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There’s No Place Like Nome


 The afternoon of June 1 we flew to Nome for 6 days of birding prior to heading out to Gambell. After picking up our vehicle and settling into our accommodation, we had a couple of hours of daylight to head out to the nearby Nome River Mouth, where a Red-necked Stint had been reported the previous day. As we were driving along the coast road, Andy noticed a flock of geese heading west over the ocean. These were mostly Brant but contained seven Emperor Geese, one of our key targets for the Nome Area. On arrival at the river mouth, we saw another goose flock coming into land there, which included two Emperor Geese. These gave excellent views and ended any concerns about not getting good enough looks.

Emperor Goose

There was a small mudflat exposed in the river mouth with a good selection of shorebirds. A couple of Bar-tailed Godwits were immediately obvious and scanning through a flock of about 80 peeps quickly revealed the Red-necked Stint – a very bright alternate-plumaged bird – and a couple of Semipalmated Sandpipers were also in with the Westerns. Two Red Knots were present and a flock of (Black-legged) Kittiwakes contained a smart Sabine’s Gull.

We were checking the Arctic Terns as they flew by and soon picked up an Aleutian Tern that landed close by on the sandspit at the mouth. It was soon joined by two more, with all three being incredibly confiding allowing an approach down to 15 yards. After Paul and Andy had satiated their desire for photos, we headed back to our studios, very happy to have had great looks at two of our top five targets for the Nome segment.

Aleutian Tern

The next morning saw us heading out east towards Safety Sound, making various stops along the way. Heavy fog over sea around Nome put paid to any hopes of a seawatch. Willow Ptarmigans were frequent along the roadside all day, with all birds still in transition from their all-white winter garb to alternate plumage. We had excellent looks at a Short-eared Owl.

As we approached Safety Sound, the fog began to clear somewhat and we started to check the ponds and tundra for shorebirds and other species. The most striking feature was large numbers of Long-tailed Jaegers that were mostly sitting around on tundra. We counted about 80 birds by the time we reached the bridge over the sound.

Long-tailed Jaeger

The channel at the mouth of the lagoon had a swarm of birds with 20 Harlequins, a few Common Eiders, several dozen each of Kittiwake, Sabine’s Gull and Arctic Tern, a couple of hundred of Red-necked Phalaropes and 30 Red Pharalopes, both Ruddy and Black Turnstones and a Sanderling. Continuing east along the lagoon, large numbers of Tundra Swan began to appear and we estimated about 500. Single Pomarine and Parasitic Jaegers completed the jaeger set.

Red Phalarope

Crossing the second bridge at the east end of the lagoon, we found a productive area for shorebirds with Long-billed Dowitchers and Pectoral Sandpipers along with many Red-necked Phalaropes and Western and Semipalmated Sandpipers. A beautiful alternate-plumaged Red Phalarope gave stunning views and a local rarity was a Hudsonian Godwit. We walked out over the marsh to get good photos to verify the sighting and let Paul get good looks at a species he had only seen once before.

Hudsonian Godwit

While talking with other birders along our route, we learned of a Gyrfalcon nest further out on the road to Council. Obviously this was one of our top priority species, so we headed out there and got rather distant views of the pair both perched and flying. A bonus was a nice singing Bluethroat.

 

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