Nome again

John had a great time on his second day of birding around Nome with the Wings tour group. Besides adding the Willow Ptarmigan, American Tree Sparrow and Fox Sparrow to his big year list, his tour group went out on the famous Nome highway.  Yesterday, I wrote about an incident at the Bristle-Thighed Curlew bluff years ago when curlews flew down to the van on the road so that people who decided not to climb the bluff saw them and the people that did climb the bluff did not. Well, this time, most of the group started scaling the hummocky tundra slope while a few stayed back at the van. Sure enough, when the climbing group was about halfway up, the non-climbers radioed that a curlew was flying about the van. Then it flew up the slope nearer to the climbers and they got fair looks. Some members of the group were satisfied and went back down. John and a few others stayed on the slope to try to get better looks and photos. They actually found the curlew again and got great photos. John is very happy. When he and I, did the climb several years ago, I saw a curlew flying away, at least, the guides told me it was a curlew, and John didn't see it at all. Now he has another ABA life bird.

The curlew bluff was at mile marker 72. They went out to 74.4 to see the Bluethroat, turned back toward Nome and at mile marker 42 got sort of looks at the Gyrfalcon on its nest. The best for John was the Arctic Warbler at 24.4 because everyone told John he was too early for it. 

For added fun, a really grizzled grizzly bear lumbered along down the creek next to the road. 

John has an ABA big year total of 526.

There's no place like Nome!

Finally, a long phone conversation with my husband, John, who is now in Nome, so I have something to blog about!

After Attu/Adak John was up to 500 species of birds for the year to date in the ABA North American Region. After Gambell (5/27 to 6/4) he was at 514 and after one day of birding in Nome his total is 519.

Gambell was COLD and WINDY. It's a village of about 600 Yupiks on the north end of St. Lawrence Island. The island is in the Bering Sea, 65 miles from Russia and 210 miles from Nome. Soft drinks and alcohol are banned there and the Wings tour group John was with were required to bring their own drinking water. The village is wedged between a mountain and the sea. Most of the coastal shelf it perches on is made up of rounded stones, pebble to boulder size. Very difficult terrain to walk on, so the tour group moved around with ATV's. They birded the drainage ditch, the little lake, the air strip, the boneyard (centuries of hunting) and the shore, then did it all again the next day.

Some of the highlights for John were - seeing all the species of eider ducks, comparing Common Ringed (asian) and Semi-Palmated (american) plovers side by side, the Red-Necked Stint and the Lesser Sand Plover. Truly spectacular were the thousands upon thousands of birds streaming past just offshore, heading north to their breeding grounds. As the group were gathering their gear for the flight from Gambell to Nome, a White-Tailed Eagle soared over and gave everyone a good view. A nice farewell.

Nome seemed almost tropical compared to Gambell. In one day, John added Sabine's Gull, Red Phalarope, Yellow Wagtail, Tundra Swan and Arctic Loon to his list, the last loon he needed.

Wednesday, June 6th, the Wings group will head out at 4 AM to see the infamous Bristle-Thighed Curlew. For those who have led a sheltered life, the curlews nest on top of a high bluff covered with spongy hummocks of tundra that John will have to scale with his bad knees. Once, years ago, the birds flew down to the tour van on the road below so the people who opted out of the climb saw the curlews and the climbers didn't. That's what makes birding so much fun!