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Migration: on the Move in Alaska National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior Alaska Park Science Alaska Region Migration: On the Move in Alaska Volume 17, Issue 1 Alaska Park Science Volume 17, Issue 1 June 2018 Editorial Board: Leigh Welling Jim Lawler Jason J. Taylor Jennifer Pederson Weinberger Guest Editor: Laura Phillips Managing Editor: Nina Chambers Contributing Editor: Stacia Backensto Design: Nina Chambers Contact Alaska Park Science at: [email protected] Alaska Park Science is the semi-annual science journal of the National Park Service Alaska Region. Each issue highlights research and scholarship important to the stewardship of Alaska’s parks. Publication in Alaska Park Science does not signify that the contents reflect the views or policies of the National Park Service, nor does mention of trade names or commercial products constitute National Park Service endorsement or recommendation. Alaska Park Science is found online at: www.nps.gov/subjects/alaskaparkscience/index.htm Table of Contents Migration: On the Move in Alaska ...............1 Future Challenges for Salmon and the Statewide Movements of Non-territorial Freshwater Ecosystems of Southeast Alaska Golden Eagles in Alaska During the A Survey of Human Migration in Alaska's .......................................................................41 Breeding Season: Information for National Parks through Time .......................5 Developing Effective Conservation Plans ..65 History, Purpose, and Status of Caribou Duck-billed Dinosaurs (Hadrosauridae), Movements in Northwest Alaska ...............47 Connecting Taiga to Tropics: Swainson’s Ancient Environments, and Cretaceous Thrush as a Model for Nearctic-Neotropical Beringia in Alaska’s National Parks ............17 Influence of Spring Prey Pulses on Seasonal Migration in Alaska ....................................75 Migrations of Pinnipeds in the North Pacific Pleistocene Megafauna in Beringia ...........25 Ocean ...........................................................53 Bridging the Boreal: Landscape Linkages The Klondike Gold Rush: A Search for Connecting the Federal Conservation Estate Seasonal Sea Ice and Arctic Migrations of in Alaska ......................................................85 the Archaeological Traces of an Historic the Beluga Whale .......................................59 Migration Event ...........................................35 Migration’s Foundation: Ecological Intactness of Alaska’s Ecosystems ...............93 Cover photo: Caribou migration through Onion Portage, Kobuk Valley National Park. NPS/Kyle Joly Alaska Park Science, Volume 17, Issue 1 Migration: On the Move in Alaska Laura Phillips, Nina Chambers, and Stacia Backensto, National Park Service 2017). Millions of salmon return from the ocean to Dead Tufted Puffin and Short-tailed Shearwater found in Bering Land Bridge National Preserve, 2017. the rivers of Alaska each year to spawn, providing a NPS /Stacia Backensto critical food resource for wildlife and people. While The far north provides both challenges and these astonishing movements exemplify migration Changes in patterns of seasonal movements— benefits to the people and animals that live here. in Alaska, smaller movements of animals on the at large spatial scales or more localized—have In summer, Alaska is teeming with life, providing landscape are equally important to an individual’s far-reaching affects throughout the ecosystem. abundant food and resources. In the winter, however, survival as well as the integrity of ecosystems. For example, with less sea ice, the dark open darkness and bitter cold require Alaska’s inhabitants ocean absorbs more heat from the sun. Warm to use a variety of strategies to survive. Some animals, The daily and seasonal movements of the ocean waters are poor habitat for forage fish that like collared pika (Ochotona collaris), collect and smallest animals support the function of marine are critical to the survival of seabirds. store food in their summer homes to last them the ecosystems in places like Glacier Bay National Park winter. Many animals move across the landscape to and Preserve. These migrations do not meet the Alaska’s largest seabird die-off occurred in the winter ranges that may be across the next valley or traditional definition of migration as exemplified Gulf of Alaska in 2015-2016, affecting hundreds across the globe. by long-distance migratory birds, but are similar of thousands of Common Murres. The birds had in function. Tiny marine invertebrates collectively starved because forage fish were largely absent. Migration encompasses a variety of movements referred to as zooplankton support much of the life The forage fish (like capelin, herring, and juvenile between two areas (Dingle and Drake 2007) and