David Irons, “Prince William Sound Seabird Highlights 2024”

This is a presentation from the 2024 Natural History Symposium that took place on May 13-14 in Whittier, Alaska. The Natural History Symposium is a free two-day community event featuring the latest in news and research from around the Sound hosted by the Prince William Sound Stewardship Foundation. Visit www.princewilliamsound.org to find out more and become a member.
This video's subject is “Prince William Sound Seabird Highlights 2024” with
David Irons, President, Arctic Insight; Retired US Fish and Wildlife Seabird Program Supervisor.
David shares some seabird highlights, focusing on a few of the more common and interesting species. For example, what has happened black-legged kittiwakes in the past 40 years? How is the recovery of pigeon guillemots at Naked Island? What are parakeet auklets and Kittlitz’s murrelets, and where do they live? Do arctic terns really fly to Antarctica every winter? Can pigeon guillemots predict when lingcod will be abundant again?
David Irons came to Alaska in 1976 from Penn State to work as an assistant on a sea otter project on Attu Island, where he spent many cold hours underwater in leaky dry suits counting sea urchins and other benthic invertebrates. He received his MS from Oregon State University in 1982. With his attention switching from marine mammals and the nearshore community to seabirds and the marine ecosystem, David received his PhD from UC Irvine in 1992. His work throughout Alaska has focused on seabird foraging behavior and ecology and population changes related to food availability and climate change. He also conducted long-term studies on the effects of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill on marine birds. Recently, he has been working with seabird scientists from other Arctic countries to investigate the effects of climate change on seabirds at the circumpolar scale. He is currently working in Prince William Sound on pigeon guillemots and black-legged kittiwakes. Results of his work are published in many peer-reviewed journal articles.
Watch a playlist of the whole 2024 Natural History Symposium at:
• 2024 Natural History S...
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Prince William Sound Stewardship Foundation is an Alaska-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that came together around a shared love of Prince William Sound. We coordinate and support projects such as beach clean-ups, invasive species control, site restoration, public education, and much more. We accomplish our work through fundraising, partnership development, and our growing volunteer network, and we work closely with the Chugach National Forest and other Prince William Sound stakeholders.