WatchList Species Account for Spectacled Eider (Somateria fischeri)

Qualifies for the list as a Red List Species

Photo: USFWS

Found at northern latitudes on the north and west coasts of Alaska and the north coast of eastern Russia, the Spectacled Eider breeds in 3 disjunct populations, of which 2 are in Alaska and 1 in Russia. Currently the Russian population is much larger than the 2 Alaska populations. The core wintering area for the species is the Bering Sea south of St. Lawrence Island, and measures only about 50 x 75 km; molting areas are several sites along the Alaskan and Russian coasts. Habitat on the breeding grounds includes areas with numerous thaw lakes, freshwater and brackish ponds, seasonally flooded wetlands, and wet meadows. Vegetation inclues wet sedge meadows, sedge-dwarf willow meadows, and pendnat grass along edges of lakes and ponds. Males leave their mates and young after a few weeks and return to the sea, where they spend 11 months of the year, while adult females spend 8 or 9 months at sea. During breeding food is primarily insects while during nonbreeding the bird feeds on benthic invertebrates, primarily clams.

Population trends in the species are alarming; in western Alaska the population declined by 96% between 1957 and 1992, survey data from northern Alaska are inconclusive and there are no data available from Russia. More recently data suggest that the western Alaska population is stable or declining only slightly. As of 2000, the nesting population was estimated at fewer than 4,000 females, down from 50,000 in the 1970s. In 1995, the population in Arctic Russia was estimated at fewer than 140,000 birds. Lead poisoning is a leading cause of mortality and some habitat has been degraded by lead shot. Up to 10% of adults are killed by hunters in Russia, while the season of hunting and egg-collecting was closed in Alaska in 1991 and there is a ban on the use of lead shot. Oil field development in Alaska has reduced available habitat. Because of the severe declines in the western Alaska populations and possible declines in the northern Alaska and Russian populations, the bird has been listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.