Subject: Common Murre colony on sea rocks, Uria aalge

Location: Oregon coast. Upper photo at Yaquina Head; middle photo at Haystack Rock in Clatsop County; bottom photo at Cape Meares.

Stock Number: 07-24247 (top); 07-23828 (middle); 07-23731 (bottom)

Comments: A pair of national wildlife refuges, Cape Meares and Three Arches, are home to perhaps a third of a million nesting seabirds each season. Common Murres are the most numerous of these.

Oregon Islands National Wildlife Refuge, which includes Haystack Rock in Clatsop County, is another place where hundreds of thousands of murres congregate.

All told, the Oregon coast is home to more Common Murres than any other U.S. location outside Alaska.