We've been home for a week from our Alaskan "trip of a lifetime."  It's funny how you anticipate something for a year, and then it's over and life goes on, more or less the same.  I've been going through ~3,000 photos and it's fun to relive the trip, remembering different scenarios, the weather, the birds, the mammals, the amazing scenery.  And very few mosquitoes.  Going in late May and the first half of June (along with colder than normal weather) gave us a nice break from what could have been.  I'll take the cold over the mosquitoes.

It was a wonderful trip, stretching from May 29 to June 16, 2008.  The first and last days were travel days, though we got a little birding in on them too.  In the next week or two, I plan to include highlights on Denali and environs, Nome, Kenai Fjords National Park, and Barrow.

This Google Earth capture gives an idea of where we visited.  The tip of the pin indicates the location.

The three auks:  Crested, Parakeet and Least Auklets.  As much as anything, the allure of these species got the ball rolling for this trip.

Our first night in Anchorage was on May 29, 2008.  The views on the flight in and those around the hotel near the airport were incredible, with national park caliber mountains surrounding the city.  Despite a problem with our connection in Seattle, and spending 6+ hours there, we arrived in time to meet our group from Field Guides (a little late) for dinner.  Seeing a Short-eared Owl out of the window of the plane on touchdown was a welcome sight.

We flew out to St. Paul Island in the Pribilofs on the morning of May 30th.  Flying a prop plane over the Bering Sea was quite an experience.  Even before we reached the sea, I was struck by the incredible views out of the window.  The kettle lakes were especially striking.

The common birds away from the coast on St. Paul are
Lapland Longspur (stretching),

Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch,

and Rock Sandpiper.  That is all. 

Any other songbird is of interest.  Rock Sandpipers are everywhere.  Sure, they're on the rocks, but also on the snow, in the grass, in trash piles, nearly underfoot.  I've seen them on several occasions on the California coast (different subspecies), but to see dozens of them each day, doing fluttering display flights and calling a frog-like "gree, gree, gree..."  Here's a short video of one bathing.

The Lapland Longspurs were great too, flying up and fluttering down, with meadowlark-like songs.  The large Pribilofs Gray-crowned Rosy-Finches aren't as musical, but they make up for it with their looks.

When we arrived in St. Paul, it was very windy and in the upper 30s.  It rained some on our first afternoon, but was otherwise relatively dry.  Rain coats and pants helped a lot with the wind, however.

The transportation and local knowledge of which birds were around was supplied by St. Paul Island Tours.  For the most part, any visit to the island will need to go through them.  We were met off of the plane by Dylan Radin, formerly (?) of Davis, CA.  It was odd to roll the luggage off of the plane and straight to our rooms at the "Airport Hotel."

Our first life birds were these Bar-tailed Godwits (male on left:  brighter and shorter-billed) at Salt Lagoon.  There were five on the first two days of our stay, and six on the last two days.  This species has perhaps the most amazing fall migration of any bird, with some flying nonstop from Alaska to their wintering grounds in New Zealand.

This female Tufted Duck was hanging out with a female Greater Scaup.

Beautiful Long-tailed Ducks were abundant, as were Harlequin Ducks.

Unfortunately I didn't get any good shots of Red-faced Cormorants, though you can see them quite a bit better here.

I was overwhelmed by the novelty, and "forgot" to get good pictures of the Red-legged and Black-legged Kittiwakes either.

Despite not being able to see its legs, this is a Red-legged Kittiwake.  They have a darker mantle and upper surface to the wings.  Also, on Black-legged, the bases of the primaries are paler than the rest of the upper wing and back, so there is a pale gap between the medium gray back and the black of the wing tips.

We had our first introduction to the birds on the breeding cliffs on our first day, but it was on the next morning that we really got to spend time with the Parakeet Auklets

as they fought for the best spot on the ledge.

A little video here.

The Crested Auklets were the least common and most unusual of the three little auks.

But the sparrow-sized Least Auklets ("choochkies") may be my favorites.


There was a steady stream of them past the cliffs.

Both Common and Thick-billed Murres (right) were present in good numbers.  The Thick-billed is blacker above, with a thicker bill (imagine that) with a conspicuous white line, and a white point on the neck.

We had more views of puffins in flight than on the cliffs.

Tufted Puffin

Horned Puffin

Glaucous Gull

The Pribiliofs are a vital breeding ground for Northern Fur Seals.  Their numbers have dropped steadily despite an end to the commercial harvest.

As it was early in the season, the females had yet to arrive, but large males, or beach masters, were setting up territories.

Much of the time they occupied their territory by sleeping,

looking sleepy,

or occasionally looking and sounding fierce.

Also present were a few Steller's sea lions.  This is a species that has undergone even more dramatic declines than the fur seals.

One of the highlights was seeing the Arctic foxes.

A little video here.

This fox was more of a blue-gray.  Some were browner and one (observed catching a Parakeet Auklet) was white.

This male King Eider posed for us several times on Salt Lagoon.

In addition to the breeding birds and regular migrants, St. Paul is known to attract a few Asian vagrants each spring.  We'd hope to run into one or more of these, but the winds were coming from the east instead of the west.  When I asked Dylan, shortly into our first outing, if there were any vagrants around, he said, "You just saw it."  He was referring to the Tufted Duck.  The vagrant songbirds we had were a singing Golden-crowned Sparrow and a Wilson's Warbler (wind from the east).

Slaty-backed Gull.  This 2nd-summer bird was completely washed out except for the mantle.  I'm not used to these heavily worn summer gulls.  Many of the immature Glaucous-winged Gulls on St. Paul were completely white.  Another Slaty-backed 2nd-summer we saw in Nome was more typical.

It was nice to see these sharp-looking female Red-necked Phalaropes at close range.

With her duller mate (reverse sexual dimorphism).

At a quarry site, there were many singing Snow Buntings among the rocks.  It was great watching them sing and flutter down with spread wings and tail.


We had brief view of a possible female McKay's Bunting, but couldn't refind it for better looks.

The quarry was also the site where there were at least two Winter Wrens hanging on after a couple of harsh winters.  This is one of very few resident species on the island.  A couple videos of one singing.

St. Paul Village

Russian church

Island scenes:


Otter Island off shore in the upper right.

Here is video of grooming Norther Fulmars and of the Ridge Wall seabird cliffs.

Check back for updates.  The next will be on Denali and Denali Highway.  Depending on my mood at the time of writing, there may even be musings on Alaska as it relates to the meaning of life.

Okay, here is Installment 2, Denali.