August in the Aleutians

Birders drool at the thought of seeing a Horned Puffin. Birders in the Aleutians drool because they are so common and boring. Ok thats not true...the puffins never get old, even after seeing them every day for months. They finish nesting really late in the summer so right now they are probably very busy bringing fish back to their fat fluffy chicks.

This picture is totally not from August, sorry. By now almost all the Least Auklets will be out at sea, as they finish up nesting and fledging pretty early. It's sad when you are out clambering around on Buldir Island's Main Talus and have no auklets for company...you are accompanied by a hole in your heart instead. Note the Crested Auklet and Least Auklet doing weird things in the background.

Aleutian Cackling Geese spend weeks higher up on the island while they molt their flight feathers...by August they have mysteriously reappeared near the coast. I think the front birds are juveniles.

The view from the front door of the cabin. Or, more obnoxiously, "my office".

July and August are stressful because you are just fiending for rare shorebirds (like this Red-necked stint) to appear. Rare birds, especially of the Aleutian caliber, have an addictive quality.

Some Tufted Puffins mingle above a Thick-billed Murre colony. No big deal.

Red-legged Kittiwake battle. So intense. I think those are Black-legged Kittiwake wings sticking out in back.

Black-legged Kittiwakes. Some juveniles (foreground) should be fledging by now.

Aleutian Song Sparrow. I don't know what else to say about them, except that I'm glad they were there. It's weird to not be around Song Sparrows. These are big and dark.

Scumbag.

Our Civil Liberties Will Die By Morning's Light

Red-legged Kittiwake.


"LBB". "LBJ". These are specieist terms. Yup. That's even worse than racism you know...being against an entire species.

Let me explain, nonbirders.There's a lot of birds out there. A lot. Some of them are pretty distinct. Take my friend the Red-legged Kittiwake. It looks like your basic gull....but wait. What are those things dangling off of it? Oh, it seems to have red legs. It looks like its been wading in a pool of blood. That's pretty distinct.


No. An LBJ (Little Brown Job) or LBB (Little Brown Bird) is something else. The definition is simple: a small brown bird. For example, take the Common Rose-Finch, below.

Common Rosefinch. It's rare. When your first child is being born in the hospital, this is the bird you would go see instead.


As you can see, its brown. It's a bird. I don't know about a job. But there you have it. It's brown. It's...indistinct. To the undiscerning eye (that's you, nonbirder), it looks like literally hundreds of other bird species out there. Does that make it any less awesome? No, you ass.

People who know a little bit about birds, but not a lot, will use these hurtful terms. No, scratch that....HATEFUL terms.

Parakeet Auklet. I'm still bummed I didn't get any very impressive pictures of them. They are cooler birds than you know (and one of the worst to extract from mist-nets).

In my opinion, the original reason these terms came about was relatively innocent and humble. People just couldn't hang with these birds. The lacked the skills to differentiate, for example, female Common Rosefinches and female House Finches. They just couldn't do it. It's not that they disliked them or viewed them with distaste, they just had no idea what to do. From 1997 to 2007 I worked for LBJ Enterprises, whom were usually filled with people who would have a heart attack if they were lucky enough to see a female Common Rosefinch on American soil. Thats Little Brown Jobs, not Lindon Banes Johnson.

Flash forward to 2011.

This Lapland Longspur is just checking on some stuff.

"LBB" and "LBJ" are slurs known by all who associate themselves with wildlife, birds, biology or what have you. Budding birdwatchers still use them in the same context as they belong in. But now, its become a derogatory term for everybody else. Its like, "oh, these look the same, so they don't matter". What the fuck? I mean that's a cute attitude and everything, but all it means is that your bird skills are weak and you're too lazy to do anything about it. Why are people racist? Because they are afraid. Why are people speciesist? Same reason.

The path to camp.

People are afraid to try to identify these birds. It's sad.

But let me tell you kids. It's ok. Can't tell a Chipping Sparrow from a Vesper Sparrow? Who cares? Doesn't mean you shouldn't try. The only people who can are some of the world's biggest nerds anyways. You have nothing to lose.

There is not much worse in the world than the willfully ignorant. You people, who use these terrible words, fit this description to a tee.

Thick-billed Murres are not exactly agile, but are gifted enough fliers to deal with raising families on near-vertical cliffs. This is what murre air-brakes look like.

Now that we have that out of the way, I will say that I am happy that there is more out there than those....wonderful birds I've been speaking of. Variety is the spice of life right? So instead of posting nothing but sparrows, pipits and flycatchers, I went with a suite of birds from Buldir Island.

A year ago I was on Buldir, in the western Aleutians, working absurd hours and scaring the crap out of myself trying to avoid falling off cliffs. But the birds were just so good, and the possibilities were endless in terms of weird migrants that could show up.

