Look Closer . . . Cape Thompson

Where ice meets the midnight sun
– the cast of seabirds shifts
and new players take the stage

Summer Frenzy

Cape Thompson lies above the Arctic Circle, washed by the cold Chukchi Sea. For seven to eight months each year, the sea is frozen or choked with drifting ice. On land, the ground remains frozen, just under the surface, even in summer. Plants and wildlife have adapted to take full advantage of summer’s endless daylight to compensate for the short growing and nesting season in this chilly environment. Seabirds that need the cover of darkness to fly to and from their underground nest burrows don’t nest here!

Dividing Line for Seabirds

Cape Thompson and nearby Cape Lisburne are the two largest arctic seabird colonies in the United States. For some birds such as cormorants and horned and tufted puffins, this is as far north as they nest. Arctic-adapted black guillemots replace pigeon guillemots at these northern latitudes, although you can find a few pigeon guillemots nesting here. Only black guillemots nest at Cape Lisburne, 50 miles north.

On the cliffs, thick-billed murres (with a white line on their upper bill) outnumber common murres by about 3 to 1. Only 150 miles to the south at Chamisso Island and Puffin islands, common murres are indeed more common!

Fulmars, crested and least auklets, storm-petrels, and glaucous-winged gulls do not nest at the Chukchi Sea bird colonies. The breeding ranges of these birds end south of Bering Strait.

Cast of Seabirds at Cape Thompson (listed in order of abundance)

Murres (about 200,000-250,000 -- 70% thick-billed murre & 30% common murre)
Black-legged kittiwakes (30,000-40,000)
Horned puffins (3,000-5,000)
Glaucous gulls (less than 1,000)
Tufted puffins (less than 200)
Pelagic cormorants (less than 200)
Pigeon guillemots (20 or less)
Black guillemots (20 or less)
(Note: Cape Lisburne, 50 miles north, hosts about half a million murres)

Icy Quiet – Almost

When the pack ice presses southward again and stills the ocean waves, ringed and bearded seals can be found near breathing holes. They are stalked by both roaming polar bears and Native subsistence hunters from the nearby villages of Kivalina, Point Hope, Point Lay, and Wainwright.

Whaling Cultures Meet

When it’s spring on the calendar but still white across the landscape, bowhead whales follow shifting breaks in the ice as they migrate to their summer feeding grounds off of Canada’s Mackenzie River Delta. Native whaling captains and their crews pursue these leviathans with a mix of traditional techniques and tools introduced by the Yankee whalers who first brought the Outside world to the Inupiat in the 1840s. In the 1890s, the newcomers operated 15 shore-based whaling stations between Cape Thompson and Point Barrow.

The Muskox Returns

Inland from the seabird cliffs, keep an eye out for muskoxen. These shaggy beasts are well adapted to cold arctic winds and extreme subzero temperatures. They fell prey to whalers and explorers who killed them for food, and by 1900 they disappeared from Alaska. In 1930, Congress provided money to ship 34 muskoxen from Greenland to Alaska. These animals flourished on Nunivak Island, another of Alaska’s national wildlife refuges. In 1971, some of the animals from the Nunivak Island herd were brought to the Cape Thompson region.

Omelets for Grizzlies

Refuge biologists studying seabirds here stay alert for grizzly bears. Unlike islands without large land mammals, Cape Thompson’s mainland location supports resident bears. Some grizzlies supplement their regular diet with seabird eggs. Young 3- or 4-year-old bears lie on the cliff tops and reach down to the upper-most nest ledges for a murre egg snack. Biologists have seen a few bears slowly walking along narrow cliff ledges, eating seabird eggs. The ledges were too narrow for the bears to turn around, so they had to walk backwards to return to safety.

The grizzlies feed mainly on plants, ground squirrels, marmots, moose, and the Western Arctic caribou herd that wanders through here after calving. The bears also patrol the beaches for dead walruses, seals, whales, and birds.