WHO WE ARE

Friends of Creamer's Field is a community-based, nonprofit organization dedicated to providing educational opportunities and family programs at Creamer's Field Migratory Waterfowl Refuge which comprises 2000 acres of fields, woods, and wetlands in Fairbanks, Alaska. 
Our volunteers staff the Farmhouse Visitor Center, provide guided nature walks in the summer, and organize educational events throughout the year.
We work closely with Alaska's Department of Fish & Game, the state agency that manages the refuge, but our visitor center and activities are funded solely by grants, memberships, gift shop sales, and many generous contributors.

    HOMES FOR WILDLIFE

Creamer's Refuge habitats offer homes for a diversity of animals but its special role is for stopovers and summers of migratory birds. Even though some birds such as Canada geese, pintails, and golden plovers stay for only a short time, they depend on Creamer's Refuge to feed and rest each spring and fall. Other birds such as Sandhill cranes, shovelers, and mallards may remain the whole summer.
Visitors enjoy excellent bird watching spring through fall.
Creamer's Refuge appeals to other types of wildlife as well. Visitors frequently spot moose meandering through the forest, snowshoe hares nibbling on willows, squirrels chattering or a red fox pouncing on voles at the field's edge.

    CREAMER'S DAIRY

During the gold rush at the turn of the century, Belle and Charles Hinckley brought three cows and some horses from Nome, Alaska, by steamboat and sternwheeler to the small outpost of Fairbanks to operate a dairy. They paid for their passage by selling milk to other passengers. On the last leg of the journey, they met and became friends with the Creamers, another pioneer family on their way to Fairbanks. In 1928 the Creamers purchased the dairy from the Hinckleys and continued to develop, enlarge, and operate it until 1966. It was the largest and most successful dairy in interior Alaska.
In 1977, the farmhouse, barns, and surrounding 12 acres were listed in the National Register of Historic Places of the National Park Service.

    CREATION OF THE REFUGE

As the dairy grew over the years, migratory waterfowl congregated at Creamer's Field in increasing numbers. The grain and large open fields provided prime habitat. When the dairy went up for sale in 1966, local residents met to plan a way to purchase the property. Along with money raised by the community, the State legislature provided funds (25%) to match with the federal government's Pittman-Robertson funds (75%) to purchase the 250 acre farm. Management was given to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADFG). In 1970 an adjacent 1500 acres of state land was added and the entire parcel designated "Creamer's Field Migratory Waterfowl Refuge" in 1979. Since that time, additional acreage has been added to the Refuge, bringing its total size to 2000 acres.

For questions about our programs, please email programs@creamersfield.org or call 907-452-5162.