Tag Archives: Robin Barefield

Mary Ann Poll’s Journey to Becoming a Published Author

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Three weeks ago, I introduced you to Mary Ann Poll when she generously shared a post about her character Kat’s Thanksgiving in the small town of Ravens Cove, Alaska. This week, Mary Ann has written a guest post for my blog about her journey to becoming a published author. Mary Ann writes Christian-based, supernatural thrillers. I’ve read Ravens Cove, and it is a thrilling ride. I’ll let Mary Ann explain her books to you.

My Journey to Becoming a Published Author
by Mary Ann Poll

There is one thing to be said for coincidences. There aren’t any. And, before you think I’m crazy or just ‘narrow-minded’ consider the following story of how I became a published author.

A day came when I was confronted with an indisputable fact: My eternal soul lives in nothing more than crockery. That day came in May 1998.

I awoke for another day of work. Hands reaching toward the ceiling in that wonderful morning stretch were stopped instantly by sharp, tear-producing pain. As the initial pain subsided, I downed a pain reliever and was at my desk by 9 am. The pain returned with a vengeance by noon. At 1 pm I found myself in the emergency room. A disc had herniated in my neck, and I faced surgery with a long recovery.

This small writing is from a piece I wrote several years ago when I was asked to describe how I became an author. As they say, “The Lord works in mysterious ways.” Indeed, He does. Because if a disc in my neck had not herniated, if I had not read 100 books in ninety days because I could do nothing else while I healed, and if I had not listened to a good friend who suggested I write a novel, I would not be writing this article today.

My first book in what is now the Iconoclast series took many more years before it saw the black and white of printing. That journey was full of trips down other paths – going back to work time and again to make the almighty dollar and avoid the emotions and mental weariness that writing took. I took courses, joined online chat groups and talked about writing until I was blue in the face. In the end, I accepted the idea of writing was not going to go away. That was the day I sat down to write a book. It took twelve years to summon the courage and face the passion that would not leave, no matter what I did.

In all of the trips down other pathways, one helped me. I found out about National Novel Writing Month from a contact I made on a Christian writers forum. This is a yearly event where over 300,000 writers come together and grind out a novel in 30 days. I had tried everything else, so what was there to lose? So, I committed to the project. Low and behold, Ravens Cove was born.

Once written, then I was faced with the frightening and somewhat overwhelming question every writer has: “What now?” My answer for several months was, “nothing!” This was when I first discovered that writing a book is akin to giving birth. I wasn’t putting my ‘baby’ out into the world for criticism and rejection.

So, I let the book sit in the dark for several months. It stayed in the rawest of formats, and I think I was actually in denial that I had written an entire novel. I didn’t have (or make) the time to edit it because I had no clue where to go and who to trust with my ‘baby.’

My husband read the prologue and told me it was great. Of course, he did. He wanted dinner and to sleep in his own bed – what else would he have said? I knew he meant it. I also knew he loved me, so I dismissed his compliment.

It just so happened that my father-in-law came to visit the summer after I wrote Ravens Cove. He asked if I might allow him to read it. His reading it was not such a frightening thought, and, to be honest, I really wanted his opinion. And, I trusted his view because he has a Ph.D. in education and had published works of his own. He also happened to be the most avid reader I had ever met. So, I thought if anyone could

I gave him the book. He and my husband left that weekend for our RV in Anchor Point. He read it there. He came back and told me he really liked it. He said he had read authors he thought should have never been published. And, he thought mine should be.

My husband, with the I-told-you-so-look, agreed. Then, he took it a step further and emailed links to several publishers and publishing houses with information on what it took to get the book to press. And, here’s where Providence is again disguised as coincidence. One of those names was Publication Consultants.

I debated sending out query letters to the ‘big houses.’ I heard stories of books that were tied up for months, even a year or more, by those ‘big houses’ that had initially accepted the author’s work and then left them hanging forever. I debated the self-publishing houses and again read and heard of the horror stories of authors that were taken financially to the point it wasn’t worthwhile to pursue marketing their books. With all this, I decided I wanted to be able to look a publisher in the eye. So, I met with Evan Swensen of Publication Consultants.

Before I did, I reviewed the website and the different contracts available to an author. They all seemed above board and fair. I reviewed what authors had said about them, and it sounded good. So, I called.

Evan reviewed the first few pages of what was to be Ravens Cove. There were some problems but he told me the story was good and he would publish it-after I took it to an editor to fix the ‘boulders’-his word for problems. The rest is history. Since 2010, I have been privileged to call Publication Consultants my publishing house.

Publication Consultants was and still is invaluable to this me. They have taught, and are still teaching me, the ins and outs of the road to becoming a successful author. There have been numerous mountains to climb and valleys to traverse. They have stuck with me throughout the process and have opened doors that self-publishing could not. Without Evan Swensen and his staff, I would not have reached the goal of becoming a published author.

