The wildlife from Alaska’s Empty Interior

From the following map, we can easily see that the Empty Interior covers most of Alaska’s land:



But why this region it is called “empty”? Is that an indicator that there is no life at all? No animals or humans?

In the second post of this blog (called “Megalopolis”), I already discussed about human’s and their territories, ;). It would be fair that next, we should dedicate a post to the wildlife from Alaska’s Empty Interior.

Did you guys ever seen a moose? If you did not, you should move (or at least visit) the town of Anchorage from Alaska. This is the only place from USA which has a “moose problem”. In this city, there are so many mooses that destroy some of the local crop that there have been talks about hunting and reduce their numbers. I like animals and I hope this hunting which people are talking about (http://www.alaskascenes.com/wildlife.html) will not happen any time soon.




Other animals characteristics Alaska’s Empty Interior are grizzly and black bears. I don’t guarantee that you will see them in the wild, but you can go to Denali National Park (http://www.denaliparkresorts.com) or to MacNeil River Sanctuary and you changes to see them are pretty high.




If you see any bears on the rivers, don’t disturb them! They are fishing and they might get violent,:).




There are also birds, like Bald Eagle, and Ptarmigan, Loons, Tufted and Horned Puffin, Gulls, Swans, Sea Ducks, Steller’s Jay, etc.

Also, Caribous are living in herds. There are more than 30 herds which are spread across Alaska’s Empty Interior. Again, Denali National Park is the best place to see them. Caribous look like deer, but they are bigger: males can be up to 660 pounds and females can have up to 300 pounds.



There are also other wild animals like: Dall Sheep, marine animals (whales, fishes, sea otter, etc ), mountain goats, lynxs, grey wolf, musk oxes.

If you decide to go in a place and see wild animals for an arctic climate, you should choose a national park in Alaska. As I already said, Denali National Park is a perfect place to visit. Enjoy!

Resources:

1) http://www.alaskascenes.com/wildlife.html
2) http://www.denaliparkresorts.com
3) http://www.alaskacruises.com/alaska_wildlife.asp?pageID=499
4) http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/GEO/map11.gif