Today started out very interesting. I went out yesterday night around 11pm, the plan was to be out for an hour or so. On my way out, a local native family offered me a ride to see Spectacled Eider. They were in a big van with the name of their tour group on it, and a buddy from another research crew was on board, so I decided to hop on. After a few hours ( I got back to the station at 1:30!) we never did see the eiders, but we had some good birds on the way. I saw 2 Sabine's Gulls, my lifer Arctic Tern, Long-tailed Jaeger, a few fighting Snowy Owls and Canada Geese. Red Phalaropes are everywhere.

After little sleep, I woke up and we hit the tundra for the first time. We have 6 600X600 meter plots, and we did the first of four rounds of snow cover surveys. The snow was still up to my thighs in some places! Parasitic, Pomarine and Long-tailed Jaegers were seen, with Pomarine being very numerous. I had 6 all flying together, fighting for lemmings. It seems to be a very good lemming year, you can even catch them with your hands as they zip by.

A lot of Greater White-fronted Geese were out, with 1 lone Snow Goose tagging along. Snowy Owls are also taking advantage of the lemmings, and I saw at least 5 today. A lot of the shorebirds are already setting up territories and even some nests. The American Golden-Plovers are beautiful in full breeding plumage.
Tonight we tried to go out to Point Barrow. Unfortunately, the arctic fog rolled in and visibility was terrible so we stopped before we got there and did a little town birding. A singing Varied Thrush was cool, another White-rumped Sandpiper and another Arctic Tern.
Tomorrow I will be back on the Tundra re-sighting color banded birds on our plots, and then birding the surrounding areas later!

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