As I stated when I began this article, there are no coincidences. Each occurrence that seemed so small in and of their selves led me to Publication Consultants and the adventure of being a published author. To date, the journey continues. The entire Iconoclast Thriller series is complete. And, when ready and God willing, the next book will be published with the assistance of Publication Consultants.

Thank you, Mary Ann, for sharing your incredible journey with us. In my experience, writing a novel is the easiest part of the “author” process. The true work begins with editing, followed by publishing, and finally, the never-ending, tedious job of promotion. Mary Ann and I work very hard to promote our books, and we both belong to a promotional group called Author Masterminds. Our group is opening a reading club, and soon, I will invite you to join us. In the meantime, check out Mary Ann and her books. If you would like to know more about Mary Ann’s journey to becoming a published author, watch her webinar. At the end of the webinar, you will be able to download one of her books for free!

By the way, Mary Ann’s books would make perfect Christmas presents!

Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.

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Karluk Bones

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Karluk Bones is the title of my fourth Alaska wilderness mystery. The book has taken me longer to write than I had planned, but I think it will be worth the wait. This week, I want to share a portion of the opening scene with you.

Those of you who have read my other novels know Dr. Jane Marcus is a biologist at the Kodiak Fisheries Tech Center. In this scene, Jane and three of her friends camp near Karluk Lake on Kodiak. The next morning, they plan to float the Karluk River, but a fire in the middle of the night derails their expedition.

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Karluk Bones

Saturday, May 24th

“Fire! Wake up! Fire!”

The cry yanked me from a pleasant dream where my camping companions and I sat around the campfire roasting marshmallows. Now, I realized the smoky inspiration for my dream emanated not from a campfire but a forest fire.

I struggled to sit in my sleeping bag while my fingers fumbled with the zipper. Did we leave our campfire burning? No, I remember Geoff throwing water on it, and then we all watched until the last curls of smoke evaporated.

I’d worn my clothes to bed, and as soon as I struggled out of my bag, I crawled through the fly of the small tent. Smoke filled the air, and my friend and colleague, Geoff Baker, my friend, Dana Baynes, and her new beau, Jack Parker, all stood, staring to the north. I followed their gazes and saw the flames, but the fire had not yet spread far.

“What do you think?” I asked.

“It looks like a campfire got out of hand,” Geoff said.

“It’s so dry,” Dana said. “It’s bound to spread before they can put it out.”

“And the wind is blowing this way,” Geoff added.

“We’d better help them,” Jack said.

“You’re right,” I said, “but I fear only Mother Nature will be able to extinguish a blaze in the midst of all this dead, dry vegetation.”

“I’ll dump out our food buckets,” Geoff offered. “We can use those to scoop up lake water to throw on the fire.”

“Sure,” Dana said, “We’ll do a bucket brigade.”

I doubted anything we did would help, but if we stayed where we were, we’d be burned alive. “I suggest sticking anything you can’t live without in your pocket,” I said.

“Good point, Doc. I’ll grab my phone,” Geoff said.

“I’m grabbing my raincoat just in case,” Dana added.

I nodded. “I hope we need our raincoats. Rain is the one thing that will extinguish this fire.”
Geoff, Jack, and I carried our bear-proof food buckets now empty of their contents, and Dana shouldered a pack full of first-aid gear. She also carried a small camp shovel.

We hiked along the shore of Karluk Lake. It was a dark, chilly night. Correction, it was a dark, chilly morning. Darkness is an infrequent visitor in late May on Kodiak Island, but I can testify it is dark at 3:00 am. We wore headlamps to light the beach along the lakeshore, and I glued my eyes to the ground so that I wouldn’t stumble over a large rock or a tree branch. The smell of smoke grew stronger with each step.

As we neared the fire, I could see the flames growing in intensity and slowly but steadily spreading toward the south and our camp.

“We should have packed our stuff and moved it out of the line of fire,” I said.

“I don’t think we could move our stuff far enough to get it out of the fire line unless we brought it with us and stashed it upwind from the flames,” Geoff said.

We clung to the lakeshore and skirted around the edge of the fire. As we neared the tent camp where the blaze had started, we saw four young men frantically packing their tents and gear and moving everything down the beach. Miraculously, it looked as if the flames had not touched their camp.

Dana ran toward the men. “Is everyone okay?” She called.

One of the young men stopped in his tracks and looked toward her, obviously surprised by her presence. “Our campfire got out of control,” he said. “I thought we put it out but guess we didn’t.”

The man slurred his speech and seemed confused. At first, I thought he had a natural physical or mental impairment, but then, I realized he was drunk, or to be more accurate, he hadn’t completely sobered up from being drunk. I took in the entire scene and watched his camping companions stumble to move their gear, their actions clumsy and awkward. They were all in the no man’s land between drunk and sober, the period of the night when you wake up and curse yourself for drinking too much alcohol. I admit I’d been there a time or two, and now I tried to muster some forgiveness for them stupidly getting drunk and letting their campfire burn out of control.

Forgiveness was not on Dana’s mind, and she immediately understood the situation. She dropped her pack on the ground and stood, hands on hips, glaring at the young man who had spoken to her. “Are you drunk?”

