Our Gambell Tour Finds a New Species for North America!

Report and photos by tour leader Aaron Lang.

A trip to Gambell in the fall can be frustrating, rewarding, exhausting, exhilarating, discouraging, and at times, nearly magical. Every trip could be described using one or two of these words. But every once in a while there is a trip that is aptly described by all of these. Our 2019 fall trip to the northernmost island in the Bering Sea was one of those trips.

For most of the 11-day trip, there were a lot of uncommon to rare migrants around. This list included mostly birds from the Alaskan mainland like GOLDEN-CROWNED, WHITE-CROWNED, and “SOOTY” FOX SPARROWS. As well as rarer finds like CHIPPING and LINCOLN’S SPARROW. These sparrows and warblers like WILSON’S, ORANGE-CROWNED, YELLOW-RUMPED, and TOWNSEND’S filled the boneyards and filled out our trip list. However, these were mostly not the species that birders hope for at Gambell during fall migration.

The first island record of a WOOD-PEWEE (probably Western) a few days into the trip added some excitement, but Asian rarities were nearly completely lacking for much of the trip. An OLIVE-BACKED PIPIT that we saw only in flight added a degree of frustration, as did a BRAMBLING that only some of our group saw. We did get great views of GRAY-TAILED TATTLER, which is regular in fall at Gambell. And we found two juvenile COMMON RINGED PLOVERS at the sewage pond which set the new late date for the island by about a week. The seawatch provided all four species of eiders, YELLOW-BILLED LOON, SABINE’S GULL, EMPEROR GOOSE, KITTLITZ’S and ANCIENT MURRELET, and even a very rare MARBLED MURRLET. A few ARCTIC WARBLERS, low numbers of NORTHERN WHEATEARS, SHARP-TAILED SANDPIPIPERS, RED-THROATED PIPITS, and the locally breeding WHITE WAGTAILS rounded out the tour.

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So on the morning of September 8^th, with just over 24 hours left to go in the tour, we were looking at wrapping up a very fun trip, with a long list of birds found by an excellent crew of birders, but it was a trip that mostly lacked Asian rarities, which, of course, is what we all dream about at Gambell. And then, well, things changed. After several days of moderate east and northeast winds with rain, the winds on the last two days of the trip were light and variable with little precipitation. Our morning sweep of the Far Boneyard on September 8^th produced two SIBERIAN ACCENTORS which showed very well and called loudly to each other as they perched in the rocks at the base of the mountain. Encouraged by these results we swept through the Near Boneyard after lunch and popped a small brownish bird with a wedge-shaped tail and white tips to the tail feathers. We formed a tight sweep where the bird had landed and with patience and persistence, all got very nice looks of a MIDDENDORFF’S GRASSHOPPER WARBLER! Many photos were taken, including shots of the bird standing in the open as it crossed the road from one wormwood patch to another. We were all thrilled with these great birds on the final full day of the trip. Spirits were high!

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On the last morning of the trip, our final sweep through the Far Boneyard didn’t produce any new birds. Rather than go to lunch, we opted for a quick check of the Near Boneyard first, just in case there was a rarity in it that required time to get everyone on. Fall birding at Gambell is a labor-intensive endeavor, with many of the most sought after birds being shy and skulky. Also, many of them are LBJs (little brown jobs) and frequently there are similar species from which they need to be separated with care. Not long after our sweep began we flushed a small brown bird from nearly the exact same spot as yesterday’s Middendorff’s Grasshopper-Warbler. Our assumption was that we had relocated the Middendorff’s and we swept through again to see if we could get more views of this great rarity. On the next flush of the bird, I got a flight photo as it landed in a wormwood patch, and it soon became apparent that this bird was not a Middendorff’s! We put a call on the radio to alert other birders on the island that we had “something good,” and as a team we worked the bird to get more looks and photos. The result: North America’s first record of PALLAS’S GRASSHOPPER-WARBLER! Amazing! Two incredible rarities, one a first for the continent, from nearly the same spot in less than 24 hours!

Could it really get any better? While we were working the Pallas’s Grasshopper-Warbler, a calling LITTLE BUNTING literally fell from the sky and landed in the boneyard in front of us! Little Bunting is nearly annual at Gambell in the fall, but this was the first of the season. Time was now running very short for our group. We had to rush back to the house to shovel in a quick lunch and pack up for the 5 PM flight back to Nome. We got back to the tarmac, which is surrounded by the near boneyard, about 40 minutes before the flight so we could spend the final minutes of the tour in the boneyard trying to get better looks at the Little Bunting and Pallas’s Grasshopper-Warbler. And then…the radio cracked and Paul Lehman’s voice clearly and excitedly called out… “WRYNECK in Old Town flying toward Clarence’s House!!” What?! I was standing next to Clarence’s house with two folks in our group! With a great degree of panic, I scanned the air for the bird and the birders that called it out. I turned to the south and saw the rest of our group with Paul and watched a strange woodpecker-like bird fly in and land in the grass in front of them. It was literally 10 minutes before the flight arrived! Before our group got on the plane all had achieved great views of the nearly mythical Eurasian Wryneck. Only the fourth ever for North America!

What a turnaround and what a trip! September 9^th, 2019 is the new September 4th, 2014.

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