Unalaska, AK – This year's participants 19th annual Christmas Bird Count in Unalaska identified 45 different species of birds and 8,436 individual birds in total. Included in the count was one new species - the canvasback. Count organizer Suzi Golodoff said the duck is frequently seen on the mainland, but Unalaska is in the very edges of its range. Another notable point in the count was the number of bald eagles - 840. Golodoff said it's the second highest number they've recorded during the yearly count.

"That's way too many eagles for the territory," she remarked. "I mean it would be better to have a greatly reduced number of healthy birds than to see all those birds scrapping around out there."

Golodoff said she's not exactly sure why there are so many bald eagles, but it's likely because of the large number of artificial food sources from the landfill, fish processing plants, and boats. The high density might also account for last summer's negative bald eagle - human interactions.

"I don't know why it's up so high but it might explain the territorial behavior that they've been displaying, kind of going after people and nesting in areas that they wouldn't ordinarily. You kind of feel sorry for them when there are that many."

The 21 bird counters also saw large numbers of Marbled Murrelets and 1,800 emperor geese. The increased number of geese could be a positive indicator for the once highly-endangered species.

The Audubon Society's annual Christmas Bird Count began 111 years ago in North America and is one of the longest running citizen science data collection projects. The counts provide baseline bird data for areas around the continent. In Unalaska it's used by the Fish & Wildlife Service when they try to assess the potential impacts of maritime disasters, such as the grounding of the Selendang Ayu. Golodoff said the service called on their data more recently as well.

"In fact last month when the Golden Seas cargo ship was disabled and they went and fetched her and brought her in, the [Alaska Maritime National Wildlife] Refuge was all over that because they knew they were going to bring that ship in here. We're a port of refuge. And immediately they wanted to know what sort of risks were involved, what species were here in case something went wrong. And they even contacted us and said do you guys have your - they can access the data of course but they wanted first hand information from local people as to if we brought that ship into Captains Bay or Broad Bay at this time of year, what sort of resources would be at risk."

This year's count took place on Sunday, January 2 and covered 24 miles of roads and other areas.