“Maybe,” he said. “I’m not quite sober.”

“You are camping on an island with 3500 bears.” Dana walked toward him, her voice as loud as I’d ever heard it. “Many of those bears live near this lake.”

The young man looked at the ground and said nothing.

“If you want to camp on this Refuge, you need to be responsible.” Dana gestured to the spreading fire. “You started a fire by not putting out your campfire.”

“We tried to put it out,” the young man said.

“You tried?” Dana was now only about four feet away from the poor guy, all five feet nothing of her intimidating the young man as she screamed up at him.

Although the situation was dire, I nearly laughed as I watched the much larger man cower while petite Dana approached him. He flinched at each of her words as if she were slapping him in the face, and I thought she might slap him in the face when she got a few steps closer.

“I saw a video the other day,” Dana said. “An observant camper watched and videotaped a bunch of yahoos like you and your friends. They ate breakfast around their campfire, threw a little water on the fire, packed their gear, jumped in their raft, and headed down river. A few minutes after they’d left, a curious bear began sniffing their campfire. He put his paw on the hot embers, burned his paw and limped away, holding his burned paw in the air.” She took another step toward the young man who was now backing away from her. “I thought their lack of regard for the environment was disgusting until I see what you idiots managed to do here.”

I stood, caught up in the drama of Dana and the young camper when Geoff thumped me on the shoulder.

“Here, Doc,” he said, handing me a full bucket of lake water. “Let’s get this bucket brigade going.” He looked at Dana and the cowering campers. “Yo!” he yelled. “We need some help here; we have a fire to put out.”

The campers seemed happy for any excuse to escape Dana’s withering gaze and sharp reprimand. They found two more food buckets in their gear, emptied the contents, and hurried to stand in line between the lake and the burning fire.

I knew I couldn’t be the only one in this group who saw the futility of fighting a spreading wildfire with buckets of water, but buckets were all we had, and we needed to do something. There was no firefighting agency to call in the middle of the night to help put out a fire on the Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge. If the fire hadn’t been extinguished by morning, we would notify the National Wildlife Refuge office in Kodiak, and perhaps they could ask for assistance from the Department of Natural Resources. Dana was a biologist for the Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge, so she would know what to do. At present, Dana stood in the bucket brigade between the four campers, still lecturing them. If they weren’t sober by now, they would be soon, and between excessive alcohol, smoke, and Dana’s piercing voice, I didn’t envy any one of them the headache he would have for the next several hours.

We continued the steady progression of bucket passing as the sky slowly lightened. At 5:00 am, my arms were numb, my shoulders screamed with pain, and I had one of the worst headaches of my life. My comrades and I silently passed buckets, refusing to admit defeat. At 6:00 am, Mother Nature decided to lend us a helping hand. It started as a drizzle, but soon the rain pelted us in sheets.

I stepped out of the bucket line and said, “I think we can stop now.”

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While hiking back to their campsite, Jane and her friends stumble across human bones exposed by the burned vegetation. Are the bones ancient or modern, and how did this individual die? These are the first of many questions Jane asks Alaska State Trooper Sergeant Dan Patterson, and Jane won’t rest until she uncovers the answers and learns not only the identity of the man whose bones she found but also what or who caused his death.

I will share other outtakes of my novel at intervals over the next few months. Please let me know what you think. The above scene is the beginning of the book. Did it grab you and make you want to read more?

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Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.

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Author Rich Ritter is the New Voice of the American West

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Rich Ritter is another friend and author in my Author Masterminds group. Rich writes edgy historical fiction and many consider him the new voice of the American West. I don’t need to add anything else to hook you on Rich’s writing. Read this post, and I guarantee you will be an instant fan, clambering to buy all his books. _____________________________________________________________________

Rich Ritter: My Journey to Becoming an Author

Although I resented it at the time, I must now thank my eighth-grade English teacher for two excruciating months of lessons on the arcane subject of sentence diagramming. She aroused a latent desire to write, which eventually blossomed in high school when I was mistakenly chosen—along with two other students—to represent the school in a district-wide writing competition. The contest did not go well because the teacher in charge of our team loathed my uniquely-chaotic prose and forced me to write in the dreary style he preferred. Stunned by failure, but mostly due to a five-year diversion to study architecture, I did not submit my first short story for publication until the year after college. I would offer proof of this significant event, but I have since misplaced the rejection letter from the Atlantic Monthly.

I wrote extensively during the next twenty-five years, producing many important works of literature including A Proposal for Professional Services for the Dzantik’I Heeni Middle School, The West Douglas Planning Study, and Technical Specifications for the New Juneau Police Station, to name a few notable works. I did not rediscover fiction—although my competitors might argue this point—until the age of 49. My wife and I adopted our sons in 1983 and 1985, which eventually led to family upheaval and the attendance at four multiday sleep-depravation seminars. During the second seminar, the facilitator challenged us to commit to a “big bodacious goal.” This goal theoretically represented our true purpose in life. When I awoke the next morning, I foolishly scribbled on the little piece of paper next to the hotel phone that I would write a novel. However, I may have overdone the exercise because when we each announced our goals at the seminar the woman sitting next to me promised to take a multi-vitamin every day for a year.

