I saw my first alcids at a famous breeding colony called St. Mary's while stationed at a naval base in Newfoundland. Years later, I found myself camped out on an Alaskan island that was a veritable seabird beehive. Thousands of puffins, murres, and smaller auklets crisscrossed the skies, dodging more distant relatives, such as gulls and fulmars, as they delivered fish to their young and returned seaward for more. My stint in the Semidi Islands was good training for a later assignment farther west, in the fog-shrouded Aleutian Islands.
Various islands host various combinations of puffins, murres, and auklets.
Until I find time to write a more detailed article about auks, or alcids, I'll leave you with a few comments on this small family of birds that bring color into an often harsh, forbidding environment, a simple map of their home, a list of alcid species. The presumed homeland of the alcids is just about on the opposite side of the world. Of twenty-two species, sixteen include the Bering Sea in their range, and twelve are found only there. The Bering Sea sheltered the last of the Steller's sea cows and hosts the lion's share of sea otters, a species that nearly followed the sea cow into oblivion. Larger species, such as puffins, also eat small fishes.