Driver reports wolverine sighting near glacier
State Dept. of Fish and Game doesn't have enough for positive identification
In the 12 years Duane Callahan has lived in Juneau, he'd never seen anything more wild than a bear.
But the creature he saw Saturday near the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center may have been equally wild, more reclusive and much more rare.
"It looked like a small bear, only longer, with a long tail and short legs," said Callahan, who was driving eight cruise ship passengers in a Last Frontier Tours bus when he spotted what he believes was a wolverine crossing Glacier Spur Road.
"I didn't even know they had those things up here," he said.
After the animal crossed the road, Callahan drove to the center and described the creature to a naturalist at the center. The naturalist said it must have been a wolverine.
The creature crossed the road at a slower pace than a bear - about 7 miles per hour, Callahan estimated.
He and the passengers on the bus were unable to take a photo of the creature before it disappeared into the woods.
Callahan's description of the animal is close to that of a wolverine, but it's not enough to make a certain identification, said Polly Hessing, the assistant area biologist for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
"There's so much traffic out there and so many people walking around, it's just hard for me to picture them crossing the street right there," said Hessing, who has seen only three wolverines, all in very remote places.
Wolverines are reclusive, solitary and fast, and their population here is pretty small, she said.
They usually hang out in high, rocky areas and move to lower valleys in the winter.
Because they are foragers, though, and can travel up to 30 miles per day looking for food, it's possible that wolverines would dip to some pretty low elevations even in the summer, said Doug Larsen, assistant director of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
Regardless of elevation, any sighting of a wolverine is fairly rare, Larsen said.
He grew up in Juneau, moved back here in 1998 and has never seen a wolverine here.
Employees of the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center see wolverines occasionally, but mostly on the Nugget Creek trail, said Michelle Warrenchuk, the information assistant work leader at the center.
In the six years she's worked at the center, she's seen two wolverines.
If a hiker crosses the path of a wolverine, Warrenchuk suggests the hiker keep the dog on a leash and stay out of the wolverine's way.
"Wolverines can be very aggressive," she said.
Christine Schmid can be reached at cschmid@juneauempire.com.