Gates of the Arctic National Park |
| The scenery is of remote wilderness and unpeopled distances,
where the natural forces of wind, water, temperature, and
glacial and tectonic action have sculpted a wildly varied
landscape. Southerly foothills step into waves of mountains
which grow to limestone or granite peaks of over 7,000 feet.
At the Arctic Divide the ranks reverse as the tundra stretches
to the Arctic Ocean. Six national wild rivers are among the
numerous waterways transecting the park. No formal trails
exist within its boundaries. With adjacent Noatak National
Preserve and Kobuk Valley National Park, Gates of the Arctic
comprises one of the world's largest parkland areas.
Created to ensure the integrity of the arctic environment,
Gates of the Arctic contains major portions of the Brooks
Range and habitat of the western arctic caribou herd. Grizzly
and black bear, wolf, moose, Dall sheep, wolverine, and
fox are also found in the park. At spring breakup, the
few resident bird species are joined by migratory species
from Europe, South America, Asia, tropical archipelagos,
and the continental United States. Despite the variety,
wildlife is widely dispersed because large areas are required
to sustain life in the Arctic.
Sparse black-spruce forests called taiga (from the Russian
for "land of little sticks") dot north-facing
slopes and poorly drained lowlands. Boreal forests of white
spruce, aspen, and birch are typically found on south-facing
slopes. Near tree line, the shrub-thicket community of
dwarf and resin birch, alder, and willow appears. Heath
moss, and fragile lichen make up the understory. Alpine
tundra communities occur in mountainous areas and along
well-drained rocky ridges. |
| Official
Gates of the Arctic National Park Website |
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Bering Land Bridge National Preserve |
| Most archaeologists agree that it was across the Bering
Land Bridge that humans first passed from Asia to populate
the Americas. The distance across the Bering Strait from
Siberia to Alaska's Seward Peninsula is approximately 55
miles, and for several periods during the Ice Ages the
trip could be made entirely on land. During additional
periods the passage could have been made by small watercraft
bumping along coastlines. Similar languages, spiritual
practices, hunting tools and dwellings are just a few examples
of the cultural practices shared by Native Alaskan and
Siberian populations.
The Bering Sea has a long history of stable, although
seasonal, animal populations productively supporting
human life despite otherwise harsh environmental conditions.
Cold much of the year, the preserve today is a primitive
landscape to which flocks of migratory birds may descend
so profusely in summer as to look like snowstorms. Migrating
sea mammals seasonally funnel through the Bering Strait
in concentrations unknown elsewhere. The preserve continues
to provide opportunities for local residents to subsistence
hunt and fish.
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| Official
Bering Land Bridge National Preserve Website |
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| As one of North America's largest mountain-ringed river
basins with an intact, unaltered ecosystem, the Noatak River environs features some of the Arctic's finest arrays
of plants and animals. The river is classified as a national
wild and scenic river, and offers surperlative wilderness
float-trip opportunities - from deep in the Brooks Range
to tidewater of the Chukchi Sea. Noatak National Preserve
lies almost completely enclosed by the Baird and De Long
mountains of the Brooks Range. In the lower river valley,
the northern coniferous forest thins out and gradually
gives way to the tundra that stretches northward to the
Beaufort Sea.
The Noatak basin is internationally recognized as a
Biosphere Reserve. Under this United Nations scientific
program, the area's ecological and genetic components
are monitored to establish baseline data for measuring
changes in other ecosystems worldwide. Information can
also be gathered here on sustainable uses of natural
resources by humans. Sustainability is exemplified by
the Inupiat and other Native peoples who have lived off
the land of northwest Alaska for many thousands of years. |
| Official
Noatak National Preserve Website |
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Cape Krusenstern National Monument |
| Cape Krusenstern National Monument is a treeless coastal
plain dotted with sizable lagoons and backed by gently
rolling limestone hills. Cape Krusenstern's bluffs and
its series of 114 beach ridges record the changing shorelines
of the Chukchi Sea over thousands of years. Because the
ridges accumulated over time, the earliest ridges lie inland,
and the most recently formed ridges near the shore. This
unusual series of beach ridges present, in sequence, detailed
evidence of an estimated 9,000 years of prehistoric human
use of this coastline. Some archeological sites here are
older than well-known remains of ancient Greek civilizations
on the Mediterranean Sea.
In summer, wildflowers color the beach ridges and nearby
hills. Large numbers of migratory birds come from all
over the world to Cape Krusenstern to nest. In fall,
these migrating birds use the lagoons as feeding and
staging areas. Shifting sea ice, ocean currents, and
waves continue to form spits and lagoons possessing important
scientific, cultural, and scenic values. Along the outer
beaches, Alaska Natives still hunt marine mammals. Local
rural residents are allowed to hunt in the Monument.
A road to the Red Dog mine crosses the northern boundary.
Trucks haul zinc from open pit mines to a tidewater port.
Cominco Alaska operates the mine, along with the NANA
Regional Corp., a Native corporation based in Kotzebue. |
| Official
Cape Krusenstern National Monument Website |
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Kobuk Valley National Park |
| Kobuk Valley National Park is encircled by the Baird
and Waring mountain ranges. The park provides protection
for several important geographic features, including the
central portion of the Kobuk River, the 25-sqaure-mile
Great Kobuk Sand Dunes, and the Little Kobuk and Hunt River
dunes.
"With adjacent Noatak National Preserve and Kobuk Valley National Park, Gates of the Arctic comprises one
of the world's largest parkland areas."
