Max's Grand Adventure: Heading South Max's Home Place It is June on the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In this "land of midnight sun," far north of the arctic circle, the sky is light around 20 hours each day. Clouds of mosquitoes and biting flies swarm over the vast tundra, searching for warm blood. They find plenty of it in the thousands of caribou that are here on the coastal plain. For thousands of years, this is the place the caribou have come to calve. Grizzlies, wolverines and wolves come here too, to prey on young and weak caribou, and bring food home to their own young. All of these animals would have to find another place to live if the oil industry is successful in opening the coastal plain to oil and gas development. The swarm of insects drive the caribou from place to place. Some dash about, crazed by the mosquitoes. Others cluster together in large herds, seeking safety - and relief -- in numbers. Many begin their migration southward to Canada, where they will spend the fall and winter. The caribou are the most famous of the wildlife that use the coastal plain of the Arctic Refuge, but they are by no means the only critters there. There are more than 250 different wildlife species that use the coastal plain. In fact, while the caribou prance about trying to escape the mosquitoes (and fiercer predators) there's a whole other world thriving at their feet. Max's world. Next Page Back to "Max's Grand Adventure" Index All About Max  |  Max's Grand Adventure From Alaska to our Backyards  |  Amazing Arctic Birds  |  Links