Points of Connection
Arctic habitats support birds across the hemisphere, and we are called to protect these landscapes—wherever we live.
By Elizabeth Gray
Chief Executive Officer and Ex-Officio Board Director
Published September 25, 2026
This article is a product of 91 magazine. Become a member to receive our quarterly print issue in the mail.
The photo essay opening this issue brings you to Teshekpuk Lake in Alaska’s Western Arctic. I traveled there to see a place 91 has long worked to help protect. Before I arrived, I understood Teshekpuk as a core breeding area for birds and one of the world’s most important wetlands. I knew its protection mattered far beyond Alaska.
Still, some places cannot be fully understood until you experience them. Understanding comes through the lens of vast landscapes without another person in sight, snow beneath your boots, howling wind against a tent at night. It comes from looking across a horizon where lake, sky, and snow merge, while the landscape waits for the season to turn.
We arrived expecting spring, but we discovered a place still held by winter’s grasp. Snow and ice covered the ground. Warmth, gear, safety, and every step required attention. The Arctic strips life to essentials, which may be why the birds felt so vivid.
In three days, moving across the tundra on skis and snowshoes, we saw nearly 30 species. Snow Geese. Loons. Cranes. Ptarmigans. Their calls carried across snow and open air, sometimes close enough at night to feel just beyond my tent wall.
As 91’s CEO, I move between worlds. One day may be a boardroom with partners and spreadsheets, another frozen ground with binoculars and bear spray. Decisions made in one world have consequences in the other. At Teshekpuk Lake, I was reminded of what all this work is ultimately for: following birds and the science to where conservation matters most.
Arctic spring is brief, abundant, and exacting, with only a narrow window for life to begin again. As snow and ice give way, water flows, insects emerge, and the landscape comes alive. A delayed thaw affects food availability. Weather shifts cascade through the tundra, affecting species and processes that have existed for millennia.
This is what birds help us see. They make the invisible visible, revealing the health of places across flyways. They also remind us how deeply connected these places are. Migration depends on where birds begin, where they end, and every safe haven along the way.
You do not need to camp at Teshekpuk Lake to feel connected to it.
This is why 91’s work spans the hemisphere, from working lands and marshes to forests, coasts, urban parks, and vast landscapes. You do not need to camp at Teshekpuk Lake to feel connected to it. Birds have made the connection for us. They carry Arctic whispers into our communities and yards.
“Bending the bird curve” begins with birds but reaches far beyond them. It means protecting the places life depends on in a changing climate. Teshekpuk reminded me of how miraculous and personal this work is. Birds connect us to places we may never experience and call us to care for them as our own.
This piece originally ran in the Fall 2026 issue as the 91 View. To receive our print magazine, become a member by .
