Alaska's state bird is the Willow Ptarmigan, a grouse of tundra and willow thickets that turns white for the winter. It is a real Alaska bird, and a beautiful one. It is not a feeder bird.
At Alaska feeders, the list is led by the redpoll, at 91.0% of sites.
The twelve birds Alaska feeders report most
From Project FeederWatch, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's winter count, in which volunteers record what turns up at their own feeders. The 2023–24 season had 67 participants in Alaska — a small sample, so treat close numbers as ties rather than rankings. The percentage is the share of Alaska feeder sites that reported the bird at least once.
| # | Bird | Share of AK feeders |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Redpoll (Common) | 91.0% |
| 2 | Black-capped Chickadee | 85.1% |
| 3 | Red-breasted Nuthatch | 73.1% |
| 4 | Black-billed Magpie | 64.2% |
| 5 | Downy Woodpecker | 64.2% |
| 6 | Hairy Woodpecker | 61.2% |
| 7 | Pine Grosbeak | 58.2% |
| 8 | Dark-eyed Junco | 55.2% |
| 9 | Boreal Chickadee | 50.8% |
| 10 | Steller's Jay | 44.8% |
| 11 | Common Raven | 40.3% |
| 12 | Canada Jay | 38.8% |
Four things in that list worth knowing
Redpolls come by the crowd
When redpolls show up at an Alaska feeder, FeederWatchers count an average of about 26 at a time. FeederWatch still lists the "Common" and "Hoary" forms separately (the Hoary is #15, at 24%); the American Ornithological Society now treats them as a single species, simply called the Redpoll.
Two chickadees, sometimes three
Black-capped Chickadee is second, at 85% of sites. Boreal Chickadee — brown-capped, with a wheezier call — is ninth, at 51%. On the southeast coast, the Chestnut-backed Chickadee joins in (#16).
A magpie and two jays
Black-billed Magpie is fourth. Steller's Jay, dark blue with a black crest, is tenth; the grey, fearless Canada Jay is twelfth.
The big finch
Pine Grosbeak is seventh, at 58% of sites — a plump, slow-moving finch, rosy in the males and olive-yellow in the females, usually in small groups.
What is on our Alaska mug, and where each bird actually ranks
The Backyard Birds of Alaska mug shows the Black-capped Chickadee (#2, 85%), the Steller's Jay (#10, 45%), the Common Redpoll (#1, 91%) and the Red-breasted Nuthatch (#3, 73%). All four are in the Alaska top ten.
The ones we would add next are the Black-billed Magpie (#4) and the Pine Grosbeak (#7).
If you want more of them
Black-oil sunflower seed covers the chickadees, nuthatch, jays and grosbeaks. Nyjer or sunflower chips bring the redpolls and siskins. Suet brings the Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers — and, in an Alaska winter, almost everything else.
Where these numbers come from: Project FeederWatch, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Top 25 Feeder Birds for Alaska, 2023–24 season. These are volunteer reports from their own feeders, not a formal survey, and they describe the winter feeding season (November to April) rather than the whole year. Percentages are the share of participating sites that reported the species.
See the mugs for the other states → · Identify a bird in three questions →