[Illustration: Fig. 4. Willow-lined creek at Chandler Lake, August 25, 1951. Willows and alders offer nesting sites for birds.]
[Illustration: Fig. 5. NW face of Mt. Chamberlin, 9131 ft.; terrain inhospitable to most breeding birds. August 5, 1952.]
[Illustration: Fig. 6. Destruction of bird communities by caribou trampling south of Lake Peters. August 8, 1952.]
+Somateria spectabilis+ (Linnaeus): King eider.--Specimen 1: Point Barrow, 156°27'25", 71°23'11", 3 ft., No. 31306, ad. male, August 25, 1952.
Robert McKinley told us that in the last week of April of 1952, eiders (king?) arrived in the vicinity of the Arctic Research Laboratory in large numbers and continued to pass to the east for the next three weeks. King eiders were observed at Point Barrow on July 3, 1951.
Ninety king eiders and 30 Pacific eiders were resting on the shore of the Arctic Ocean at Point Barrow on August 25, 1952. The following day 200 king eiders were in the same area. A male, shot there, measured 560 millimeters in total length. The muscles were only a third the size of those on a normal bird. Another eider found dead also was emaciated and may have died from gun shot wounds inflicted by the guns of the Eskimos. For every bird killed by Eskimos, several are injured; many of these die along the migration route. On July 28, king eiders were flying northwest along the shore of Elson Lagoon, thence across the Point Barrow Peninsula at Birnirk, and thence southwest along the coast of the Arctic Ocean. This day was foggy and wind was from the east. On clear days and especially when wind blows from the northwest, king eiders cross the peninsula a fifth of a mile or so nearer Point Barrow, which is the most northern extension of the Peninsula. More eiders moved by on clear days than on cloudy or foggy days. In one hour, ten flocks, averaging 400 birds each, passed overhead at Birnirk (July 28); three days earlier flocks of from 50 to 300 passed approximately every 20 minutes. Eskimos on this date were shooting into these flocks of eider and bagging them in excess of the winter needs of the hunters. One Eskimo had 40 king eiders undressed and hanging on a drying rod at his home at Barrow Village (Sept. 2, 1952).