I commenced within the week. Five long years later, I self-published Toil Under the Sun, a novel of the Korean War and an adopted son who does not believe he is worthy of love. Although I spent countless hours researching (even learning to operate and shoot an M-1 Garand without cutting off my thumb), much of my inspiration derived from my father, who served as a First Lieutenant with the U.S. Army in Korea, and my oldest son, who served as a sergeant with the U.S. Marine Corps in Iraq. My younger son provided source material as well, in his own way. When book sales did not go well, I embarked on a six-month effort to find a literary agent. I wrote numerous query letters, sent numerous emails, made numerous phone calls, and produced only one glimmer of interest from a New York agent who was on a desperate search for “Chic Lit approximately 80,000 words long.” When I told her that Toil Under the Sun clocked in at 133,000 words, our conversation quickly ended.

Undaunted, I decided to plunge into my next project: a novel of the west set in Silver City, Idaho during the late 1800s. Concerned about the effort required to produce Toil Under the Sun, my wife suggested I take a break and write something “smaller and funner,” possibly set in Juneau during the time of the great gold mines. I followed her counsel, and one year later completed the manuscript for Heart of Abigail: A Lyric Novella of Juneau, Douglas and Treadwell. At 28,000 words though, my writing speed had not increased. Unsatisfied with the previous self-publishing and literary agent results, I began fishing around for a publisher in Alaska by reading the “published by” information on book covers at local bookstores. I eventually found an interested publisher in Homer, but I declined after the editor told me that she would “…bleed all over my manuscript, but I can’t start until next spring.” A bit discouraged, I found myself wandering down the book aisle (after browsing the food carts) at the local Costco. A very handsome paperback caught my eye, and when I looked on the back I noted “Publication Consultants” in Anchorage. I called the owner, a man of integrity named Evan Swensen, and Heart of Abigail was published four months later.

Having satisfied my wife’s desire for something “smaller and funner,” I embarked on Nor Things to Come: A Novel of the American West. Another five years and more than 268,000 words later, I submitted the manuscript to Evan. He reviewed my work, then called me on the phone to let me know that no one would pay for a book this big from an unknown author. My wife stepped in once again to propose a solution. She suggested I publish the book as a trilogy because the story was already organized in three parts. Evan declared the idea “brilliant” and prompted me the get to work right away. I originally assumed very little effort would be required, but four months and five revisions later I submitted The Perilous Journey Begins, the first book of Nor Things to Come: A Trilogy of the American West. The second book, Gathering of the Clans, followed in six months. I do not yet have a title for the third book, but I know something interesting will eventually pop into my head—or maybe my wife will suggest a title: she has come through before when I needed help.

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Thank you, Rich! I think it always pays to listen to your wife! Be sure to check out Rich’s books, and while you are at it, you might want to buy two copies of each book because they would make great Christmas presents! You can find Rich’s books at Author Masterminds, Amazon, and other online booksellers.

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Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries.  Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.

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Sign Up for my free, monthly Mystery Newsletter about true crime in Alaska.

 

Thanksgiving in Ravens Cove

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Happy Thanksgiving to those of you in the U.S. I think it’s a wonderful idea no matter where we live to take a day, or better yet, several days throughout the year to consider everything and everyone in our lives for which we are thankful. We are all busy and are bombarded by negative news reports, political scare tactics, vicious elections, and the knowledge violence can happen anywhere at any time. It is easy to lose track of what is important and good in our lives.

This week, in honor of Thanksgiving, I have a special treat for you. My friend and fellow author, Mary Ann Poll, has shared with me an inside look at how the residents of Ravens Cove, Alaska celebrate Thanksgiving.

Mary Ann writes spine-tingling novels about the clash between good and evil. Ravens Cove is the first novel in her Iconoclast Mystery series, and it takes place in the fictional town of Ravens Cove, Alaska.

Kat, the protagonist in Ravens Cove, wrote this post, and she describes Thanksgiving in a small, Alaska town. Kat mentions that the dishes her relatives serve for the Thanksgiving feast come from a variety of cultures and traditions, making the meal truly Alaskan and emulating the “first” Thanksgiving which was also a blending of cultures.

Mary Ann will write a guest post for me in a few weeks, and I know this post by Kat will have you excited to read about Mary Ann and her books. Take it away, Kat.

