Great! I know what I'm going to do for the next several hours! Earlier there were salmon jumping the fall, but no bear. Now there's a bear, but no salmon... hmm.
They show up a little more often than implied above . . . bottom line, wildlife will be wild . . . it's always a bit of a waiting game.
When bears are not viewable you can amuse yourself by trying to figure out what percentage of the salmon make a successful leap to the top on their first try!
And for those who have not viewed this cam yet -- someone both pans and zooms the camera when interesting sights are happening.
I was watching one bear nonchalantly and leisurely chomping on a salmon and leaving the carcass in the water. A bird approached on the water, looking for the right moment. The bear seemed to dismiss it as nothing to worry about. Of course, once the bear looked away the bird darted in to grab the carcass and fly away with it.
I'm not an expert on bear facial expressions, but I swear it appeared to be pretty flummoxed by this event.
I spent 18 days in Alaska a few months ago, my first trip ever there. Like many others, I'm sure, I left part of my heart there.
The mountains on the edges of Anchorage have already received their "Termination Dust". Fairbanks also already received a nice little snow storm. I completed a Mt. Whitney summit last year on my father's 67th Birthday September 28. When I returned to Anchorage a couple days later I was greeted at the airport by my kids with snowballs and a yard full of snow.
Also note that the Bears are actually quite wasteful and often only eat the fattiest parts of the fish leaving the rest for the birds and other scavengers.
Lately, activity has picked up. It's also very relaxing watching them in the natural habitat. I will say this, I wish I could cross a fast flowing stream as well as they do...ah, four legs.
I've noticed when darkness prevents a live feed that they now often replay video from earlier in the day. This last week, when I checked that out one time, there were 7 (SEVEN!) bears at one point within the field of view, one of them on the upper level of the falls.
Katmai -- yet another reason for me to return to Alaska.
I've noticed that prerecorded video is on LOTS of the time. Especially in the evening once darkness has hit and -- I think -- in the "off season" much of the time, when the salmon aren't running.
Just checked it out now at 11 PM PDT, and sure enough, a 29 minute and 30 second prerecorded video is on. You can see it's a video on the bottom of the screen with the slide bar moving and the video length and status information showing. I also see right now that at the lower right of that screen it says "off air".
Not that any of this detracts from the excellence of this feed! And in daytime, especially "in season", it's a live feed more often than not.