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Spectacled Eider or eider spectacle? Why not both?

 

After a day and a half of forgettable birding around Anchorage and the Glenn Highway – the highlight being a couple of Gray (Canada) Jays – we boarded the flight to Utqiagvik (formerly Barrow). This was to be the first and only time we would reach the true Arctic on our trip. Utqiagvik has a limited road system that enables access to the arctic tundra, where breeding shorebirds and waterfowl abound. More specific targets for visiting birders are the three breeding eider species – King, Spectacled and Steller’s – and Snowy Owl.

In addition to the breeding species, Utqiagvik has proven to be a fairly productive location for vagrants and a check of the RBA for the area revealed that a Temminck’s Stint has been present for two days.

While Paul and Andy waited for our bags to unload from the flight, I went off to the vehicle rental location. The interior of the vehicle was by far the dirtiest I had ever rented, with mud all over the floor mats. Although I was not at all bothered by this, I did find it amusing that the rental office had a sign warning customers of a $300 fee for returning a vehicle excessively dirty! I would love to see what their definition of excessively dirty is.

After dumping our bags in our hotel room, we decided to first try for the Temminck’s Stint. This proved to be a monumental error as the ebird hotspot was located in the wrong spot, a different gravel pit to the one the bird was actually in. The wrong location proved to be horribly muddy and virtually birdless, invoking comparisons with the notorious Passchendaele battlefield in the First World War. Ironically, almost the only two birds we saw there were a pair Eurasian Wigeon, which proved to be our only ‘rarity’ find in Barrow, as the rest of the trip was spent looking at birds already found by others.

In recent years, there has been a series of very late springs here and we had heard on the flight that there were unprecedented viewing opportunities for the eiders along the road out to the new landfill as most of the open water was right by the road. My previous experience with the eiders here was that they were out in large melt ponds and that a telescope was required for good views. We headed out towards the new landfill turnoff, passing by dozens of Greater White-fronted Geese, Long-tailed Ducks and Red Phalaropes scattered everywhere. The first good pond we reached held a nice pair of Steller’s Eiders, although they were a little too far for good photographs. Proceeding further, we soon found a pair of Spectacled Eiders, only about 30 yards from the car. This is a real specialty of the area and it was amazing to have such close prolonged views.

A little further on, a male King Eider was floating around in a pool only 10 yards from the car, creating an almost zoo-like experience! Arriving at the landfill, we found a pool there with more pairs of King and Spectacled Eiders. 

King Eider

Another new shorebird for the trip was a spiffy breeding plumaged Stilt Sandpiper, which reaches the edge of its breeding range around Utqiagvik. Heading back towards the hotel, we ran into the VENT group and Brian Gibbons, the leader, was kind enough to give us directions to the correct gravel pit for the Temminck’s Stint, which they had seen a couple of hours before. We headed over there only to run into another group that had failed to find it despite an apparently thorough search. Typically, the stint was the first bird Andy looked at once we got out of the car! 

Temminck's Stint

We eventually got very good looks and complimented these with another new shorebird for the trip – two White-rumped Sandpipers. Four Sabine’s Gulls competed with the shorebirds to give outrageously good views and photo opportunities.

Considering that we had not even started birding until after 5 PM and had wasted the best part of an hour by going to the wrong location to start with, it had been an incredible evening. The “Opening Night” at Utqiagvik had more than lived up to expectations.

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