in the oceans as prey to fish, whales, and seabirds. pollock) feed on zooplankton, abundant in cold Alaska is well known for some spectacular examples Zooplankton exhibit a daily vertical migration within waters. of the phenomenon. Arctic Terns (Sterna paradisaea) the water column, ascending to shallower waters at In the fall of 2017, dead birds washed up nest and raise young in Alaska each summer and night and descending to deeper waters during the on the shores of the Bering and Chukchi seas. then in the fall undergo the longest known animal day, to avoid some of their many predators (Stich Among them were Short-tailed Shearwaters that migration, flying about 15,000 miles (over 24,000 and Lampert 1981). Small forage fish feed primarily migrate 9,000 miles (14,400 km) to Australia from km), to wintering areas in Antarctica (McKnight on zooplankton and their seasonal movements Alaska, Northern Fulmars, kittiwakes, murres, et al. 2013, Egevang et al. 2010). Caribou (Rangifer indicate areas of high plankton productivity as well auklets, and puffins. tarandus) in northern Alaska perform the longest as important spawning areas. Migratory patterns over-land migration of any terrestrial animal on the may change from year to year because of the changes While we don’t know the cause of the recent planet traveling over 2,000 miles (3,200 km) annually in ocean waters such as temperature, salinity, and die off, this is the fourth consecutive year the between summer calving grounds and wintering freshwater inputs. These changes, in turn, can result Bering and Chukchi seas have been exceedingly areas where their preferred winter forage, lichen, in cascading effects within seabird and forage fish warm. Warm waters can also trigger toxic algal is plentiful (Fancy et al. 1989, Joly and Cameron populations. blooms, which are suspected in some marine mammal deaths in recent years. Arctic Terns have the longest known migration, traveling between the Arctic and Antarctica each year. NPS/Jared Hughey 1 Migration: On the Move in Alaska Across a landscape as vast and sparsely populated Migrations in the Microwilderness as Alaska, our understanding of the ecology and movement patterns of many species that live here is Jessica Rykken, National Park Service limited. This is particularly evident in invertebrates, some of which undertake long-distance migrations While we don’t know of any as observed in well-known insects such as monarch Alaska insects that undergo long- butterflies (Danaus plexippus), though we do distance migrations, the larvae know of some very interesting smaller scale insect of some fungus gnats (family migrations. Another challenge is piecing together Sciaridae) have a remarkable ancient movements of animals now extinct such method of traveling en masse to as investigating the colonization of Alaska during reach their pupation sites. Each periods when the Bering Land Bridge was present. larva is small, less than half an inch (about a centimeter) long, In this issue of Alaska Park Science, readers but they congregate in columns will learn how scientists discover the stories of of up to a thousand or more animals’ movements across Beringia in “Duck-billed individuals to form long, snake- Dinosaurs, Ancient Environments, and Cretaceous like bands up to an inch (several Beringia,” and “Pleistocene Megafauna in Beringia.” centimeters) across and yards People also travelled across Beringia and developed (meters) in length. The writhing specialized methods for hunting Pleistocene column also has depth because megafauna like steppe bison (Bison priscus) and larvae are stacked on top of one caribou. “A Survey of Human Migration through another, each secreting a layer Time” describes the movements of the first Alaskans of mucus that allows the upper over thousands of years. A more recent human larvae to slide forward over the migration is described in “The Klondike Gold Rush.” lower ones, with those in the rear Many Alaskans still rely on migratory animals to rising to the top layer, much like support subsistence lifestyles. Caribou and salmon a conveyor belt. In this manner, have figured prominently in Alaska Native culture the column of fly larvae (maggots) for thousands of years. “History, Purpose, and Status can advance an inch (several of Caribou Movements” and “Future Challenges for centimeters) per minute, leaving a Salmon and Freshwater Ecosystems” discuss how trail of mucus behind it. changes in the populations (of caribou and salmon respectively) may affect today’s Alaskan residents. As Fungus gnat larval aggregations fungus gnat species inhabiting Alaska is Sciara seasonal ice conditions change with climate warming, have been observed to travel up to 32 feet militaris, also known as army worms or snake longer periods of ice-free
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