Biological Projects
Monitor
Although seabirds
that use the Alaska Maritime Refuge don’t talk, they can tell us volumes
if we observe them annually, taking notes on how well they are doing – when
they nest, whether their eggs hatch and chicks survive to go to sea, what they
eat, and more.
By such periodic checking and recording (monitoring) we
can track the long-term health not only of seabirds, but also of the ocean –
an environment we all depend on, but that is harder to study and understand than
are the species that rely upon it.
The Alaska Maritime Refuge is so extensive – from rainforest islands in
Southeast Alaska, west out the Aleutian Chain, and north to above the Arctic Circle
– and so long established, that it is ideal for revealing trends and alerting
us to what’s happening under the waters that wash Alaska’s coast.
What
We Monitor Annually
breeding seabirds
breeding
land birds
wintering waterfowl
breeding bald eagles
sea otters
Annual
Monitoring Field Stations
Cape
Lisburne
Bluff
St. Paul
St. George
Buldir
Kasatochi
Aiktak
Chowiet
East
Amatuli
St. Lazaria
What We Do at our Monitoring Sites
Landbird Monitoring
Off-road point count routes at annual monitoring
sites
Strip transects for beach dwelling birds (song sparrow and winter
wrens)
Territory mapping for ptarmigan
Winter Waterfowl
Population
indices from nearshore surveys at selected sites
Juvenile ratios for emperor
geese
Bald Eagle Populations
Nest surveys periodically at three
islands in the Aleutians since early 1970s
Trends in numbers of nests and productivity
Sea
Otter Population Monitoring
Counting animals at annual monitoring sites
Baseline
Monitoring Program For Environmental Conditions
Sea temperatures
Air
quality at Class I sites (three on refuge)
Contaminants in seabird eggs
Beach
oil
Additional Data We Gather in Nearshore Ocean Habitats
Oceanography
– temperature, salinity
Prey Abundance – acoustics surveys, prey
sampling
Distribution of birds and mammals at sea
Coordinated investigations
of seabirds, marine mammals, and oceanography
Last updated:September 8, 2008
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