Explore Together!

United States Department of Agriculture Chugach

Discover common plants and animals

Lin the Chugach National Forest Moose w

Explore together! Dall Sheep Find a plant or animal Are you ready to not included in the book? Check explore the Chugach out the back page to add your own notes and drawings. National Forest? Milo Burcham

Using this guide, see how many As you explore the Chugach Arctic Tern plants and animals you can find. National Forest, try to figure an og L an You can discover many different out how different plants and Bri plants and animals across the animals might be connected. Chugach National Forest. This Plants and animals depend on Fun Facts booklet only includes a sample each other and the places they • 30% of The Chugach National Forest of each. live. It’s all connected! is covered in ice. • Copper River Delta is the largest contiguous wetland in North America. • The Chugach National Forest provides habitat for 67 million salmon a year.

map key Safety First Chugach National Forest • Be prepared for changing weather conditions. (in the United States of America) • Help may be far away so plan ahead before you go. Town or City • Always be aware of your surroundings and 2 give wildlife plenty of space. Large Mammals Bear Safety Dall Sheep 1. BE A NOISY HIKER Dall sheep don’t have beards and Sing or talk while hiking so you don’t surprise their horns are brown. Females, a bear. Make up a fun song! called “ewes” have short horns, 2. GIVE BEARS SPACE but males, called “rams” have Don’t approach a bear - watch from a distance. massive curled horns that they use to head-butt other rams. Brown Bear Their strong shoulders allow them to dig curled, brown for bugs, plant roots and other food. Sheep Dall horns on males short, round ears dished skinny black horns face that curve backward profile shoulder hump

no Bear Brown beard Goat Mountain

Bear Black beard

straight face taller no shoulder profile ears hump Mountain Goat Black Bear Mountain goats have skinny black Black bears use their short, sharp claws to horns that curve backward. They climb trees. Sows also send their cubs up have shaggy white fur, which they trees as a babysitting strategy. shed in the summer. Look for a beard under their chins (females Both black bears and brown and kids too). bears vary in color from from blonde to brown to black. 3 black tip Small Mammals

body stocky 4

n g round winter summer, allwhitein reddish brownbodyin large ears can dropbelowthefreezingpointofwater. a hibernatingsquirrel’sbodytemperature hibernators! Scientistshavediscoveredthat Arctic groundsquirrelsaresuper- Arctic GroundSquirrel you thinktheychangecolor? summer, whiteinthewinter.Whydo throughout theyear:brownin An ermine’sfurcoatchangescolor Ermine legs short white belly tan fur grey or the winter.Listen fortheirhigh-pitched “enk”call. they areoften busygatheringandstoring foodfor Pikas arerelatedtorabbits anddonothibernate,so Collared Pika

help themblendin. predators. Furiseventhecolorofrocksto rocks. Theysitontopofrocks,watchingfor Hoary marmotsloverocks!Theyburrowunder Hoary Marmot

o wide head short and n g grey fur legs fordigging short, strong tan-brown fur lower back darker faceand squirrels other tail than shorter body stocky

Bob Armstrong thick beak black body Birds

Bald Eagle Immature (young) eagles are dark brown. A bald eagle doesn’t have bright white head feathers until it is about five years old. There are Raven more bald eagles in Alaska than in Ravens Ravens are scavengers, and will eat just anywhere else in the U.S. are larger about anything. They love elderberries than in late summer! Ravens are playful crows and very smart, able to solve complex problems.

Jen Christopherson wing span dark brown up to 7.5 mottled brown, body feet tan and black body chicken-like bird brown tip on tail white tail white head

Black Oystercatcher Look for black oystercatchers hopping up and down rocks along the coast, searching for their favorite food - mussels. Spruce Grouse long During breeding season, male red bill spruce grouse work hard to Because they impress females. They fluff their depend on rocky feathers, stick their tail high in coastlines, black the air, and beat their wings so oystercatchers are fast that it makes a low drumming sensitive to disturbance. black long, dull sound. Can you flap your arms head and pink legs Please watch them fast enough to make a sound? body from a distance. 5 © mbalame99 6 Salmon purple bars.Maleshavecanine-liketeeth. maroon sidescoveredwithirregularreddish Spawning adultsdevelopolivegreenback, Chum Sockeye green head Coho dark browntomaroonbodies. develop greenish-blackheadsand Spawning cohosalmonadults to spawn.Thisiscalledanadromous. salt water,andthenreturntofreshwater Salmon areborninfreshwater,live spawning adult bright red body

king tallest finger, turn maroontoolive. lose theirsilverycolorand Spawning salmonadults Chinook sockeye poke intheeye, pointer finger, chum rhymes with thumb

© Donna Pomeroy USDA Forest Service light spots on dark Fish spawning body adult Dolly Varden Though similar to trout, Dolly Varden are actually a char. To tell a char from a trout, look at their spots—char have light spots (white, yellow to red) on a dark body, while white leading edges on fins trout have dark spots (brown to black) on a light body.