Sand created by the grinding action of ancient glaciers
has been carried to the Kobuk Valley by both wind and
water. Dunes now cover much of the southern portion of
the Kobuk Valley, where they are naturally stabilized
by vegetation. River bluffs, composed of sand and standing
as high as 150 feet, hold permafrost ice wedges and the
fossils of Ice Age mammals. |
| Official
Kobuk Valley National Park Website |
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| Arctic is the most northern of all of the wildlife refuges.
The refuge encompasses one of the most spectacular assemblages
of arctic plants, wildlife and land forms in the world.
Designed to embrace the range of the great Porcupine caribou
herd, the Arctic is home to free-roaming herds of muskox,
Dail sheep, packs of wolves and such solitary species as
wolverines, polar and grizzly bears.
Winter on the refuge is long and severe; summer is brief
and intense. Snow usually covers the ground at least
nine months of the year. Arctic adapted plants survive
even though permafrost is within 1.5 feet of the surface.
The annual growth of trees and shrubs is slight. It may
take 300 years for a white spruce at tree-line to reach
a diameter of five inches; small willow shrubs may be
50-100 years old.
The Arctic offers a rich pageant of wildlife including
140 bird species. It protects a large portion of the
migration routes of the Porcupine caribou herd (180,000
animals) - one of the two largest herds in Alaska. The
caribou migrate from wintering grounds south of the Brooks
Range to calving grounds on the northern coastal plain
of the refuge and the Yukon Territory. The migration
covers more than a thousand miles.
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| Official
Arctic Wildlife Refuge Website |
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| Rivers are the heart of the Koyukuk country - its living
pulse and historic past. Fourteen rivers and hundreds of
creeks meander throughout the refuge providing habitat
for salmon, beaver and waterfowl. There are also over 15,000
lakes. The topography is realatively gentle featuring an
extensive floodplain surrounded by hills with a boreal
forest. The landscape includes the Nogahabara Dunes - a
10,000 acre active dune field. The field was formed from
wind-blown deposits about 10,000 years ago. It is one of
two active dune fields in Alaska.
Spring flood waters of the Koyukuk River carry away
signs of the past season and recharge the lowlands. The
floodplain provides ideal nesting habitat for ducks,
geese, and other water-adapted birds. By September more
than 200,000 ducks and geese migrate from the refuge
to southern wintering grounds.
Black bear are abundant in forests and grizzly bear
inhabit the open tundra. Furbearers on Koyukuk include
otter, lynx, beaver, marten, muskrat, and mink. Wolves
and moose are common. Other large mammals on the refuge
include caribou from the western arctic herd that often
winter on portions of the refuge.
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| Official
Koyukuk Wildlife Refuge Website |
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| Selawik straddles the Arctic Circle in northwestern Alaska
about 360 miles northwest of Fairbanks. The refuge is composed
of estuaries, lakes, river deltas, and tundra slopes. The
most prominent feature is the extensive system of tundra
wetlands that are nestled between the Waring Mountains
and Selawik Hills.
Selawik is located where the Bering Land Bridge once
existed. Plants, animals, and humans migrated freely
across this land mass connecting Asia and North America
many years ago. The refuge retains evidence of these
ancient migrations.
Selawik is a breeding and resting area for a multitude
of migratory waterbirds returning from North and South
America, Asia, Africa, and Australia. Nesting ducks number
in the hundreds of thousands. Thousands of caribou winter
on the refuge as they feed on the lichen-covered foothills.
Other common mammals include moose, grizzly bear, and
furbearers. Sheefish, whitefish, grayling, and northern
pike inhabit lakes, ponds, streams, and rivers. Sheefish
weighing 40 to 50 pounds are not uncommon. |
| Official
Selawik Wildlife Refuge Website |
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| Kanuti straddles the Arctic Circle approximately 150
miles northwest of Fairbanks. It is composed of the Kanuti
Flats, an interior basin characterized by the rolling plains
of the Kanuti and Koyukuk rivers. The basin is interspersed
with lakes, ponds, and marshes. The refuge provides nesting
habitat for waterfowl primarily Canada and whitefronted
geese and ducks.
Kanuti's contribution to waterfowl increases when the
prairies of south-central Canada and the northern mid-western
United States lie baked and dry. In times of drought,
birds displaced from traditional breeding areas fly northward
to stable waters. Additional loss of prairie wetlands
from draining and filling will further increase the importance
of northern wetlands such as Kanuti.
The refuge supports 16 species of fish including whitefish,
northern pike, grayling and salmon. Other wildlife includes
moose, black bear, grizzly bear, wolf, and wolverine.
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| Official
Kanuti Wildlife Refuge Website |
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Yukon Flats Wildlife Refuge |
| Yukon Flats is about 100 miles north of Fairbanks - the
most northerly point reached by the Yukon River. Here the
river breaks free from canyon walls spreading unconfined
for 200 miles through a vast flood plain. In the spring
millions of migrating birds converge on the flats before
ice moves from the river. The migrating birds come from
four continents to raise their young.
The refuge has one of the highest nesting densities
of waterfowl in North America. By August the surfaces
of over 40,000 lakes and ponds ripples with scurrying
ducklings and molting adults. Yukon Flats contributes
more than two million ducks and geese to the migration
routes (flyways) of North America.
Birds are not the only migratory wildlife dependent
on wetlands of the flats. Salmon from the Bering Sea
ascend the Yukon River to spawn in the freshwater streams
of their birth (some salmon travel nearly 2,000 miles
into Canada). Runs of king, coho, and chum salmon pass
through and spawn in the flats each summer - the longest
salmon run in the U.S. Mammals on the refuge include
moose, caribou, wolves, black and grizzly bears.
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| Official
Yukon Flats Wildlife Refuge Webiste |
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