Life in Alaska: Keeping an eye out for salmon and bears | Alaska: The Next Generation

It is something that's kinda been lost. And it does make the elders happy and excited that you're getting out there and doing what they used to do. Yeah, this is the end. End of the line right here. The fish are all spawned up now. These are uh, sockeye salmon. Some of them are still spawning, you can see eggs and stuff in the water, but the fish are kinda like this all over the place up here right now. I mean they’re in the lake, they’re in the creeks. I mean they're everywhere.

You gotta catch them as soon as they get into the lake basically cause once they hit fresh water, they stop feeding and then they start basically dying. They start turning red and their meat starts to turn white, and they no longer taste good at all. And it's like mushy. It's like soft. They're not good to eat. For the next couple weeks, they’ll be fish around just kinda dying and floating up on the beach. Can tell that the bears have been coming down because all the grass is all matted down and there's dead fish all over the place. This is kinda their feeding ground.

Let's see what else I can see. Oh man, look at that. The bears stashing his fish right here. It's super fresh too. And once the bears get full, they’ll kinda stop eating the whole salmon. They’ll just start eating like the good parts, like the belly and stuff. Think I'm gonna keep going a little more. Do a little more exploring. That's a pretty cool find. It's good just to get out and explore.

Stuff's kinda always changing out here too you know. The topography of the land and it's good to see if the salmon are schooling up in different places. How many bears are out and about. You know, what all the animals are up to this time of the year. I’m back here just kinda checking out where the bears are hanging out. Where they're at and about how many there are around. I mean, there's a lot of bears around here and they will try to protect their feeding ground.

That is something you kinda have to worry about cause we're like right where they’re eating right now. I like kinda knowing what they're doing, where they’re at. Partially just so you can stay away from them kind of a thing. Cause certain years you'll have more aggressive bears. Some years you'll have bears that break into stuff. But there is that off chance that you run into that bear that just wants to eat your face off.

I can hear the bears move around in here but I can't see ‘em. I don't like being this low to ‘em. I’m gonna climb up this hill up here so I can kinda see what's going on. Don’t have to have a showdown with a bear, if I don't have to. If I don’t have to. Oh (bleep), that’s a brown bear! He’s a pretty big bear growing up out here.

It's burned in to you that you shouldn't really be afraid of them. I mean, you should respect them. But if they do just want to leave you alone, for the most part, three bears just came out of the woods. They’re fighting over a fishing spot. They're a pretty good size too. They're coming to check out the salmon in that creek.

I’m not really worried about the bears, partially because I have a gun. They don't really care about you, especially right now cause they have like as much food as they can eat. This time of year, you can really see the life cycle of everything. You know cause the fish are coming up and everything kinda seems to feed off the fish somewhat. There’s just thousands of fish out here. The seals are coming in to eat the salmon. I mean the bears are here.

Be nice if I can get out, catch some pike and maybe shoot a seal. You know, have a little variety.