The lizard is called an ichthyosaur. Along with a recently rediscovered ichthyosaur specimen on Gravina Island near Ketchikan, the Kake lizard could help shed new light on how Southeast Alaska formed over time.

Researchers from the United States and Canada found the remains of one or more ichthyosaurs on an island in Keku Strait near Kake this month, according to Christopher McRoberts, a team leader and an invertebrate paleontologist from the State University of New York at Cortland. Kake is on the northwest shore of Kupreanof Island, about 70 miles east of Sitka.

The specimens had an estimated length of about 10 feet and are from the Upper Triassic Period, or about 220 million years old, he said. Ichthyosaur literally means "fish lizard" in Greek.

"We were very surprised," McRoberts said. "They've never been reported in the area."

Ichthyosaurs are a group of marine reptiles that are believed to have lived in the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous periods of the Mesozoic Era. They are not dinosaurs, but they lived when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, McRoberts said.

The animals had streamlined bodies, a fish-like tail, a skull with a large eye opening and narrow jaws with peg-like teeth that they used to feed mostly on squid-like organisms. They resembled the dolphin and might have given birth to live young. Some were 65 feet and longer.

Ichthyosaur remains have been found in similar-age Triassic rocks in British Columbia, Nevada, California and Oregon. They also have been found in the Brooks Range, the Wrangell Mountains and on Gravina Island.

The team left most of the Kake ichthyosaur remains in place, giving a few pieces to the Organized Village of Kake, the community's tribal government. The researchers held an informal town meeting in Kake to show residents the fossil and explain the importance of the find, McRoberts said.

The Ketchikan Daily News Shakespeare comes to Juneau

A colorful pile of scarves, seriously rumpled paperback copies of "Twelfth Night," two rapiers and a dagger covered a table in McPhetres Hall downtown Juneau as a dozen youths sat in a circle on the floor.

It's the Bare Bones Shakespeare Ensemble, children aged 9 through 17 who are assembling for four weeks to put on Shakespeare's comedy about identity that's mistaken and love that's unrequiteduntil the final scene.

It's Wednesday's four-hour afternoon rehearsal at Holy Trinity Episcopal Church's hall, and they have about a week before the performances, director Nancy Buttenheim reminded them as one girl sharply drew in her breath.

Bare bones means the scarves will be taped to the wall as scenery, the hall's floor may be the stage, a couple of stools are the sets and the actors have to hand color the red hearts on the promotional fliers.

But it isn't bare bones in its effort or appeal to the imagination. Buttenheim puts the actors through rapid tongue-twister exercises to warm them up for enunciating their lines.

They run through nearly all of the 1 1/2-hour play in the rehearsal as Buttenheim prods them to speak up and be clear, listen to each other and remember the blocking instructions she's given them on where and how to move.

"Let's imagine now the lights are going out," Buttenheim told the cast as they began. "Go in quiet footfalldon't run, do a silent walkbe way still in your face."

The play began to the music of Bach with four pairs of actors holding blue or white cloths. They thrust up their arms and let the billowing fabric, representing waves, slowly sink. Waves enveloped and pulled apart the actors playing twin brother and sister Sebastian and Viola, who are separated in a shipwreck.

They wash ashore in Illyria, in southern Europe. Viola will pretend to be a man, for safety's sake, but fall in love with a man who is in love with a woman who becomes attracted to Viola in her man's role. It ends up being handy that Viola has a twin brother.

This is Buttenheim's fourth time directing Juneau youths in Shakespeare, including once in the early 1980s and two times in recent years. She's an actor, director and instructor in yoga and dance in Lenox, Mass.

The Juneau Empire