Alaska: Gambell in Spring

As more and more North American birdwatchers have discovered, spring birdwatching in Alaska is an experience to be found nowhere else on this continent. There is first of all the excitement of seeing many species whose North American range is almost exclusively from Alaska, and hopefully seeing them well. Second, there is the distinctly arctic flavor of high-latitude birdwatching at a season of very long days filled with tundra birdsong and, from mid-June on, tundra wildflowers and Arctic butterflies in abundance. For the veteran birdwatcher there is Bering Sea island birdwatching at Gambell on St. Lawrence Island, where in some years a variety of species from Asia occur. Finally, there is Alaska itself, huge, wild, varied but always beautiful: the icy shores of the Bering Sea and mountainous vastness of the Seward Peninsula.

To listen to a recent radio piece on birding around Nome with WINGS please follow this link. A few years ago Paul Lehman published a comprehensive account of the birds of Gambell through Western Field Ornithologists (WFO), and we have decided to include a digital copy of this volume when you register for the tour.