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Happy Thanksgiving from Ravens Cove, Alaska

Today is a cold one for this time of year. Usually, we are around thirty-four degrees, but today our forecast is for the mid-twenties and a north wind, which means I’ll be pulling out the Army-green parka and clunky boots. On the bright side, the cold means fair skies…after 9:30 a.m. when the sun peaks out from behind the mountains. But, I digress. Today the cold is really last on my list of concerns because this is one of my favorite events of the year – Thanksgiving at Grandma’s house.
It seems like half the town gathers at Grandma’s (Alese Bricken for those of you who do not know her) for Thanksgiving. It is the time to catch up with my neighbors. Funny how we live in a small town and in the winter we can still go months without talking to each other.
We will have the traditional American feast but with parts of my Alaska native heritage thrown in – Grandma cannot seem to cook a meal without adding moose to the menu and, of course, smoked salmon for the appetizer. And, there is the pumpkin pie and mincemeat – does anyone know how a mincemeat pie became part of this? – Not my favorite, I’ll tell you! But, I will have a small sliver because Grandma thinks it is good for my bones. And, I choose my battles with Grandma.
May your turkey day be blessed!
Until next time…… Chin’an gheli – for my English-speaking friends: Thank you very much.
Kat

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Thank you, Kat, and thank you, Mary Ann. I am very thankful for you both for writing my post this week, and I love the idea of imagining how my characters spend their holidays! I am also thankful for my blog readers. A few of you have been with me from the beginning, and you hold a special place in my heart, so as Kat said, Chin’an gheli!

 

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Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.


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My Life as an Author

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It has been a while since I’ve posted about my life as an author, and I’d like to share news about some exciting writing opportunities I’ve been offered in the last few months.

Autumn is a busy time at our lodge, and I have little extra time to do anything. When I take a break, I usually fall asleep, so I haven’t written as much as I’d planned this fall. I have received some interesting invitations, though, and they have reignited my passion for succeeding as an author.

I was surprised and honored when Krishna Prasad, the editor for The Wagon Magazine, invited me to publish my mystery newsletters as a monthly column in his magazine. He even provided this logo for me to use. A few weeks later, the editor of True Crime: Case Files ezine asked me to submit an article. I sent her one of my mystery stories, and she accepted it for publication in the winter issue.

As the number of subscribers for my newsletter grows, I feel I’m beginning to reap the rewards of the many hours of hard work I’ve put into writing the newsletters, and I can’t wait to see what awaits down the road for my true crime stories. I hope before long to compile the stories into a book (or two).

Several of the authors I’ve invited to write guest posts on my site over the last few weeks are members of a group I belong to called Author Masterminds. We all have the same publisher (Publication Consultants), and the group consists of approximately thirty authors. We meet once a week via Zoom, an Internet meeting interface. Our group includes authors from Alaska, Texas, Florida, Michigan, Idaho, and other U.S. States, as well as from South Africa and Gibraltar. We write in many different genres, and I don’t think any two of us write in the same genre. We range in age from 16 to 75 and have very little in common other than a passion for writing and a dream to have others read what we write.

When I first joined this group, I felt honored to be invited. Our first meetings were quiet as we got to know each other, but as the group has expanded, we’ve all become more verbose. I have grown attached to the people in this group and feel especially close to the few I’ve been with since the beginning. We have supported each other through medical issues and family worries, and we’ve laughed a great deal as we’ve shared our clumsy attempts at marketing. A few members of the group make me laugh whenever I hear their voices.

It’s always nice to form a bond and belong to a group with others who share your passion, but for me, it’s a special treat. I live in the middle of the wilderness, and I have no one to talk to about writing and promoting my writing. It is invaluable to spend an hour a week with other authors who understand my dreams, confusion, and insecurities when it comes to the modern world of writing and publicity. I look forward each week to our meetings, but with our limited Internet out here in the wilds of Kodiak Island, I can only attend the meetings by audio, not video, so I refer to myself as the voice in the darkness. Some of our African colleagues face the same bandwidth restrictions I do, so we hang out with each other in the shadows.

Our publisher has recently hired a marketing specialist for us, and we are developing a book club Our club will differ from most book clubs because we, the authors, want to interact with our readers, get to know them and find out what they think about our books. I’m excited to invite readers to join our club, and I hope we can pull together an involved group. I’ll let you know how it goes, and I will provide a link to our club once we are organized. I hope all of you will join us.

Next week, Rich Ritter, a member of our Author Masterminds group who writes edgy historical fiction, will be my guest blogger. Rich is a talented author, and I know you will find him as fascinating as I do.

For now, my wilderness friends and I want to wish you a great week.

 

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Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. If you like audiobooks, check out her audiobook version of Murder Over Kodiak. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.

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Sign Up for my free, monthly Mystery Newsletter about true crime in Alaska.

What Do Sea Otters Eat?

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As I told you last week, a sea otter burns calories at a rapid rate to help maintain its body temperature in its home in the cold North Pacific. It consumes between 23 and 33 percent of its body weight per day, so a fifty-pound otter eats 11 to 16 lbs. (5 to 7.3 kg) of food every day. Where does a sea otter find this much food, and what do they eat?

Sea otters are known to consume more than 150 different prey species, mostly slow-moving benthic invertebrates such as mollusks, crustaceans, and echinoderms, but if they are hungry enough, they also sometimes eat fish and even seabirds. Sea otters are the only marine animals capable of lifting and turning over rocks in search of prey and the only marine mammal that catches fish with its forepaws rather than with its teeth.

