ST. PAUL, Alaska — The island rises from the mist in the sea between Alaska and Siberia as a bush plane from Anchorage glides to a landing.

Passengers laden with binoculars, spotting scopes, tripods and field guides zip their jackets against a cool summer wind and gather around a young man with a movie-star smile.

"Welcome to the Pribilof Islands," says Gavin Bieber. "I'll be your guide.

"You are about to experience some of the finest birding in the world. More than 240 species of birds have been identified here in the Pribilofs. More than 2 million seabirds nest here each year."

The Pribilof Islands are five volcanic islands clustered in the Bering Sea — about 750 air miles southwest of Anchorage.

St. Paul village, on the southern tip of St. Paul Island, has about 650 residents. There, the native Aleuts are in the tourist business. Birders arrive here on package tours organized by Tanadgusix Corp., the tribal corporation for St. Paul village. Tanadgusix — TDX, for short — also owns the island's only hotel, the King Eider.

Bieber, 28, is team leader for St. Paul Tour, the TDX tour division.

"I'm a birder, too," Bieber says. "That's what I do on my days off.

"I enjoy birders. They tend to be nice people."

The main attraction on St. Paul is a series of vertical cliffs high above the Bering Sea — rocky tiers crowded with thousands, sometimes hundreds of thousands, of nesting sea birds. Horned puffins, tufted puffins, common murres, thick-billed murres, red-faced cormorants, crested and parakeet auklets, black- and red-legged kittiwakes and more. The red-legged kittiwake (80 percent of the world population breeds in the Pribilofs) is considered a rare find beyond the islands, but listed as a "common summer bird" on St. Paul.

One of the best viewing areas is Ridge Wall, a short drive from St. Paul village. There seabirds compete for space on the black basaltic cliffs in a hubbub of shrieks and squawks almost as deafening as the Bering Sea surf.

Tourists gather here

"Locals call the wall Tourist Point — a good place to see tourists," Bieber jests.

STANTON H. PATTY Dale Fox, an Anchorage, Alaska, birding authority, trains his spotting scope on the bird life at Westchester Lagoon near downtown Anchorage. Urban birding is a popular activity for visitors to Alaska's largest city.

But the biggest draw here for expert birders may be the chance to see "vagrants" — Asian songbirds blown off course by storm winds. Birders rate these as "choice sightings."

Right on cue, less than an hour after our plane reaches St. Paul, there is a radio report of a possible "vagrant" sighting in a patch of tall tundra grass.

"They think it's an eye-browed thrush!" Bieber says excitedly.

Quickly, Bieber and his fellow guides, Rick Knight and Becky Gordon, converge on the site. You would have thought they had discovered gold.

"It is an eye-browed thrush, for sure!" Bieber says.

The tiny songster, about the size of a robin, is a weary guest after veering off course from Siberia and pausing here to rest.

"This is why I traveled all the way to Alaska," says Peter Willi, a birder from Romanshorn, Switzerland. "I hoped to see the wandering birds (vagrants) from Asia. This is just marvelous."

"And they pay me to go birding," says Bieber.

Five-mile-long dining table

It happens when snow falls and cottonwood trees along the Chilkat River shed their leaves.

STANTON H. PATTY / STANTON H. PATTY The 99-year-old Russian Orthodox Church of Saints Peter and Paul is the centerpiece of St. Paul village in the Pribilof Islands.

Every fall and winter, thousands of bald eagles congregate for a salmon feast around the mountain-rimmed town of Haines in Southeastern Alaska.

More than 3,500 eagles join the rendezvous some years.

"One day I made a 360-degree circle with a spotting scope and counted 1,900 birds," says Dan Egolf, a local nature guide.

Five-mile-long dining table

One of Alaska's special dramas occurs as the eagles gather along a five-mile stretch of the Haines Highway, just outside town. The Chilkat Indians in the Valley of the Eagles say this has been going on forever.

The salmon banquet is a gift of nature. Late runs of salmon arrive as warm-water upwellings from springs deep in the riverbed prevent stretches of the Chilkat from icing over. The eagles thus are assured of a dependable food source.

Most of the visiting birds assemble in the 48,000-acre Alaska Chilkat Bald Eagle Preserve along the Chilkat and neighboring rivers. Travelers have easy access thanks to frequent vehicle pullouts on the Haines Highway.

Some bald eagles inhabit Haines all year. Summer visitors view them during river-rafting excursions while others just park their cars and RVs to enjoy the show.

Then, in October, hundreds of salmon-seeking eagles begin to congregate, and by November, the count can rise into the thousands.

We joined a group of birders last November to go eagle-watching with Egolf, who is president of Alaska Nature Tours.

It was a heart-pounding scene.

