Brachyramphus brevirostris
Silhouette: Matías Muñoz · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~90% in a week >90%
Kittlitz's murrelet (Brachyramphus brevirostris) is a small alcid found in the waters off Alaska and Eastern Siberia. This near threatened species is, like the closely related marbled murrelet, unusual for seabirds in not being colonial, nesting instead in isolated locations on mountain tops, where the nests were known to Native Americans for many years before skeptical ornithologists described and photographed them. It is a poorly known and little studied species, although concern over its status and that of the closely related marbled murrelet has led to a recent increase in research.
The common name of this species commemorates the German zoologist Heinrich von Kittlitz, who first collected this species. The Kittlitz's murrelet is, like the marbled murrelet, a small compact auk, 25 cm (9.8 in) long with tiny legs and cryptic plumage during the breeding season. The colour of the breeding plumage, greyish-brown, reflects its habit of breeding on bare ground near snowfields. In the winter, it adopts the black and white plumage typical of many seabirds. Its bill is smaller than that of the marbled murrelet.
The Kittlitz's murrelet mostly breeds and lives... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kenai Fjords National Park | 🇺🇸 United States |
More parks will be added in future updates.
Likely
About 60% of wildlife watchers report a Kittlitz's Murrelet sighting in Kenai Fjords National Park on a given day, based on 543 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 9th most-seen of the 99 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 90%, and over a week to over 90%, if each day is a fresh chance.
Between noon and 3 pm
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Kittlitz's Murrelet sightings with a recorded time, and about 8 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Only Kenai Fjords National Park, in our data
Kenai Fjords National Park is the only park on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Kittlitz's Murrelet sightings: about 60% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Kittlitz's Murrelet is recorded against all the birds logged in Kenai Fjords National Park (543 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
