Monday, February 23, 2009

Sea Ducks on Elmendorf

Yesterday was a beautiful day here in Alaska. The skies were clear and the sun was shining! We took a nice drive around the back side of base to enjoy the scenery. It was a tad chilly at 18 degrees, but the truck was nice and toasty. This is the small end of Six Mile Lake on Elmendorf AFB, and a great spot to bird watch. These are Common Golden Eye sea ducks. They come by the name naturally, because their eyes are a very pretty golden color. These ducks are amazingly well insulated. As we watched, they would dive under the sheets of ice, and stay under for a very long time. The largest one stayed under about twice as long as the smaller ones did. At one point, I was sure he was stuck under there and couldn't get out.

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