Taking a short break from this due to a busy work schedule but lots more pics to come! Please check back in two weeks or so!

The Only Cat in Town

The one hard thing about living in Deadhorse for a month and a half was there were no pets!! As I mentioned, the town exists only as oilfield support. Everyone works a two week on/two week off shift, which means when they are in Prudhhoe Bay/Deadhorse they are always working. The pets are left behind and most workers go home for two weeks out of every month to get their pet fix. Hence, no dogs or cats in Deadhorse--except one. This is Deadhorse Denver, who even has his own shirt! He was brought up several years ago via the Dalton Highway and the General Store staff adopted him. The store workers told me that people come to the store all the time just to sit with Denver and pet him because they miss their cats from back home. And yes, I went to the store often just to pet the cat, too!

When I was doing the Avian Influenza project in Prudhoe Bay, we saw several herd of Musk Ox grazing right by the side of the road. On this day we were lucky to see some babies, too. My work partner Amy took this picture. The adults look especially raggedy because summer is when the Musk Ox shed their quiviut, or hair (not fur) which is warmer than wool and softer than cashmere. We often found chunks of it on the tundra.