Common Murres, like the one held by Wildlife Biologist Leslie Slater on the beach along the Spit in Homer, are turning up along beaches all around the Kachemak Bay area.
Wildlife biologist Leslie Slater says there have been two waves of mortality.
"This die-off started to be noticed around mid-July in certain parts of the state. And so it continued at some level — a fairly high, noticeable level — for a couple weeks and then it seemed to diminish and then there seemed to be resurgence again of the number of carcasses that we were seeing on beaches, and that happened in mid-November or so," Slater said.
There have been die-offs reported of the penguin-like sea birds in Cold Bay in July and in Kodiak in November. Slater says they've also had reports from Seward, Sitka and Prince William Sound. In November starving and dead murres turned up around the Mat-Su and Anchorage areas, farther inland than usual.
"It seems that then they would either be disoriented, which could be the result of ingesting a toxin or they could be very desperate in searching for food and just kept traveling up the inlet," Slater said.
Comment: See also these other reports for 2015: Common murre (guillemot) die-off along the waterfront in Seward, Alaska
High number of dying seabirds found in San Francisco Bay Area
Pacific seabirds dying in record numbers - 100,000 auklets
More dead seabirds found on Oregon beaches