Hovering Above, Walking Amidst

The date is June 20, and we're just wrapping up the last of our helicopter survey of the Teshekpuk Lake Special Area.  We've been working for 12 days to survey plots scattered throughout this region of the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska.  This area has high density of many species of breeding shorebirds, and the surveys have been designed to measure the numbers of birds that come to this special place to raise their young every spring.  

We've been traveling in a small helicopter, a Robinson R-44, which transports us to randomly selected plots scattered throughout the area.  At each plot, we conduct a survey for one and a half hours to record displaying shorebirds.  Unlike when we see them in the fall on migration, on the breeding ground, shorebirds sing and display, much like familiar birds we're used to seeing at home.  This helps us locate their presence, and sometimes find their nests.  After counting the birds, we conduct an analysis to determine how many we missed on our survey, and then extrapolate the total population for the area.  Many of the species breeding here, like the American Golden Plover, are in deep decline, so we're concerned to measure the population that breeds in important areas, like this one.

We're finishing the last of our 40 helicopter plot surveys today, and changing gears to focus full-time on collecting Avian Influenza samples for the last five days of our field work.  We'll be working on foot, and traveling out from our camp to find wetlands where shorebirds are breeding, and band them, and take samples to determine whether they're carrying the virus.  

We couldn't come to this remote location without support from our many donors and sponsors, and we're very grateful to have the opportunity to work in this remote wilderness area.  Manomet is the only non-governmental organization participating in the collection of data on shorebird densities in both the Teshekpuk Lake Special Area and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.  We appreciate your support, and look forward to sharing our results when we return home to Massachusetts.  

That's it, and we'll be sharing another report with you sometime soon.