Ready and Able

The time to spring into action is before it鈥檚 too late.
A group of 20 juvenile Brown Pelicans are herded by Alex DeLuca in a beachy landscape.
Alex DeLuca, a student at UNCW, helps to herd juvenile Brown Pelicans on South Pelican Island in North Carolina's Cape Fear River on August 15, 2024. Volunteers collected blood samples from the pelicans to test for PFAS contamination. Photo: Madeline Gray

Juvenile Brown Pelicans aren鈥檛 exactly cooperative鈥攍ike any tween they鈥檙e instantly recalcitrant when faced with authority. 鈥淥ne volunteer had their hat stolen by a pelican that was resisting being captured,鈥 says photographer Madeline Gray, who tagged along with a field research team in North Carolina. But you鈥檇 never know it from this issue鈥檚 cover star: a young bird perched in its habitat with an air of quiet equanimity, coolly appraising its visitors on a late-summer day.

Led by 探花精选 coastal biologist Lindsay Addison, many in this group were the birds鈥 neighbors. The pelicans share a river with residents of Wilmington, and they all鈥攂irds and people鈥攍ive downstream from a chemical plant. By studying the pelicans, Addison and her collaborators hope to learn how compounds in the plant鈥檚 wastewater may have affected the birds鈥 health鈥攁nd by extension, their own. When a Brown Pelican last appeared on our cover in 2010, the bird had rebounded from a century of persecution to a much-celebrated delisting from the Endangered Species Act. But as Addison knows, its recovery isn鈥檛 assured.

Throughout this issue, you鈥檒l see people like her taking action to stay ahead of evolving environmental threats. Sometimes doing so is a matter of documenting what birds need, when and where they need it. Surveys led by another 探花精选 biologist, Erik Johnson, showed that Gulf Coast habitat essential to Eastern Black Rails is also the site of a planned liquefied natural gas facility. And community scientists are taking a fresh look at forests to locate 鈥Very Important Pools鈥濃攅phemeral wetlands that serve as biodiversity hotspots鈥攖o safeguard protections for them.

Throughout this issue, you鈥檒l see people taking action to stay ahead of evolving environmental threats.

In Ashley Stimpson's story on 鈥渇eathered field assistants,鈥 we illustrate (quite colorfully!) how scientists are enlisting birds themselves to assist with gathering data. Many avian species go where people can鈥檛, making them uniquely suited to the job of probing ecosystems for insights that will benefit both wildlife and people.

Often, we already know what birds need, and it鈥檚 simply a matter of providing. In the southern Great Plains, landowners are conserving habitat for the Lesser Prairie-Chicken, whose populations are already threatened and endangered, as Susan Cosier reports. Restoring native prairie, ranchers like Dallas May know, will create holistic benefits for the land and all that rely on it鈥攁nd hopefully, help another beloved species bounce back.

This piece originally ran in the Spring 2025 issue. To receive our print magazine, become a member by .