On June 11, 2019, ABC shared a close-up encounter with endangered birds of Hawai’i with Clarice and Jerry, who volunteered to work on a couple of different islands with various endangered species, a category into which most native species fall for various reasons.
Clarice described finding a worthwhile project for them. They both have lots of projects on their resume including banding in most of the central America nations. She was frustrated by many of the potential projects that not only wanted you to pay all your own expenses but subsidize the project and then do mostly housework and cleanup. At last they found these Hawai’i projects that seemed to be the answer. Of course the terrain turned out to be not only roadless, but impassable, requiring helicopters part of the time!
And what’s with those Nomex flight suits requiring particular underwear anyway? Clarice quoted the New York Times mentioning that journalists and photographers following the researchers can’t take it — one had to be flown out after 24 hours, as if she were “used to pine trees or something, or trails.”
The endemic birds of the islands have a long history of serious challenges, one of the first major ones being the arrival of Captain Cook in 1778, with many extinct species from that time only identifiable from subfossils (not quite completely fossilized yet). Exotic species since then have had their way with the birdlife, including ungulates, cats, and worst of all — mosquitoes bringing avian malaria, which is why you can barely find any native honeycreeper species below 5000 feet, an altitude that is climbing with global warming. They all descend from Asiatic Rosefinches on Oahu before Kaui was even a blog in the ocean, and there were no mammalian predators or mosquitos. Species which have colonized the islands in more recent times sometimes have some immunity to mosquitos, but not to the other threats. But not all mosquitos are as bad as the Culex genus, which kills 93% of I’iwis that get bitten, the most iconic red honeycreeper of all. Various methods of control are being invented including baits (“stinky” water) and even recordings!
The good news is that there seems to be the will to save these birds, citing recent avoidable extinctions as a rallying cry. The new rat traps that really work (see video) are good news! But those cats that develop a particular taste for seabird fledglings are an even bigger problem than the usual very bad outdoor cats, whether feral or pet (but indoor cats are fine pets). Toxoplasmosis is hitting the population pretty badly as well, and it is spread almost entirely by cats (read the article for the complicated method of spreading). Pig wallows and exotic plant and tree invasions are somewhat successfully being countered with special fencing and re-terraforming the islands.
The Seabird Recovery Plan took them down to sea level. The problems include cats and Barn Owls (which were introduced to take care of the rats!), as well as lack of food, which stable isotope analysis tracked persuasively to the arrival of humans who also ate fish. Stable isotope analysis also can tell what a cat eats, which is how they found out there are seabird chick specialists among the cats. Collisions with power lines surprisingly are a major threat. Adding lasers or LED deflectors seems to be a possible way to go.
Midway Island is undergoing translocations of albatross colonies away from missile ranges and also to O’ahu to save them from the rising seas threatening the lower elevation Midway. Luckily, the Albatross have no problem with being moved!
IMPORTANT LINKS!!
The fund-raising shirt:
https://www.bonfire.com/birds-not-rats-1/?fbclid=lwAR1ihorlLaQMdlTTeUiAZQqZHq3gKy6V4MUTxg-GN8BVcM0GCjTrNBmUlxl
The feral cat problem (and also see ABC’s previous summer read, Cat Wars, by Smithsonian ornithologist Peter Marra):
https://www.outsideonline.com/2127956/hawaiis-crazy-war-over-zombie-cats
What researchers have to contend with in the shorebird nesting sites:
https://www.audubon.org/magazine/summer-2018/one-scientists-valiant-mission-save-two-hawaiis
RAT TRAPS THAT WORK:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZedgyTsk-uw
