Refuge Notebook

Photo by Ronan Dugan/USFWS Kittiwakes build their sturdy nests on cliff sides, and they prefer to live in crowded neighborhoods for additional safety from predators.

Refuge Notebook: Keeping an eye on birds

Around this time of year I start to include a pair of binoculars in my checklist of essentials for heading out the door on a… Continue reading

 

Refuge Notebook: Migration is not canceled

A friend told me recently that March is her favorite month. What? Not May when our birds of summer come home to nest? Nor June… Continue reading

 

Refuge Notebook: Introducing Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge

We’ve probably already met, but you didn’t realize it. We’re the other national wildlife refuge headquartered on the Kenai Peninsula. If you’ve taken a Kenai… Continue reading

 

A sign marks one of the groomed ski trails on the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge. (Photo by Matt Bowser/Kenai National Wildlife Refuge)

Refuge Notebook: I Think I Can Ski

Let us start with a riddle. There are 11 frogs sitting on a log. Five of the frogs decide to jump off the log. How… Continue reading

A sign marks one of the groomed ski trails on the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge. (Photo by Matt Bowser/Kenai National Wildlife Refuge)
Photo by Mark Laker/USFWS Mosaic of burned and unburned rocky tundra in the Mystery Hills off of the Skyline Trail on Sept. 12, 2019.

Refuge Notebook: Wildfire in Kenai Mountains tundra

Late last summer, as I waited in a line of traffic on the Sterling Highway to get through the Swan Lake Fire, smoke rose from… Continue reading

Photo by Mark Laker/USFWS Mosaic of burned and unburned rocky tundra in the Mystery Hills off of the Skyline Trail on Sept. 12, 2019.
Photo by Jamie Lyons A migrating dark-eyed junco in fall.

Refuge notebook: Wintering sparrows find their way to Kenai

A recent study published in the journal Nature Climate Change highlighted some work by Dr. Kyle Horton and his colleagues, who figured out how to… Continue reading

Photo by Jamie Lyons A migrating dark-eyed junco in fall.
Photo provided by Kenai National Wildlife Refuge Permanent and seasonal staff from the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge who helped estimate the Kenai brown bear population in 2010.

Refuge Notebook: Tales of a wildlife biologist

In 1975, as a freshman in Wildlife Ecology at the University of Wisconsin, I was required to take a weekly no-credit orientation seminar during my… Continue reading

Photo provided by Kenai National Wildlife Refuge Permanent and seasonal staff from the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge who helped estimate the Kenai brown bear population in 2010.

Refuge Notebook: The Refuge Notebook passes millennium milestone

“Welcome to Refuge Notebook. This is day one, page one of a new weekly column devoted to life and happenings on the Kenai National Wildlife… Continue reading

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