The former Hazy Islands National Wildlife Refuge, established in 1912, was designated Wilderness in 1970 and incorporated as a subunit into the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge, Gulf of Alaska Unit, in 1980. Far offshore, beaten by wind and wave, Big Hazy Island and her four smaller sisters stick out of the frigid sea, providing predator-free nesting areas for large populations of common murres, pigeon guillemots, glaucous-winged gulls, horned puffins, and tufted puffins. Brandt's cormorants nest here, one of only two islands they inhabit in Alaska.

Remote, without anchorages or campsites, beaten by frequent storms under high winds, the rocks called Hazy Islands are seldom seen and human visitation is discouraged to protect the birds and the humans. This is Alaska's smallest Wilderness area.