Sea Otter Eating an Octopus

Studies done in southeast Alaska, Prince William Sound, and near Kodiak Island indicate that clams are the primary and preferred prey of sea otters in these regions. Clams constituted anywhere from 34% to 100% of the diet of sea otters near Kodiak. In areas where clams are less plentiful, and in areas where otters have depleted the clam populations, mussels and sea urchins comprise a larger percentage of otters’ diets. Crabs are also important prey species where they are available. On the west side of Kodiak Island, we see otters eating clams, scallops, crab, and octopus. Sea otters’ diets vary not only from one location to another and in response to available prey species, but also because individual otters have different food preferences, and a mother often passes on her fondness for certain foods to her pup.

A sea otter has a loose pouch of skin under each foreleg where it can store food collected on a dive. When the otter returns to the surface, it can rest on its back and leisurely retrieve one piece of food after another from its pouch. In addition to food, the sea otter also stores a rock in one of its pouches. The otter can use the rock underwater to pry loose mussels or other attached bivalves or to dislodge sea urchins wedged in crevices. When floating on the surface, the otter places the rock on its chest and pounds crabs, snails, clams, and other prey against the rock to break through the tough shells. Sea otters are one of the few animals other than humans known to use tools.

Sea Otter Eating a King Crab

Sea otters are very efficient at finding and eating shellfish, and where large groups of sea otters reside, they reduce populations of abalones, clams, and sea urchins to the point where a commercial fishery for these species in the area is not viable. This competition between sea otters and fishermen creates a conflict which cannot be easily resolved by fish and wildlife managers.

Sea otters are considered a “Keystone” species, meaning they affect the ecosystem to a much greater degree than their numbers would suggest. Sea otters protect kelp forests off Northern California by eating herbivores such as sea urchins that graze on the kelp. In turn, the kelp forests provide food and cover for many other species of animals, and kelp forests play an important role in capturing carbon and reducing atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. Without sea otters, urchins over-graze the kelp, throwing the ecosystem out of balance.

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Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. If you like audiobooks, check out her audiobook version of Murder Over Kodiak. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.

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How Do Sea Otters Stay Warm?

Kodiak Wildlife, Sea Otter, , , , ,

Northern sea otters (Enhydra lutris kenyoni) are common in the waters surrounding Kodiak Island. Our summer guests love watching and photographing these cute, curious animals as we pass by them in our boat. Some otters lie placidly on their backs and watch us motor past, and others dive from the perceived danger we create. A few otters repeatedly twist and turn in the water or turn summersaults, and we laugh at their comical antics. The truth is, though, sea otters don’t turn summersaults because they are having fun; these movements have the much more practical application of keeping the animals warm.

A marine mammal must maintain a body temperature near 100° F (37.8° C), and in Alaska, where the water temperature drops as low as 35° F (1.67° C), keeping warm can be a challenge. Other marine mammals have a thick layer of blubber to insulate themselves from the cold, but sea otters have very little fat and depend mainly on their fur for insulation. Sea otters have the thickest fur of any animal, with 850,000 to one million hairs per square inch (up to 150,000 per square centimeter). It is their dense, beautiful fur that made them so valuable to fur traders in the 1700’s and 1800’s.

A sea otter’s fur consists of two layers. Long guard hairs form the outer layer, providing a protective coat to keep the underfur dry. The extremely dense underfur provides warmth, but for the fur to insulate efficiently, it must be clean, so sea otters spend a large portion of each day grooming and cleaning their fur.

In addition to cleaning his fur, an otter will somersault in the water and rub his body to trap air bubbles in his fur. These bubbles not only provide insulation but also help to keep his skin dry. An otter’s underfur ranges from brown to black, and the guard hairs vary from light brown to silver or black. Alaskan sea otters often have lighter fur on their heads, and the fur usually lightens as an otter gets older.

In addition to their warm fur, sea otters maintain their body heat by burning calories at a rapid rate. A sea otter’s metabolism is two to three times higher than the metabolism of a similar-sized land mammal. Because its metabolic rate is so high, a sea otter must eat 23 to 33 percent of its body weight each day. This means a fifty-pound otter will eat 11 to 16 lbs. (5 to 7.3 kg) of food every day.

Because very little fur covers an otter’s paws, they lose heat rapidly when submerged in cold water, otters conserve heat by keeping their forepaws out of the water and their hind flippers folded over their abdomens when resting and floating.

Since sea otters are dependent on their fur to keep them warm and insulated from the cold ocean water, and because they must continually groom their fur to maintain its insulating properties, they are extremely vulnerable to the effects of pollution. When oil or another pollutant soils an otter’s fur, the fur becomes matted, and it can no longer keep the animal warm. Matted fur can lead to hypothermia and death from exposure. When the otter tries to clean his fur to remove the pollutant, he ingests the toxin, which is also often fatal.

