Frogs
Of Waxwings and Goshawks and Standing Up to Power
A Tale of Two Wolverines and One Beloved Dog