Horned Puffin.


2011 only turned out to be a so-so year in terms of vagrants, but I do love seabirds. When you can watch tens of thousands of auklets swirling around from the deck of your cabin you forget about bitching about that Eyebrowed Thrush that never showed up.

Right. The weekend appears to be here. I'm not sure how much I'll be working, but if the weather is right (un-frakking-likely) I'll be sure to get out and bird if I can. Someone finally found some Baird's Sparrows, which is the epitome of LBBs and one of the reasons I've come to North Dakota at all. But the plovers come first!

Why does my blog have Halloween colors? Huh.

Tufted Puffin.

I pooped a lot in here last year. I always felt self-conscious because I could hear Song Sparrows and Grey-crowned Rosy-Finches on the roof.

Cuddle All Through The Storm

Crested and Least Auklets in the midst of their nightly spectacle off Main Talus.

Tufted Puffin. Their beaks are not all show though....they can and will crush you.

No matter how hard I try, I really haven't been on top of showing off my Alaska pictures from last year, so apologies for that. For some masochistic reason I have largely not even putting up my favorite shots, which I don't completely understand the reasons for. Maybe I don't want ya'll to short-circuit your computers with drool and/or tears. More likely, I'm just a weird dude. It's probably Felonious Jive's fault....I can't stand that guy sometimes. At any rate, all of these pictures are from Buldir Island.

It's time to take my Perpetual Weekend to the next level and get tranquilo. On Monday I embark on my Mexican Roadtrip, and will return to the United States on January 26....so I'll be back then. Hopefully I will have a photograph or two from that.

This kelpy-faced male Bar-tailed Godwit was one of the more abiding sandpiper visitors we had.

For a few weeks, chocolate lilies blanket the island.

Female Lapland Longspur.

So, if you haven't heard already, Saudi Arabia has captured a vulture and claimed it was an Israeli spy. I am not making this up, even though it sounds straight out of The Onion. It is consistent with the region's recent behavior, as Egypt has attempted to blame their recent shark attacks on Israel as well. It is rare that I am surprised anymore about how stunningly retarded people can be, but this takes the fucking cake. I can't believe I just read a real quote from an Israeli biologist worried that his vulture was going to be tortured (its a well-founded concern, I reckon). Now, I'm not on Israel's side on any of the conflicts going on in the region, but they certainly have become the scapegoat for everybody and their mother. The vulture article is all the proof you need.

Ok, I need to go sit on a toilet. Thanks a lot Israel.

Horned Puffin.

Crested Auklet.

Just One More Nasty Glance

Much like people, Crested Auklets get a kick out of rubbing the crap out of each other. Obviously, the good-looking ones get the most action.

As I mentioned before, I have a massive backlog of Alaska photos to show ya'll still. I'm pretty sure people are into that. Not many people get to go out to the Aleutian Islands, and those that do know how bloody hard it can be to photograph anything out there, so hopefully this makes everyone happy. All of today's bird photos are from Buldir Island.

In meta news, I made a page dedicated to myself. Yup, I've got that much time on my hands. It's in the bar above the posts. Check out "The Life And Times of SeagullSteve" to learn more about your favorite nerd, and how I single-handedly defeated the Nazis in WWII.

A Parakeet Auklet peers out of its crevice. This is one of the few decent shots I managed. I'll get you next time auklet, next time...

This is the legendary Coast Guard LORAN station on Attu Island, which was decommisioned earlier this year. Pictured are the majority of the residents of Buldir Island in 2010, who are nerds.

Horned Puffins doing their thing.

Christmas. It's a busy time of year. So much to do. So much....consuming! It makes me gag a little. But it's nice at the same time (the season, not the consuming). I've never really had a bad Christmas, so I can't complain too much. Ever since I was.....3, I think.....my mom and dad have been the only family I've ever spent it with. Our family tradition is putting everyone's presents under the coffee table. Talk about festive. Then we lurk around the house for a few hours, have dinner, then I take off for a friend's house. My mother watches Korean television until about 1 in the morning and my dad drinks a bunch of vodka and passes out on the couch. I guarantee you this is what will happen this year.

Well that was kind of a weird aside, wasn't it? I'm looking forward to taking off to Mexico next month for some heavy birding. I still only have vague ideas of what I will see, but I'm dangerously optimistic. Things may get Weird, but those are the conditions I thrive in. Oh yeah I'll be at the Salton Sea next week as well. I have finally answered the Clarion Call of the Bean Goose.

Speaking of holidays, many of us are driven to the bottle this time of year. Preferably, this is to celebrate being reunited with old friends and family....but for all to many it is simply to cope with said family. Worse, you are spending Christmas with nobody at all, and are entering a state of catatonic depression. If any of these scenarios are applicable to you, you might be interested in this quick read on sustainable drinking. Thanks to Jherime for the link. Happy boozing!