When the Exxon Valdez struck a reef in Prince William Sound in 1989 and spilled eleven million gallons of crude oil, nearly 1000 sea otter carcasses were recovered, and biologists estimated the actual number of sea otters killed by the oil spill was anywhere from 41% to 80% higher than the number of dead otters observed.

Sea otters have many interesting adaptations to a life spent in the ocean. In this post, I told you how much sea otters need to eat each day just to stay warm, and next week, I’ll write about what sea otters eat and how they catch and eat their prey.

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Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. If you like audiobooks, check out her audiobook version of Murder Over Kodiak. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.

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How Can You Tell if a Kodiak Bear is a Male or a Female?

Kodiak Bear, Kodiak Wildlife, , , , , ,

Unlike cartoon bears, female Kodiak bears don’t wear hair ribbons on their head, so you must depend on other factors when trying to differentiate a male from a female bear. Last week, when I wrote about how to judge the size of a bear, I covered some of the ways body shape and musculature vary between males and females, but I will cover body shape and other clues in more detail this week.

Does the Bear Have Cubs?

This statement seems so obvious to me that I almost forgot to mention it. I’m sure most of you know male bears do not hang around with cubs. Regardless of what you might have seen in the movies, a Kodiak bear accompanying cubs is always their mother.

Do you see sex organs?

Minus cubs, there are only two sure ways to determine the sex of a Kodiak bear. The first is the presence of either nipples or a penis sheath and testicles. Even if you don’t see her cubs, you might see nipples in the armpit area of a nursing female when she walks. While often not visible, you sometimes see the penis sheath and testicles on a male, especially on a large boar.

Have you seen the bear urinate?

The only other way to be certain of the sex of the bear is to watch it urinate. Females urinate outward and to the rear, while males urinate straight down or forward between the legs. Females also sometimes squat to urinate.

Head and Shoulders:

If you do not see cubs or sex organs, and if the bear is not cooperative enough to urinate in front of you, you will have to depend on other clues to make an educated guess at the sex of the bear. Some of these are the same body shape differences I covered last week when I discussed how to determine the size of a bear.

A female brown bear’s head is narrower than a male’s, and her muzzle tapers, giving her a pointy nose. A female also has narrow shoulders roughly the same size as the head. Male Kodiak bears are more muscular than females. A male has a wide head and a square face. A large male’s forehead muscles bulge, creating a furrow or valley down the center of the forehead, and his massive shoulders are noticeably wider than his head.

Body Shape and Legs:

An adult female brown bear’s legs are shorter and thinner than the legs of an adult male, but unless you are comparing two bears standing side by side, it is not easy to determine the sex of the bear by looking at its legs. Males have robust front legs, and they are heavy through the ankles, ending at their wide feet. A female’s legs taper slightly, giving her the appearance of thinner ankles. Also, because females have shorter legs, their bodies hang lower to the ground.

The body, legs, and mid-section of a male brown bear look heavy and bulky, but since females aren’t exactly dainty in appearance, it is difficult and often misleading to use body shape to determine the sex of a bear. My husband, who had been around Kodiak bears all his life and has been a guide most of his life, says he is still sometimes surprised when he watches a young bear he is certain is a female until the bear urinates, and he realizes it’s a male.

Conclusion:

Unless a bear has cubs, you see her nipples or his genitalia, or you see the bear urinate, it is impossible definitively to differentiate male and female Kodiak bears. A huge bear is probably a boar, but large sows can also look huge, especially after a summer gorging on fish and berries.
The body shape of a bear provides clues to its gender. A heavy, bulky bear with a wide head and shoulders and a furrow down the middle of its forehead, is likely a male. It is more difficult, though, to distinguish sub-adult males from females.

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I hope my posts on bear size and gender answer a few questions about identifying bears in the field. The bottom line is that it’s impossible to pin down the gender of a bear from a distance, but you should be able to tell whether the bear is small or large by looking at the shape of its body.

Next week, I have a treat in store for you. My friend and fellow author, Steve Levi, has agreed to write a guest post about his books and his background. Be sure to stop by next week and meet Steve.

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Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. If you like audiobooks, check out her audiobook version of Murder Over Kodiak. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.

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Look Around You

Living in the wilderness on Kodiak Island, , , , ,

Look at the cloud-draped mountains, the small buck prancing through our backyard, or the eagle standing watch in the tree. Did you see the brightly colored puffin, or the sea otter lounging on her back, her baby nestled on her stomach? Did you notice the seals hauled out on the beach, two of them bloody from fighting, or did you stay up late one night to watch a beautiful Alaska sunset?

As many of you know, my husband and I own a small wilderness lodge on Kodiak Island, Alaska. In the summer, we take guests wildlife viewing and sportfishing, with an emphasis on watching Kodiak bears in their natural habitat. One thing I have noticed over the years is the guests who have the best time at our lodge are those who see everything. They are the ones who show me their photos at the end of the day and are embarrassed by all the images of rock formations they snapped. They are also the ones who admit they didn’t take any pictures of the whales because they just wanted to look, listen, smell, and feel the experience instead of watching it all through their camera’s viewfinder.