Dozens of eagles were perched in the bare cottonwoods before a backdrop of icy mountains. Others cruised overhead like low-flying fighter planes. On the snowy riverbank a pair was sharing a fresh salmon when an intruder swooped down in hopes of stealing their catch. The male of the couple flipped on its back, talons thrusting like knives. The would-be thief hesitated, then flew away.

"Wow, got it!" said David Farber, a professional wildlife photographer from Carpenterville, Ill. Farber, 51, has used a wheelchair for more than 20 years following a motorcycle accident. That hasn't stopped him from traveling and photographing raptors. He's even equipped his wheelchair with a camera tripod and shutter-release mechanism. "I'm not remarkable," he said. "I'm just proof that anyone can enjoy birding."

There are more than eagles here for birders.

Egolf showed us mergansers (fish-eating ducks, diving to collect salmon eggs), small ducks called buffleheads, American dippers (they can walk and feed under water) and several other wintering birds.

"There are 231 species of birds here, and we're still discovering others to add to the list," Egolf said.

Showtime!

Dale Fox was less than a mile from downtown Anchorage when a medley of birds filled the lens of his spotter scope.

Shorebirds, songbirds, ducks ... Hudsonian godwits, American wigeons, red-necked grebes, lesser scaups, mew gulls, greater yellowlegs, herring gulls, black-billed magpies, swallows ... and more.

The setting was Westchester Lagoon, a freshwater pond between downtown Anchorage and the city's international airport. Birds were strutting, preening and chattering on a June morning.

"This is urban birding," Fox says. "We have 150 species regularly, right here in the city. You can see 30 to 40 in a half day when you go hiking."

The 11-mile Tony Knowles Coastal Trail (named for a former Anchorage mayor) passes by the lagoon as it traces the city's coastline along Cook Inlet.

Fox, a birder for 25 years, used to guide birding tours. Now he enjoys birding as a hobby.

"You go to your bird book to figure out what bird you're watching," he says. "Check out its markings, its wing patterns, etc. Find out where it lives and where it appears in different seasons. You put together little pieces of the puzzle and have fun doing it."

Another of Fox's favorite bird-watching areas is DeLong Lake Park, near the airport. It's a nesting area for Pacific loons.

Savvy bush pilots in Alaska know the difference between Pacific loons and common loons. A float-plane landing or takeoff requires a lake that might attract common loons — larger than lakes where Pacific loons hang out.

"It can make a difference," Fox says.

Chickadee country

Charlie Creamer, a pioneer dairyman in Fairbanks, used to save oats and barley sweepings from his barn to feed flocks of migrating birds that landed on the farm field.

After he died in 1974, what is now called Creamer's Field is a state sanctuary for thousands of sandhill cranes, trumpeter swans, tundra swans and other traveling birds.

It almost didn't happen.

In 1965, shortly after the death of his wife, Anna, Creamer shut down the dairy that had provided Fairbanks families with milk products for more than 60 years. Developers wanted the property for new homes, but Creamer agreed to a plan to give the community two weeks to raise $5,000 for an option to hold the land.

Residents did just that and, thanks to state and federal matching funds, completed the deal a few years later.

Today, Creamer's Field Migratory Waterfowl Refuge is a 1,800-acre mix of wetlands, fields and forests for birds and people.

"A treasure," says Andrea Swingley, education coordinator for the Alaska Bird Observatory — "Birding Central" for Fairbanksans and visitors.

A nonprofit observatory, which borders Creamer's Field, offers guided bird walks, workshops and lectures and is involved in several research projects, including studies of interior Alaska's many songbirds.

A Fairbanks favorite is the little black-capped chickadee, which manages to stay through frigid winters.

"Chickadees can lower their body temperature, like turning down a thermostat," Swingley says. "They cache seeds and insects for food in lots of little places. They weigh only about 11 grams (less than an ounce). They're just remarkable."

Fairbanksans also appreciate the four species of swallows that nest around Creamer's Field.

"They're visitor friendly — they eat mosquitoes," says Swingley.

There's more

Denali National Park, Alaska's crown jewel, counts more than 160 species of migratory birds, many that fly in from Africa, Asia and Antarctica. Other stars of the park include golden eagles and peregrine falcons — and the willow ptarmigan, Alaska's state bird.

In Nome, on the Bering Sea coast, they celebrate the arrival of the Eurasian white-winged tern, from Turkey, Siberia and other points.

Cordova, on Prince William Sound, and Homer, on the Kenai Peninsula, host annual festivals for millions of visiting shorebirds.

In Unalaska, in the Aleutian Islands, the main attractions are the whiskered auklet, the emperor goose, the Aleutian green-winged teal, the black oystercatcher — and mobs of bold bald eagles.

Stanton H. Patty, born and reared in Alaska, is a retired assistant travel editor of The Seattle Times.