20 



THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 



The black brant commonly nests around fresh water lakes and tundra 

 marshes from western Alaska as far east as the Duke of York Archipelago 

 in Coronation Gulf. Rookeries of the king and Pacific eider are found 

 locally at various points along the Arctic coast of Alaska, near Cape Brown, 

 at the mouth of the Horton River in Franklin Bay, Langton Bay and Cape 

 Parry, and a few were found on the coast of southwestern Victoria Island. 

 At Cape Bathurst thousands of male eiders passed westward nearly every 

 day in July, first the king eiders and then the Pacific eiders. The females 

 and young follow west later in the summer. These immense numbers of 

 eiders must breed on Banks Island, Victoria Island or the northern 

 islands, as the rookeries on the mainland west of Coronation Gulf do not 

 seem sufficient to account for the tremendous numbers flying west after the 

 breeding season. 



One spring season was spent around the Colville delta in Alaska. There 

 was here perhaps a greater variety of species than at most Arctic points 

 visited but no great numbers of individuals. Mosquitos were as abundant 

 here as usual in the north, perhaps not more so than in the Mackenzie delta, 



but as we passed the 

 summer without mos- 

 quito netting my recol- 

 lection is more vivid. 

 « I shall never forget the 



clouds of ravenous mos- 

 quitos which hovered 

 over me as I tried to 

 photograph the nest of 

 a ruddy turnstone on a 

 flat delta island. Still 

 another spring was oc- 

 cupied on the south 

 side of Coronation Gulf 

 where however an un- 

 usually small number of 

 species tarried. Most 

 of the birds which 

 reached this section of 

 the Arctic coast kept 

 on going to Victoria 

 Island or the numerous 

 archipelagoes north of 

 us. The last spring 



Nest of red-throated loon (Gavia stellata), at edge of a found me Oil the Cape 



little tundra lake near Coronation Gulf, Northwest D , , 



Territory. Canada Bathurst peninsula on 



