Category: Birdwatching

Hawaiʻi ʻĀkepa: Nimble Native

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This YouTube video was produced by the American Bird Conservancy.

The Hawaiian word ʻākepa means “quick” or “nimble,” words which describe this small, finch-like bird perfectly. The Hawaiʻi ʻĀkepa, which is endemic to the island of Hawaiʻi, was once considered part of a larger species that included other ʻākepas found on Oʻahu and Maui. In 2015, the three were split into separate species on the basis of differences in vocalizations, genetics, and behavior. Unfortunately, the Oʻahu ʻĀkepa and Maui ʻĀkepa are now considered extinct, additional casualties of the ongoing conservation and extinction crisis in the Hawaiian Islands.

Another close relative

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ʻAlalā (Hawaiian Crow): Hanging on in Hawaiʻi

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This YouTube video was produced by the American Bird Conservancy.

Although at least five crow species historically occurred throughout the Hawaiian Island archipelago, the ʻAlalā, or Hawaiian Crow, is the only one that still exists today. One of the rarest corvids in the world, the ʻAlalā was declared Extinct in the Wild by the International Union for Conservation of Nature in 2002, after researchers had taken the last wild individuals into captivity in order to save the species. The ʻAlalā is also federally and state-listed as Endangered.

Like other members of its family, which includes the American Crow and the

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The Bird and The Tree

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This YouTube video was produced by The Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

From the Northern Rocky Mountains, to the Northern Sierras and Cascades, whitebark pine trees grow in some of the harshest and most spectacular mountain ecosystems of North America. These long-lived trees are impressive in many ways, but what’s most remarkable is that their entire existence depends on an ancient relationship with the bird that plants their seeds– the Clark’s Nutcracker. Conceived as a visitor’s center film for Yellowstone National Park, The Bird and The Tree tells the story of one of nature’s great duos and how two very

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