Bear Cove is a small embayment on the Kenai Peninsula that extends 1.5 miles (2.4 km) southeast from Kachemak Bay, between Bear Island to the south and Chugachik Island to the north, about 57 miles (92 km) south of Kenai and 18 miles (29 km) northeast of Homer, Alaska. Its name appears on a 1912 cartographic field sheet by Daniel F. Higgins and Rufus H. Sargent of the US Geological Survey. The Kenai Peninsula stretches roughly 150 miles (241 km) southwest from the Chugach Mountains, separating Cook Inlet from Prince William Sound. ‘Kenai’ derives from the Native Athabascan Kenaitze band that once inhabited the upper inlet. Kachemak Bay—an estuary fed by several rivers, some draining the Harding Icefield—extends 38 miles (62 km) northeast from Cook Inlet. Its tidal regime is mixed semi-diurnal, averaging 16 feet (5 m) with extremes exceeding 30 feet (9 m). A 4.4-mile (7 km) spit along the bay’s northern shore separates the inner from the outer bay, where warm, less dense freshwater overlies colder, denser saltwater. Geologically, Kachemak Bay’s northwestern coast contrasts sharply with its southeastern shore because of repeated glaciations and the Border Ranges Fault, which roughly follows the bay’s axis. The northwestern coast comprises Quaternary glacial sediments overlying nonmarine, weakly lithified sandstones, siltstones, mudstones, carbonaceous shales, coal and volcanic ash of the Beluga Formation. In contrast, the area around Bear Cove features the McHugh Complex—thick layers of graywacke and conglomerate from the Late Jurassic to early Cretaceous—together with folded beds of basalt and radiolarian chert dating from the Middle Triassic to early Cretaceous. Multiple Pleistocene glaciations shaped the modern landscape. Ice expansions between 30,000 and 25,000 years ago, followed by a recession around 20,000–19,000 years ago, scoured the bedrock and deposited glacier-derived sediments. The region deglaciated about 10,000 years ago, and human migration began around 9,000 to 8,000 years ago.

Archaeological evidence confirms maritime cultures on Kodiak Island and the Pacific coast of the Alaska Peninsula dating back 6,000 years, with early maritime hunters active in Kachemak Bay around 4,000 years ago. A site on Chugachik Island at Bear Cove’s entrance reveals seasonal habitation about 2,800 years ago. These peoples hunted harbor seals, porpoises and marmots and also appear to have consumed beluga whales, Dungeness crabs and bottom‑dwelling fish—halibut, cod, sculpin and starry flounder—likely caught with hook and line. These findings testify to a long history of sophisticated maritime adaptation. By the 18th century, when Russian fur traders reached Cook Inlet, most of Kachemak Bay lay within Dena’ina territory. Adopting elements of Pacific maritime Alutiiq culture, the Dena’ina employed skin boats and harpoons to hunt sea mammals. Excavations at Soonoondra—an ancient village near Halibut Cove, about 10 miles (16 km) southwest of Bear Cove—confirm their presence for the past 1,000 years. In 1786, Grigory Shelikhov sent Vasilli Malakhov to attack the Dena’ina after a clash on Shuyak Island, leading to the establishment of Fort Alexandrovsk at present‑day Nanwalek. Later, in 1789 Gerasim Izmailov explored the bay, and in 1794 Russian forces raided Soonoondra, capturing young women and girls for wives. These events illustrate the harsh impacts of colonial incursion; European diseases and cultural shifts decimated the Dena’ina. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, both Dena’ina and Euro‑Americans fished for Pacific herring on a subsistence basis. Herring spawned in the bay’s extensive eelgrass beds, including those at Bear Cove. The first commercial fishery opened in 1914, expanding slowly until Scotch curing was introduced in 1917. By 1918 the industry boomed but collapsed in 1928—likely from overfishing and habitat destruction—disrupting the bay’s food chain and inflicting large scale ecological damage. This collapse not only crippled the fishery but also had severe repercussions throughout the marine ecosystem, reducing populations of marine mammals and birds with lasting regional impacts.

In the late 1940s, several prominent pioneer Alaskans began homesteading in the Bear Cove area. Among them were Harold and Roxy Pomeroy and Ted and Elsa Pederson. Much of the surrounding land has since been subdivided into more than 150 small parcels, mostly undeveloped except for a few seasonal residences and one oyster farm. Harold Pomeroy arrived in Alaska in 1949 and later became director of the Alaska Department of Civil Defense and the Kenai Peninsula Borough’s first chairman (later mayor). His wife, Roxolana (Roxy) Skobelska, born in Ukraine in 1924, studied at the University of Vienna and served as a courier for the anti‑Nazi underground before working as an interpreter during the Allied occupation of Austria. The couple, who emigrated to the United States in 1948, established a Bear Cove homestead with a sawmill and small farm that supplied timber and vegetables to the Homer area. They later relocated to Soldotna in 1963 and eventually to Anchorage. Ted Pedersen, born in 1905 on Samalga Island in the Aleutians, was the son of Captain Christian T. Pedersen, a noted Norwegian whaler and fur trader. His Aleut mother died in 1906. After finishing school, Ted served as a lighthouse keeper at Cape Saint Elias on Kayak Island and at Cape Sarichef on Unimak Island. He married his second wife, Elsa, in 1942; they homesteaded at Bear Cove in 1945. Ted later worked as a marine pilot in the Aleutians until 1985, while Elsa became a prolific writer, publishing in Alaska magazine, national outlets and the Anchorage Daily News until 1995. In 1988 the Aquatic Farm Act allowed permits for constructing aquatic farms. Oyster farms in Kachemak Bay—such as Early Tides Seafarms at Bear Cove—use lantern nets to keep Pacific oysters submerged, ensuring constant access to plankton despite their preference for warmer waters. This modern aquaculture complements the area’s long history of resource use and embodies its ongoing transformation. Read more here and here. Explore more of Bear Cove and Kachemak Bay here: