Get Out on a Refuge, Do Some Good, Volunteer!

by Poppy Benson, Friends Vice President for Outreach Want to get to the Pribilofs or Izembek? Discover Tetlin? Get your hands on a duck? Share your love for Alaska Refuges with friendly people? Our Alaska National Wildlife Refuges are looking for our help as they are dealing with short staffs and small budgets.   Here’s a sampler of volunteer opportunities.  See all the projects (some are new since the last newsletter) on our volunteer web page here.  

• Share your knowledge of Alaska at Tetlin’s Interagency Visitor Center 
• Band ducks on the Tetlin Refuge.
• Real science: aging black brant at Izembek.
• Or come on down to Homer May 8 – 12 for the Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival co-sponsored by Friends and the Alaska Maritime Refuge.  Sign up for Friends outreach here and for festival events here.
• Spring clean a refuge – Kenai April 26-27, Alaska Maritime Homer April 20
• Spread the good word about refuges at Outreach Booths at events in Seward, Soldotna, and Homer. 

Some volunteer jobs are just a few hours commitment and others offer a chance to spend a month on a refuge.  Take some time this summer to experience a refuge through helping. For more information go to the web page or contact us at volunteer@alaskarefugefriends.org.  Volunteer applications are online. It’s a lively job working the Friends Outreach Table at the Kachemak Bay Shorebird  Festival and we need 15 – 20 people to cover all the shifts.  Sign up here.  Friends Rosa Meehan of Anchorage and Board President Marilyn Sigman of Homer working the booth at the 2023 Festival.