I’ll cover a soggy Alaskan spring, the grim but hopeful dog-cruelty case with a newly recovered survivor, local raptor migration at Gunsight Mountain Hawkwatch Weekend, and the early return of summer songbirds — ending with a brief peek at a new item from the gun safe.
Spring in the Great Land still feels wet and drippy, with ATVs sitting in the machine shed while standing water dots the valley. That standing water promises a lively mosquito season, but there are positives: robins and swallows have returned and song is coming back to the trees. I even heard a Varied Thrush singing behind the workshop the other morning, which is the sound of summer working its way north.
There is better news in a horrifying local cruelty case: another surviving dog was recovered from the kennel cluster tied to Talkeetna and Willow. The official report notes:
- A second live dog linked to a Willow woman charged with 26 counts of animal cruelty was seized from a Talkeetna home Thursday and is now in borough custody. She is in good health, officials said.
- Misty Rehder was arrested after more than two dozen dead dogs were found at her kennel last week.
- Wasilla attorney Richard Payne was selected Thursday to lead an external investigation into Matanuska-Susitna Borough animal control officials’ actions related to the kennel. Witnesses say they warned officials for months about the dogs’ conditions but were ignored.
It’s a small mercy that another dog survived, but the larger story is grim and will take time to sort.
I have little patience for people who mistreat animals, and this case hits that nerve. We don’t have a dog of our own right now, but our neighbor’s dog Yogi often wanders over in the mornings to say hello and waits outside the office until I come out. A simple ear scratch and a voice telling him he’s a good boy are part of how we share neighborhood life, and it makes these cruelty stories hard to swallow.
Alaska Man score: Mixed bag here. Five moose nuggets to the authorities for recovering another survivor and pursuing accountability, but nothing to reward the people who allowed those animals to suffer.
On a brighter note, it was Hawkwatch weekend on the Glenn Highway, where volunteers and visitors gather to count raptors streaming north. The Gunsight Mountain Hawkwatch Weekend draws people to Mile 118.8 to celebrate the spring migration and to tally the parade of hawks, falcons, and eagles as they move. Many come with binoculars, scopes, and cameras to witness the spectacle on clear migration days.
That event has a clear, simple aim and one speaker put it plainly: “Just to basically see this parade of migrating raptors that comes through every year. It’s just incredibly cool to sit here and watch them stream by,” said Mr. Whitekeys, a longtime Southcentral celebrity and the so-called commander in chief of Anchorage Audubon. The communal aspect of binoculars lifted to the sky, folks trading IDs and stories, is what makes hawkwatch so appealing.
Birding runs in my family; my parents were active in the local Audubon when I was young, back when it focused squarely on birds rather than politics. We did nesting and migration counts every year, and the training stuck—today I can identify most North American birds by sight and many by song alone. That background makes seeing the migration feel personal and keeps me tuned to the seasonal changes.
Closer to home, more summer birds are already returning to our corner of the Susitna Valley, with juncos expected soon and warblers not far behind. May usually brings a wave of arrivals, including Swainson’s Thrush singing from high in the treetops, whose song always sounds like the trees themselves taking a breath. Birds are steady, reliable neighbors, and on many mornings they’re better company than most people.
Alaska Man Score: Five migrating raptors. It’s the sort of seasonal tally that cheers the soul while reminding us how resilient nature can be after a long winter.
Now then, let me show you a new item in the gun safe!
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