The State of Alaska has a land mass of more than 365 million acres, 47,000 miles of marine shoreline, 100,000 glaciers, more than 3 million lakes and rivers, and a diversity of habitats that range from temperate rainforest to Arctic tundra. Alaska also has more than 50 million seabirds, 10 million waterfowl, and many species of breeding birds that breed nowhere else in the US or that are global endemics. Identifying IBAs in Alaska is a monumental undertaking, but a statewide IBA program is well underway.

Initially, regional projects were carried out in the Bering Sea and Cook Inlet, resulting in the identification of over 100 IBAs in Alaska.

In 2000, in cooperation with the Russian Union for Bird Conservation and the Asia Council of BirdLife International, Audubon Alaska initiated a project to identify marine and coastal IBAs on both the Alaskan and Russian sides of the Bering Sea. The initial list of proposed IBAs included more than 150 sites, although for some sites, especially on the Russian side, information was limited and dated. A technical committee composed of Russian cooperators, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists, and others reviewed the proposed sites. Of the sites identified in the U.S., 49 have been recognized as IBAs of global or continental significance (48 global, 1 continental). These sites include coastal nesting grounds for about 90% of the world population of Emperor Geese, staging areas for tens of thousands of Bar-tailed Godwits, the ice-bound, at-sea wintering area for many of the world's Spectacled Eiders, and seabird colonies and adjacent marine waters where hundreds of thousands of Crested Auklets and other Beringian endemic species nest and forage.

In October 2001, Audubon Alaska initiated a second IBA project in the Cook Inlet watershed of south-central Alaska. Based on information provided by wildlife agencies, Audubon chapters, major landowners, and others in the Cook Inlet area, a total of 24 sites were identified. The IBA National Technical Committee reviewed these sites and recognized 16 of them as IBAs of global or continental significance (12 global, 4 continental). These sites include the nesting grounds of almost the entire population of the Tule race of the Greater White-fronted Goose, tidal flats where almost the entire population of the Pribilof Island race of the Rock Sandpiper overwinters, and seabird colonies where hundreds of thousands of Common Murres nest.

In 2004, Audubon Alaska received a State Wildlife Grant from the Alaska Department of Fish & Game to support a state-wide IBA project. Building on the work already carried out in the Bering Sea and Cook Inlet regions, Audubon Alaska launched the state-wide IBA project in 2005, and, over the next few years, plans to identify and inventory IBAs across Alaska. An Alaska IBA Technical Committee was formed in April 2005, and will help to guide the process. Most of the sites in Alaska are expected to be of global and continental significance, and state-level IBAs will not be a major priority in the first round of assessment. Much of this work will involve collaboration and cooperation with a range of partnering organizations and communities across Alaska.

May 2008