Is it snow watch or sea watch Gambell, Ak.? Larry nearest/Molly in back (photo by Aaron-I think)
Outside of our home state, Molly and I have identified more species in Texas than any other state. (Yes Arizona is second: Texas 335, Arizona 267.). But now we were going to Alaska, a state that is two times the size of Texas. Basically, a necessity to get a really big ABA big year number. But where to go in our forty-ninth state?
The most well known hotspot for birding in Alaska is no longer birded. The island of Attu in Bering Sea, much closer to Siberia than the mainland of North America, has been abandoned since the Coast Guard moved out in 2010.
So now two Islands, not quite as close as Attu, but still attractive to rare Siberian songbirds and the pelagic birds of the Bering Sea are the places to birds in the Fall and Winter: Gamble on the St. Lawrence Island and St. Paul, one of the two Pribolif Islands. Molly and I had to go to both. In addition the Spring birding in Nome is great and we could not bypass Denali National Park. So those were our four hotspots. Let's go there.
First Gambell:
Gambell, wow Gambell the most unique place I have ever visited!! (Certainly the most culturally interesting). The 400 plus Alaskan native Yupiks, while, all US citizens, have local self-rule. Do not bring alcohol or take anything besides photos.
Do you go by yourself or do you join a group to bird Gamble? If you are the great birder Paul Lehman you can go by yourself (lots of connections, knowledge of local birds, know how to get a permit and how much food to ship). ** But for us mere mortal bird chasers Gamble is a place to go with a group. And Molly and I picked a good one: Wilderness Birding Adventures (WBA, an Alaskan based guiding company, is owned by Aaron Lang(left), AKA the BFG of birding (Big Friendly Giant) and an energy machine.
You fly to Gamble from Nome on Bering Air. Bering ably runs flights to islands all over the state. The plane is just an hour nosy ride from Nome. Wear your boots, bring your camera and bins and be ready to bird as you hit the tarmac.
Accommodations on Gamble are basic. You stay at the Sivuqaq Lodge. In the past WBA has rented a house from a local but as far we can see everyone and every group was at the lodge. The lodge is basic with shared bathrooms, rooms and one kitchen. Aaron's wife Robin cooks delicious meals which they defrost on the island. There was a Victor Emmanuel group there enjoying gourmet meals prepared by chef, but the WBA'ers eat very well and bird very hard.
The permanent residents of Gambell are all native people. In general they are friendly as they zoom about on their ATVs, dig through a boneyard or hang a butchered animal. Prominent on the grounds are the remains of a Bowhead whale killed earlier in the Spring. Aaron reported that all share and have a party when a whale is caught. Gambell carvers are amazing and show up at night to sell their wares.(the main reason you do not take anything from the boneyard is they need the ivory) Bring cash when you go. (More on that when I return to Gambell in the Fall).
A day of birding on the island starts with early morning shore watch. In addition to Aaron we were guided Steve Heinl of WBA. Steve is an absolute savant of Siberian species. He was a guide at Attu when the three birders in the book the Big Year birded there in 1998. I asked him about the movie and he said, 'They didn't talk about the guides." He is a great guide and a great guy.
Aaron said that our Spring trip was the coldest trip he had led. The group was hearty and great, Molly was the only female. We made it through about two hours each morning on the beach. We may have left a little early the day blowing snow started compromising our visibility.
Molly looks ready for a balmy sea watch? Our awesome WBA group could put in a solid two hours of cold, windy sea watch any day of the week.
Each day brought beautiful birds flying past with generally great visibility. Steve kept the counts and here's a few from the second day Ebird list: 245,000 Crested Auklets, 5,000 Least Auklets, 16,000 Thick-billed Murres, and 200 Horned Puffins.
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| Long-tailed |
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| Humpback |
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| Thick billed murres--so many |
Fulmars were the most acrobatic flyers of the trip
O
ne of many Pomarine jaegers.  |
| Steller's Eider |
On June 4th Steve pointed out dovekies for our first only spotting of this small Pelagic bird. But we saved the best for last. On June 5th with 28F weather we scored 28 Ross' gull and 2 Ivory gulls. There is nothing like 6'6' Aaron's whoop when we spotted the gulls.  |
Horned puffin
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Stars of the see watch. Ivory gull left and two of the 28 Ross's gull right.
Besides the sea watch we hit the
boneyards. Typically one trip before lunch. Then lunch and more boneyard and perhaps another sea watch. The first day in the Boneyard yielded are one and only Mckay's Bunting
The not so common, Common Ringed Plover
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| Red necked Stint
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Boneyards are piles of bones discarded over years of hunting mixed with vegetation that the birds shelter in on the treeless island.