Rainbow Trout and Steelhead Rainbow trout and Steelhead start out as basically the same kind of fish, but as they grow up rainbow trout stay in freshwater streams and steelhead migrate to the ocean. blue-green to olive

spawning adults dark spots brilliant silver reddish-pink dark spots band

brown to blue on the back Eulachon and top of the head James Crippen Eulachon are also called “hooligan” and people dipnet for these popular subsistence fish. They are also called “candlefish” because when dried, the oil content is so high the fish can silver body burn like a candle. light speckles 7 WILDFLOWERS

Nootka Lupine long Lupines take nutrients clusters from the air and put them of flowers in the soil, which helps dark pink to other plants grow. purple flowers

pod-shaped flowers flowers grow in clusters are blue with pink or up the red stem white accents

Fireweed Flowers bloom at different times on the stem, starting at the bottom and ending at the top. Locals know the end of summer is coming when clusters of the fireweed finishes blooming. 5-8 narrow oval leaves

long narrow Wild Geranium leaves Wild geranium is also known as “wooly geranium” or “cranesbill,” because sometimes the stalks in the middle of the flower are stuck together and look like the beak of a crane.

5 petals flowers in cluster of large blue or 2 or 3 purple flower

Wild Iris dark veins Wild iris can be found growing in wet areas all across northern parts of the world, from blue, purple, or Alaska and Canada to Russia and China. It is pink flowers sometimes called “beachhead iris,” because it 8 will grow in salty air on the beach. Trees pointy tips

Sitka Spruce If you shake hands with a spruce, beware of its spiky needles! Despite its prickly reputation, needles spruce is a good food source for stick out many animals, especially red in all squirrels who eat the seeds found directions between the scales of the cones. Spikey Spruce! Laurie Lamm

Hemlock (western and mountain) short If you shake hands with a hemlock, you’ll be happy to needles find its flat needles have rounded ends. Many animals hide in the shady branches of a hemlock, which makes flat a good place for birds like chickadees to build a nest. needles

rounded edges Happy Hemlock! Cedar (Alaska Yellow-cedar) Cedar needles look and feel more like scales. These scaly cedar branches are thick, bright green an important winter food source for leaves Black Sitka black-tailed deer. Cottonwood Cottonwoods have thick catkins with seeds covered in white, fluffy hairs. Black bears climb cottonwood trees in the early summer to eat the catkins, or seed pods, which are like an energy-rich nut. flat and scaly heart-shaped leaves with leaves a sharply pointed tip 9 Lung Lichen Lichens What’s lichen? Together, some fungi and algae Lung lichen grows on trees complex create an organism called lichen in really wet forests. Gently branching (pronounced “like-n”). In a symbiotic touch the lichen - does it relationship, the algae and fungi both help each other survive. feel like stiff leather?

looks like a leaf

brown tips loosely white & grey attached

Reindeer Lichen large Reindeer lichen grow close to the ground in open, wet lichen habitats. Guess who likes to eat it? Caribou!

WARNING: Do NOT touch or eat anything warts Fungi without an expert’s permission. Some on cap mushrooms in the forest are poisonous. white King Bolete stalk Boletes feel kind of like a sponge red, underneath their caps. Besides being orange or edible, you can use this mushroom to dye yellowish clothing a mustard yellow color. cap POISONOUS color ranges Amanita Muscaria from white, brown to This colorful mushroom is also called the “fly agaric” because it used to be reddish larger brown mushroom used to control house flies. This iconic mushroom looks playful, but BEWARE. club- Amanitas are POISONOUS. shaped stalk Steve Trudell 10 WARNING: Do NOT pick or Berries eat anything without an expert’s small, light green permission. Some berries in the leaves that turn forest are poisonous. reddish in fall

Salmonberry Look familiar? These popular berries are related to raspberries, only juicier. bigger than a raspberry three green & blue sharply-toothed berries leaflets Blueberry Berries from different bushes can taste differently, so sample a few bushes before you choose your 1 picking area. Watch for bears, who orange or love blueberries, too! reddish 2 3 berries

Nagoonberry Nagoonberries are hard when ripe and are best when cooked, including in jams and baked red berries goods. Nagoonberry flowers can be used in salads. messy-looking leaf looks like shrub

red berry that dinosaur footprint Bob Armstrong looks like a rasberry High Bush Cranberry The fruits of high bush cranberry leaf has three are enjoyed by both people and leaflets with wildlife. Deer, beavers and moose sharp-toothed eat the leaves while butterflies edges. grows close to visit the flowers. the ground 11 Nature Notes Find a plant or animal not included in the book? Add it on this page. This is your field guide so add notes, thoughts, and sketches.

Interested in discovering even more plants and animals in the Chugach National Forest? Forest Service rangers are happy to suggest more in-depth field guides for the area.

Produced by the Chugach National Forest and designed by Elise Wahl, Timberdoodle Studio.

Forest Service Alaska Region R10-RG-231 April 2018 USDA is an equal opportunity provider, employer, and lender.