Not many people experience the midnight of an Alaskan winter day. There are a few late travelers on the highway and only the occasional snowmobiler returning from a friends' house. However, they are insulated by machinery.
Dog mushers and the few trappers who still work their lines on snowshoes are those who truly feel the night. For them, rare is the day without a minimum of four hours in the dark.
The winter world is alive on the shadowy trails. Critters that flee frantically from man during the daylight are full of confidence under the security of dusk. The hunters are out and about. Rabbits are on the move; haven't they learned to sit quiet at night? They think that breeding, not stealth, is the answer to survival.
Night is the time to see foxes, lynx and the rare marten. Wolves howl and chuckle amongst themselves. I have had them follow me while snowshoeing back to the cabin. I have heard them howl and bark on the trailside as the dog team passed. Moose are common, though almost never caribou, as they are creatures of the day.
The most dangerous animal in the northern woods, to a dog driver, is on the trail. Porcupines, whose eyes do not shine a warning in the brightest of headlamps, waddle along on the ease of our well-packed paths. One day, my eight-dog team caught one in the predawn light. It took almost six hours of quill-pulling before we could again move.
The great-horned owl startles me as he flashes over the team on silent wings. Just how well can he see anyway? This owl is our most deadly hunter of the night. Its common prey is the varying hare, but its will take mink, marten and young foxes.
There are five common owls in the Interior of Alaska -- great-horned, great gray, snowy, boreal and hawk owls. Snowy owls and hawk owls hunt mostly by day; the others are almost exclusively night predators.
All of the owls are pure hunters -- no carrion for these guys. I once had a great-horned owl kill a full-grown red fox caught in a trap. They are our most common predator. Anyone out after dark, no matter your locale, will see or hear these birds at some point. Their booming call is the signature of the northern woods.
Great gray owls are far less common. Trappers on snowshoes, especially in the Yukon Valley, have stories of having the bejesus scared out of them by the great gray owl coming out of the spruces at head-height. In spite of their large size, which nearly matches the great-horned owl, voles are their favorite targets. Because of their preference for dark, thick spruces, they are seldom seen by us.
Occasionally, when food becomes scarce, they migrate south in great congregations. The winter of 2005 saw thousands of these big owls migrate through the Duluth, Minn., area. Birders came from across the country to catch a glimpse.
Boreal owls are perhaps the least known of the winter owls. They are tiny -- scarcely bigger than your hand. I have never seen one while out on the dog team but have had them perch on marten pole sets while snow shoeing the trapline. The Eskimos call them the "blind owl" because of their supposed inability to see in the day. I'm sure they can see, but encounter so few people and have no real predators, so they have no fear. They feed on voles during the winter months and probably insects to a great extent during the summer.
While you are sleeping, there is a lot happening in the winter world. Those who travel through during the hours of darkness will get a momentary snapshot of the life embroiled around them.
The saying "under the cover of darkness" has always baffled me. If I were a rabbit or a mouse, I'd crawl in a hole at 5 p.m. and pull the dirt in after me. Every predator in the country is out hunting during the night, and they are all hungry. And they can see.
John Schandelmeier of Paxson is a lifelong Alaskan and Bristol Bay commercial fisherman. A former champion of the Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race, he has written on the outdoors for several newspapers and magazines.
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