Beside the boneyards we always checked the town dump for gulls where Molly and I saw our first ever Black Headed gull. 
Molly ready to bid a fond farewell to Gamble
Nome Spring in Alaska Part 2
Loved Nome! Aleutian tern--Lifer!!!
The Nome area also rocked Mammals. Specifically, moose and musk ox. (even cooler than
Moose and Squirrel). We also had two huge brown bears (very whitish) up on Kugarok Road.
During my big year I visited Nome on this trip and again in the Fall. While Gambell and St. Paul can rock both times of year, Spring is by far the best time to visit Nome. Molly and I birded Nome on our own. Three roads lead out of Nome. You should bird all three.
Nome Council Road heads south out of Nome. The first stop is a short distance out of town at the mouth of the Nome River. There is a wetlands area here along the river just before it empties into the Bering Sea. Here you can sea watch, checked out the wetlands and look for shorebirds. We did all three.
A Red-necked Stint, Red Phalaropes and turnstones played in the surf near us. A Bar-tailed godwit in breading plumage strutted in the wetlands. and terns flew over head. Could it be here. Many of the terns were the red-billed arctic but then three of three different terns swept in. Yes it was the Aleutian Tern, a gorgeous, smoky-white winged bird with a slick back cap.
Red Phalaropes and Black-legged Kittiwakes-Nome River Mouth. Aleutian tern above.
The next day we drove out further on the Nome Council Road. A group of birders were pulled off the side of the road. Now when you are birding, especially without a guide, and a group of birders are gathered. Stop! Sure enough Stephan, a great guide whom we had met at Gamble had somehow a spotted a Great Knot across the way amongst a group of Surfbirds.
Nome-Teller Road is a great place to look for Ptarmigans, which reminds of something Aaron Lang asked me. "What bird can you never hear urinate?" He answered his own question. "The Ptarmigan because the 'P' is silent."
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| The Ptarmigans: Male Willow on the left |
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| And Female Rock Ptarmigan |
One of the fourteen strutting Willow P's.
Kougarok Road is the longest day trip out of Nome. Typically, you drive 72 miles out to the hilly area where the Bristle-thighed Curlew is often found in the Spring. So on the 7th we drove and drove. We hike up and down the Bristle-thighed Curlew hill. We tried to turn a couple of Whimbrels into curlews but now so such luck. Thank goodness for Hawaii.
Sometimes you loose a little perspective while big year birding. One of my main memories of the hill was the lack of curlews. But while reviewing the photos and Ebird lists for June 7th on the Kougarok Road I realized what an interesting and phenomenal day of birding. 
Snowy Wilson's Snipes and grassy Whimbrels dominated 'Curlew hill?' 
Whimbrel
Molly wonders, "Where are the curlews? Wait is that a Sandhill Crane?"
Check out the shorebirds high up on the grassy hill. For a couple of California coastal birders what treat to see Whimbrels, Black-bellied plovers and Dunlins high up on the tundra grass.
Now check out the warblers and some other songbirds.
Bluethroat 
Grey-cheeked thrush
Look to the left our friend the Wilson's warbler. We live on the southern end of the breeding area and now we have visited the other end. And to the right a Yellow Warbler. The yellow Warbler breeding range includes most of the continental US and up to Alaska! Then it migrates to Central and South America. (No wonder we spotted more yellows than any other warbler during our big year .We also saw several Northern Waterthrushes and a couple of Orange-crowneds.
The last Nome bird. After all the great birding on the Kougarok we returned to Nome and quickly hit almost everyone's nightly dinner spot. Our flight back to Anchorage was in the morning and we were done. Then we saw an WBA group, some of our buddies from Gambell. Aaron Bowman their leader and our buddies told us about a dream bird of mine, the Gyr Falcon, and its nest back up the Kougarock road. Thank goodness that it never gets dark. We found it high up on the cliff about 11:00 pm. Nome was done.
Spring in Alaska Part 3: St. Paul's the Pribolifs
After Gambell and Nome we returned to Anchorage on a birding high and ready for the breading Mecca that is St. Paul Island. We just didn't how hard it was to get to.
Using our extra time from delays to St. Paul. The Alaskan Aviation on the shore of Lake Hood in Anchorage is a wonderful delve into the amazing history of Alaskan flight and is on Lake Hood where float planes berth and birds dive.
We had booked five days and four nights at the King Eider Lodge on St. Paul Island one of two islands of the Bering Seas Pribolif Chain. On the morning of June 9th we headed for the Anchorage Airport. We were told that at 9:00 (I think it was 9) we would be informed if the plane could make it. Nope and they rescheduled a new flight for the next day. On the 10th the same thing happened. Flight cancelled but there was no room for the us on the regular flight the next day. Needless to say, I was not happy. Eventually, another couple bailed on St. Paul and Molly and we finally made it the next day.