This would make a great quiz photo, but I probably don't have enough readers to really make it interesting. Just keeping it real, you know. That's a Glaucous-winged Gull chasing off a Slaty-backed Gull...different bird than the one I've posted pictures of earlier.

Big Time In The Jungle

Thick-billed Murre. Handsome.

I think I will post really big, vertical pictures today. Why not? All of them are from Buldir Island.

I somehow ended up winning a Nikon D90 SLR on Ebay yesterday, even though I only put down one bid. So that's pretty rad, considering I'm using a decrepit old D70 now...the D90 should, I think, make a noticeable difference in my photographic efforts, considering it has twice as many megapixels and a higher rate of fire (more frames per second), not to mention video.....so you, BB&B addict, have that to look forward to. 

Thick-billed Murres, Black and Red-legged Kittiwakes, not mingling.

It's all part of the master plan. BB&B will be taking the world by storm, and I will somehow be highly paid to do so. These are not mere delusions of grandeur people. This is as real as it gets. Already a steady and mysterious flow of cash is flooding my bank accounts....pretty soon it will be up to me, with my vast resources and cunning wit, to save the imperiled Spoonbill Sandpiper. After that, I will have to bring the Ivory-billed Woodpecker back. Hopefully that won't entail any Jurassic Park-style cloning, but its all within our grasp here at BB&B.

Red-legged Kittiwake with field-readable band.

But while I sit and wait for my financial reservoirs to fill and my power to accumulate, it is up to me and me alone to continue to make birdwatchers understandable to everyone, including themselves. Think of it as me holding up a really detailed picture for all you nonbirders, and for you birders I will be holding up a mirror. As far as I know, no one in the states has anything like the Human Birdwatcher Project that BB&B sponsors, and many of the masses are still floundering in their ignorance of these people. I think the situation is a little better in Britain, where people have a better sense of humor and twitchers are better understood....but I feel alone in the wilderness here. If birders themselves don't even discuss birding and half the luminaries in this field possess the social and communication skills of a dead skunk, then the situation can look very bleak indeed. But don't worry friends, the great ornithologist Felonious Jive and I will do our best to shed some light on these bizarre and awkward issues, and are determined to lead you to The Promised Land. Stay warm, and have a positive Tuesday.

Much like the Flightless Cormorant of the Galapagos, Flightless Puffins have tiny wings. It is thought that they have lost the ability to fly in order to become cuter than penguins. Anyways...yeah this is a Horned Puffin.

Friends Feel Less And Less Like Friends

A Thick-billed Murre wings its way past Buldir Island's Spike Camp.

And so much for that.  Elections.  Depending on how you look at it, they can mark the opportunity for real change, or simply for some more blackening of the heart.  This was a heart-blackening election without a doubt.  California won't have to deal with four years of Whitman (although I doubt anybody is genuinely excited by Jerry Brown), and Prop 23 went down in flames.  But Prop 26 passed, 19 failed, and Prop E went down too. Republicans didnt gain much ground in the state, but they generally dominated things throughout the country.  Great.  Do people not remember why the country is in the mess its in in the first place????  No.  Of course not.  And I know why.

The face of misery: a Horned Puffin stranded in a wetland. 

People are idiots.  That's my answer.  It makes a lot of sense, doesnt it?  They have no memories.  None.  Their memories get rewritten with every 24-hour news cycle.  And now we have the bloody Tea Party on our hands.....ostensibly, politics look like a pretty bleak realm for a while. Its enough to make you feel like a puffin caught in a mud-puddle.  Jesus....not that Democrats are my knights in shining armor (I'm registered Green)....but I think you know what I'm saying.

Itchy. A juvenile Lapland Longspur.

Right.  Enough with the grim prophesies of doom.  They get to you after a while.  As you can see, there's still plenty more Alaska pictures to churn out.  I havent taken a bird picture in about 2 months, and I'm completely ok with that.  

A pair of banded Red-legged Kittiwakes throwing down some squeaky courtship activities.

Did I mention my devotion to Red-legged Kittiwakes?  Fantastic birds.  Between their huge, wide-set eyes and oddly shaped heads, they look like they have migrated to earth from somewhere else in the solar system.  And those legs!  Crimson.  Love 'em.

You Were Not As Good As Bad Religion

A Thick-billed Murre ponders the meaning of cliffs.

Tremble at the eye of the auklet (crested). 

North Bight Beach, next to our field camp. Vagrant magnet.

 

I never thought I'd get the chance to say this, but its time to go!  Here are a few shots to hold you over while I migrate south.  I can't believe I'm about to come out the other side of this thing, relatively in one piece.  Best of all, I'll be liberated from the workforce for a couple of month, so I'll have more time devoted to YOU, devoted BB&B reader.  I've got a momentous backlog of photos that will fall upon you like a landslide of Awesome.  You will be crushed with glee.