The guest who sheds a few tears when she talks about a bear splashing in the water twenty feet from her and the guest who was thrilled by watching through binoculars from a distance as a sow interacted with her three cubs are the guests we will see again. They will return in a year or two or ten because they won’t be able to get the sights, the sounds, or the smells of this beautiful place out of their heads.

Nearly 75% of our guests this summer were returnees, and many of them have been to our lodge multiple times. They’ve been here when the bear viewing was spectacular, and when bears were scarce. They’ve been here during great fishing years and years when the fish were slow to bite, and some years they’ve seen whales, while other years they haven’t. They’ve braved storms and basked in the sun. They’ve seen it all, but they keep returning because they have never focused on just one thing and lost sight of the big picture.

One guest this summer who has been here multiple times told me she and her husband have never had a rainy day here. I’m sure she must be either extremely lucky or mistaken, but I love that she and her husband only remember the sunshine!

No matter where you travel or what adventure you seek, if you narrow your focus too much, you will miss what is right in front of you. Instead, look around, and you might be surprised by what you see. The things that please you most and makes you fall in love with a destination could be something entirely different from what you were expecting.

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Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. If you like audiobooks, check out her audiobook version of Murder Over Kodiak. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.

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Step Out of Your World and Escape

Living in the wilderness on Kodiak Island, , , , , ,

Escaping from your life is the only true way to relax, but escape is not easy in the 21st century. You might be lounging on a beach in Aruba, but I bet your cell phone is keeping your rum punch company on the table next to your chair, and you remind yourself you need to return to your room an hour before dinner to put the finishing touches on the report you’ve promised your boss. You are enjoying a fun vacation, but you have not escaped.

As many of you know, my husband and I own a small bear-viewing, sportfishing, and hunting lodge on Kodiak Island in Alaska. Our lodge is located seventy air miles from the town of Kodiak in the heart of the Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge. No roads cross the island, so the only way to reach us is by floatplane or an eight-hour boat ride through rough seas. We don’t have cell phone service, and although we do have internet, it is satellite internet with a strict and stingy data limit.

We tell our guests they can send and receive e-mails but nothing else, and please, no photos or videos. Turn off the apps and disable location services while you are at our lodge.

Our guests look at us with wide eyes. How could we ask them to disconnect from their lives? How will they survive if they can’t watch the news on their phones, follow the twists and turns of the stock market, or catch the latest baseball scores? More importantly, how many YouTube cat videos will they miss during a five-day stay with us?

We often catch a guest cheating at the beginning of her stay when she thinks we won’t notice her texting while she holds her phone under the edge of the dining room table. Gradually, though, we see change. The iPhone, held in a death grip when a guest climbed from the floatplane, now only makes appearances after we’ve returned from our daily adventure. Computer screens that were earlier filled with business documents or e-mails are now occupied by wildlife photos from the day’s safari.

The group of six strangers who on the first evening they arrived, barely looked up from their devices to converse, now linger over the dinner table discussing the day’s excitement and laughing about the huge Kodiak bear they watched chase a salmon through a small stream.

“I thought he was running straight for Sid,” Cathy from Indianapolis says.

“Right,” Sid from Melbourne replies. “I nearly needed to change my trousers.”

The laughter grows to a roar, and then slowly, the conversation drifts to families and other far-away vacations. No one has glanced at a cellphone in hours.

Guests often say their stay with us was the best vacation of their lives. I would like to believe we are completely responsible for their excellent holiday, but I know it’s not the truth. They had fun and relaxed because they escaped their lives for a few days.

On day one, our guests ask if we’ve heard the news of the day. What’s happening in the world? By day four, they ask what time the tide will be high and what river we plan to hike the following day. They excitedly tell us about the young buck that walked up to the steps of their cabin or the eagle they watched pluck a salmon from the cove in front of our lodge. After only a few days, our guests have unplugged and are beginning to follow the rhythms of our world.

I watch with sadness as our guests wait for the floatplane to take them back to Kodiak and their lives. The chatter dies, and the phones emerge from their hiding places.

I love my job as a guide and naturalist, and I enjoy sharing my world in the Alaska wilderness with others, but I feel our trips are only successful when I see our guests relax. I know if a guest can put down his phone and escape his world for a few days, he will have the best vacation of his life. It’s not about us; it’s about the escape.

The plane lands, and our departing guests wait for the new flock to disembark before they can load their gear onto the plane. As they pass each other on the dock and exchange pleasantries, one of the departing guests looks at the new arrivals and smirks. “You can put away those phones,” he says. “You won’t need them here.”

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Robin Barefield is the author of three Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter. To download a free copy of one of her novels, watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. If you like audiobooks, check out her audiobook version of Murder Over Kodiak. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska.

Mystery Newsletter

Sign Up for my free, monthly Mystery Newsletter about true crime in Alaska.