Before we dive into the birds I have to mention the St. Paul mammals. First the islands is full of gregarious Arctic Foxes (generally blue morph subspecies) 
Arctic Fox--St. Paul
Besides the fox the island is crucial habitat for breeding Northern Fur Seals which have suffered serious declines in the last couple of decades. 
Oh yeah and our first Caribou sighting.
St. Paul is the best place in the world for the average birder to view Red faced Cormorants and Red legged Kittiwakes, to visit close in breeding cliffs of Auklets, Murres, Kittiwakes and Puffins and along with Gambell the ABA's best location for Siberian vagrants.
We experience some of each! Expertly led by Suli Gibson and his team we immediately found the Common Pochard at the lake just after arrival. The next day on June 6th we hit the cliffs. The Cormorants, Puffins, Kittiwakes and Auklets were all nesting high on the face. We carefully enjoyed our amazing views and photo opportunities.
Birds of the cliffs and water: St. Paul
Crested Auklets and murres were the most common birds on the cliff.
Tufted Puffin
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| Cresteds ready to breed? |
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| More murres |
Least Auklets
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| Parakeet Auklet |
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| Harlequin Ducks |
Red-legged kittiwakes
Northern fulmar barking at Kittiwakes.
Ancient murrelets are stunning in breeding plumage
Birds of the land St. Paul. St. Paul. One thing that I noticed in Hawaii a few years ago were that the Gallinules and Coots were the island birds are bigger. I assume this was the case for shorebirds that had no predators on an island. But on St. Paul the songbirds were also bigger and a little different looking than our continental birds. I noticed this in the plethora of Pacific wrens, Grey-crowned Rosy finches and ubiquitous Rock Sandpipers.
The second night at the King Eider lodge walkie-talkies crackled. The folks down the road doing Rosy finch research had just spotted a rare. We jumped in the vans and headed down. Got it!
Eyebrowed Thrush.
While there was not a lot of raptor action on the island and, darn, we could not find a reported Snowy Owl. But we did see this Golden Eagle joining a fox on a caribou carcass. For two and a half days St. Paul, while not the cultural experience of Gambell, delivered unparralled birding,
Happy St. Paul birders.
Back to Anchorage and on to Denali!
Alaskan Spring Birding Part 4: Denali National Park
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| Northern Shrike-Denali |
Denali National Park (always will be Denali) is the home to "The tall one" the highest mountain in North America. We spent three nights just outside the park and we had three birding encounters that stood out.
The first spot involved taking the mandatory bus to the end of the line.
After disembarking wandered onto the gorgeous, rocky flowery tundra. Mountain Avens popped up around us. A group of Short-billed gulls were twirling overhead. Then we saw one sitting on a nest. A few cones marked their breeding area. I wandered nearby but one raced at my head just veering off before contact.
A buzzy speeding up in the middle sweet call drew our immediate attention. There in the willow singing our first ever Arctic Warbler. I felt great about our timing.
They only sing for a short time on their Alaskan ground. The Arctic warbler is the only old world warbler that breeds in the ABA area. After breeding it will return to like all Willow Warblers to Southeast Asia.
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| Native Dall Sheep in the distance |
That evening we hit a food truck near our hotel. The food was just ok but the birds in the tree were spectacular. White-winged crossbills down low and feeding. Best looks ever for
The next day, June 16th we hiked up the Savage Alpine Trail.
We were given warnings by the docent at the trailhead to make sure you have your Bear Spray and don't be afraid to use it. Her husband had once been mauled but survived. Molly looks pretty comfortable in this shot. The bird of the day were a small group of singing Smith's Longspurs. Wait there is bear around. here.
Time to head back to the airport. Alaska was over for now.
*Recommended reading:
In The Big Year Steve Martin and the gang rush to the island of Atu. Before World War II over 40 native people (Unagax) lived on Attu. During World War II the Japanese occupied Atu and Kiska Aleutian Islands. They interned the Unagax people in Japan, about half died in captivity. After the war the United States would not resettle the survivors ended around 4,000 years of native habitation. After the war Attu served for many years as a Cost Guard station. In The Storm on Our Shores: One Island, Two Soldiers, and the Forgotten Battle of World War II by Mark Obamascik, yes the same Mark who wrote the Big Year details the brutal WWII battle for Attu. It is hard to imagine that 550 Americans and over a thousand Japanese died on the rocky island that before the war was home to about 40 native people.
**Also recommended: Birds of Gambell and the St. Lawrence Island, Alaska by Paul Lehman
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