Puffins do an impressive amount of Nothing.  It essentially looks like this.

Buldir Island is thick with Pacific Wrens.  Behold the long bill of the Aleutian subspecies.

Parakeet Auklet rafts.

Northern Fulmar.

I Was Halfway Through The Best Years Of My Life

A male (cock?) Rock Ptarmigan on Adak.  Look at those eyecombs!  What a stud.

I’ll be the first one to admit that coming back to civilization (or as some call it, “reality”) is both a blessing and a curse.  It has the biggest perks and the deepest downfalls.  For those of you have never been swallowed by the wilderness and were reborne Victorious (or, shat out defeated) or I’ll give you the rundown of what you can expect:

Perks: Pretty girls and nice ladies, and sometimes, the chance to make some sweet, sweet’ lovin’ again.  Different faces than the same ugly mugs you’ve been forced to look at for the past 3+ months. The chance to obtain both new music and go to some real shows.  A kaleidoscope of different sorts of alcohol that all want to meet you.  Obviously friends, family, and the loved ones inbetween who have missed you of course play a huge factor in making life worth living.

Bummers: Life gets a whole lot more complicated.  Financial problems, bills and every fucking kind of wallet suck reappears.  Coming to terms with television is always a painful chore.  You are forced to interact with countless numbers of people you want nothing to do with.  You are surrounded by a thousand different things that just squash any kind of stoke you can muster…pollution, urban sprawl, news of any kind….perhaps most obviously your social skills seem retarded (in every sense of the word), as you have subconsciously adjusted to only interacting with a tiny group of people for months.

I’ve dealt with these issues time and time again (including now), and its just part of the price you pay for the privilidge of getting to go to these places.

Ashore on Attu Island.

Anyways.  After leaving Adak we island-hopped west along the chain, stopping at Kanaga, Kiska and Agattu to drop off field camps.  A couple of the skiff trips from the Tiglax were experiences I’d rather forget (because I was absolutely convinced that I was going to die)….which was possible, because of the face-melting seabirds that began to appear as we worked our way out west.  Ancient Murrelets, Tufted Puffins, Laysan Albatrosses and Short-tailed Shearwaters appeared first, then came Horned Puffins, Least, Crested and Parakeet Auklets, Thick-billed Murres, Red Phalaropes, Black-footed Albatrosses, Fork-tailed Storm-Petrels…..what I’m trying to say is that it was pretty sweet.  On top of all this avian goodness were Dahl’s Porpoises, Humpback, Minke and Sperm Whales, and Orcas!  Fucking Orcas!  Its rare that I get so giddy from a life mammal, but they’re a big deal I reckon.

Horned Puffin!

Sorry Franklin.  They do make better national birds than turkeys.

After dropping off Rob (Willie Nelson lookalike and member of the All-Star Salton Sea Burrowing Owl crew of Y2K8) at Agattu, the weather didn’t look good for a Buldir landing…so we had no choice but to land on Attu Island to do some birding.  I was beside myself.  Had Douglas Adams been there, he would have said that I boggled.  I couldn’t believe I was going to Attu, one of the most inaccessible and inhospitable birding hotspots that is considered to be American soil.  At the very end of the Aleutian chain, Attu is notorious for its ridiculous vagrants that have been seen there every year for as long as its been birded….so it was a pretty sweet bonus to end up there.  Attu was also the site of a large, bloody WWII battle between Americans and Japanese occupation forces, which only adds an entirely new sense of gravity (Midwayesque) to the place.

Turns out we didn’t see a whole lot though.  The birding group that had been there before us apparently had some good birds (including the first North American record of Solitary Snipe), but they purposely refused to tell us for some reason, which is one of the capital crimes in the birding world.  One of guys at the Coast Guard station there (which is closing this month) mentioned that a White-tailed Eagle had been living there for some time, but again, no luck…..we were obliged by a couple flocks of Bramblings though, which I certainly couldn’t complain about.  Massacre Bay also harbored the only Aleutian Terns I saw the entire summer, so Attu was certainly a worthwhile stop….

Fishing off Attu Island, with accompanying gull-fulmar cloud.

You wouldn't think it, but Glaucous-winged Gulls are one of the top avian predators in the Aleutians.  The number of storm-petrels and auklets they eat must be staggering.

When the winds and the seas calmed a bit, we headed back to Buldir, the westernmost and most remote camp that the refuge was operating…and more importantly, my home for the summer.

In even more egotistical news, we have crested the 200 post here at BB&B, a momentous milestone.  Whiskey will be consumed tonight.

It's ok to do embarrassing things on Attu Island.  Behind me is the WWII runway and Massacre Bay.