Alaska Bird Photo Adventure

 For a long time I have wanted to go to Alaska birding and taking pictures.  There are many birds that nest in Alaska, particularly up in the far north on the tundra,  and no serious birder can get the list they want without Alaska.  June is the time to go, as particularly in the far north, as it is only a few weeks of warmth, sun and open ground that allows many of the birds to breed, fledge and head back south. That they are here from places as far away as Africa, South America and even Antarctica makes this a truly miraculous place. Even the Yellow Warblers were excited, rain and all!


 

I started out Thursday night the 6th of June flying out of Portland at 9:30 and arriving in Anchorage about 3 and 1/2 hours later at midnight their time.  Light as noon!  I then spent the next few days in Anchorage and down in Seward.  I did this on my own and had a great time.  More on that later.  This post is to give an overview of the Nome part of the trip where I joined Nate Chappel and Ken Archer of Trogon Tours.  This was a truly amazing experience up on the Bering Sea and out on the tundra.

I did get the picture of the trip on the next to the last day.  The Bluethroat is a rare thrush from Siberia that frequents the willow thickets along roads and creek beds in a small area of the Seward Peninsula.  A cousin of the American Robin, this was really fun to get.  Here is one of 6 shots I got during the approximately one second that the bird landed on a willow branch about 50 feet away.

 Ken Archer took this picture right after I got the shot of the trip.  I was pretty excited. And a little cold.



Nome is a gold mining town that is still a gold mining town.  It is the only real town on the Seward Peninsula.   Other than it there are just tiny native villages.



Yeah, it doesn't look like much, but there are about 3000 people living there, most of whom make their living in some way related to dredging gold on the beach as soon as the sea ice will allow it.  While we were there, the dredgers were able to work several days, and then the sea ice came back in and piled up on the beach.  As many ATV's as trucks ply the roads around Nome, and many of the vehicles don't even have license plates.  Hence this sign at the gas station run by the local native tribal corporation.  In case you can't read it after clicking on it, it says "If you don't have a visible license plate, you must come inside and prepay". 



Most of the landscape is essentially tundra over permafrost.  I really didn't understand this concept until I noticed the layer of ice below the plant material in places where washout had occurred.





Amazing that there is so much life here.  In addition to the birds we saw a number of mammals, including:

Moose




Reindeer and Caribou







Arctic Squirrel



Red Fox





And here is the mystery critter for this post.  First grandchild to identify this animal wins $10.  Hint, it is not part of the cow family.







 I am apologizing to Nate Chappel who is trying to teach me how to process my pictures before I post them, but I don't have the software yet, so this first post on the Nome trip has the pics right out of the camera.  A few of the birds we saw.

The very interesting Ptarmigan's.  These birds eat a lot of gravel and so are often on the roadside.  They make a very odd sound which is all over Youtube if you are interested. 

 Rock Ptarmigan



 Willow Ptarmigan



 And the very well hidden female.



 One of the most interesting of the birds were the Jaegers.  This was the first time I had seen these species as they are pelagic birds.  Except for the about six weeks they spend on the tundra mating, laying their eggs and hatching their young, these birds spend their lives far off shore never coming to land.  We saw two of the three species, the Long Tail and the Parasitic.  Ken Archer, one of our photo guides and leaders had been in the area for about a week before we got there, and had found this bird on it's nest.  

 

 It was funny watching Ken try to sneak up on it to photograph it, and the bird and it's mate buzzing him!









In the willow thickets, we saw a number of songbirds including:

Common Redpoll





Hoary Redpoll



American Tree Sparrow



Fox Sparrow



And a number of Warblers including the Yellow



Out on the tundra it was not unusual to see eggs in a nest.  We saw some eaten by fox.



Out along the beach we saw a number of additional birds including

Common Raven (the biggest I have ever seen)



Short Eared Owl





 And a pair of Western Sandpipers doing a mating dance.

 

 Eiders are a very large and beautiful duck only found in the north.  Here on the Nome coast we saw the Common Eider.



 The Long Tailed Duck has a variety of plumage's.  I had not seen this one before.



 So in the next few posts I will try and show off the birds that we saw on this trip.  That is why we were there, and I was really excited to see many new birds.  But the vastness of this place was really stunning.

 


 Seeing the remains of broken dreams like this long abandoned gold dredge.

 

 At the end of these roads, seemingly at the end of the earth were little villages like this on called Teller. 

 

 Not far from Siberia across the Bering Sea, the most poingnet place in this village for me was the cemetery.  We went up looking for the White Wagtail, but this was the vision that got me.

 

 

 Ahhh  Alaska

 

 Stay alert for future posts.