|
On
Saturday, June 14, 2005, tropical
storm Arlene hit the coast of Louisiana.
In the Breton
National Wildlife Refuge, thousands
birds were in the middle of nesting
season. A survey done in May by
biologists from Louisiana Department
of Wildlife and Fisheries estimated
4,000 brown pelicans and 4,600 sandwich
and royal terns were occupying West
Breton Colony. The majority of the
pelicans were incubating eggs and
caring for their young.
For the endangered brown
pelican families on the island,
surviving Arlene would have been
enough of a challenge. But as the
storm swept over the low island,
it carried with it light crude oil
that had spilled from a nearby oil
rig. Even though the spill was only
12-15 barrels, the storm carried
it on the waves, which swept over
the low island, covering the pelican
chicks with oil.
 |
| Young
Pelicans play after being
washed of oil that was a result
of a storm induced spill in
Louisiana. See
more photos (Photo: Jay
Holcomb/IBRRC) |
On Sunday, when workers
returned to Amerada Hess' Breton
Sound 51 Platform, which had been
evacuated in advance of tropical
storm Arlene, they learned oil had
spilled. A team of Fish & Wildlife
Service personnel and Coast Guard
officials conducting surveillance
later that day discovered that oil
had washed onto West Breton’s
rookeries. The brown pelicans were
the most affected victims.
By Sunday afternoon,
hundreds of pelican chicks lay dead
or dying, burned by the oil and
overheating in the sun. Louisiana’s
official state bird was in desperate
need of help and all spills that
have victims are a race against
time for the rescuers.
Help comes from many
places
When International Bird
Rescue Research Center’s Director,
Jay Holcomb, learned IBRRC personnel
were needed at the spill, he immediately
began phoning his spill team members,
veterans of large spills who are
used to dropping everything and
getting to spill sites, wherever
they may be. Eight of IBRRC’s
staff and response team members,
and UC Davis veterinarians from
the Oiled
Wildlife Care Network (OWCN),
rushed to Louisiana to join highly
experienced teams from Tri-State
Bird Rescue & Research Inc.
and Wildlife
Rehabilitation and Education
(Houston) to begin the process of
helping US Fish and Wildlife Service
save as many birds as possible.
Also supporting the efforts was
the U.S. Coast Guard, Louisiana
Oil Spill Coordinator's Office,
Louisiana Department of Environmental
Quality, Amerada Hess, Louisiana
Department of Natural Resources
and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration.
By Wednesday night,
a large warehouse in Venice, Louisiana
had quickly been converted into
a mash unit with 70 wildlife specialists
and veterinarians evaluating and
medically stabilizing the surviving
birds before they could be washed.
Many birds had perished, but the
survivors were in the care of the
best oiled wildlife professionals
in the world.
Rehabilitation efforts
will be long term
On June 23, 2005, 959
birds were recovered; all but three
were brown pelicans and of these
268 were live chicks. The live chicks
went into immediate care. Other
oiled adult birds were seen in the
area, but if they were able to fly,
it was virtually impossible to capture
them for treatment.
The wildlife rescue
professionals and attending vets
have extensive experience with oiled
pelicans, but none had ever treated
oiled pelican chicks. The chicks,
lacking the protection of feathers,
were both oil burned and sun burned.
(Because pelicans are extremely
sensitive to human intrusion, they
nest as far away from human activity
as possible. Most people never see
a baby pelican, which is born featherless
and purple. By the time it is seen
by humans, it has fledged and off
trying to make it on its own.)
 |
| Released
back into the wild, young
pelicans will be fed twice
a day and then tapered off
to once a day until they adjust
to their surroundings. (Photo:
Jay Holcomb/IBRRC) |
Care of the young pelicans
who make it will involve weeks to
months as they grow, fledge and
learn to feed themselves without
the help of parent birds. The US
Fish & Wildlife Service has
developed a plan to hack the birds
out on an island. “Hacking”
is a term used in raptor rehabilitation
by which birds are prepared for
life in the wild. A hack site is
a cage or location where flightless
birds are housed and allowed to
grow with minimal human contact.
As they venture out and learn to
hunt on their own, they are fed,
but eventually they become less
and less dependent, and finally
leave.
These pelican chicks
will be hacked out while they are
still flightless. They will be fed
twice a day and then taper off to
once a day as they begin to fly
and leave the area to look for food
on their own.
Hopes are high that
these chicks will respond to this
technique of rehabilitation and
survive their ordeal. Biologists
are also hoping that adults who
lost their chicks will try nesting
again this breeding season (2005).
Louisiana’s pelicans
are still in peril
The brown pelican officially
became Louisiana's State bird on
July 27, 1966. A pelican graced
the flag, but no live pelicans were
actually in Louisiana. By that time
the original population was completely
wiped out by pesticides. Throughout
the United States, pesticides killed
millions upon millions of birds,
and it was the pelicans, and a writer
named Rachel
Carson, who sounded the alarm.
Today, the pelicans
are back, but only because 1,276
pelicans from Florida (Pelecanus
occidentalis) were released
in Louisiana during a restoration
project that took place from 1968
to 1980. Pelicans became protected
by the Endangered Species Act in
1970, and that, along with the banning
of the use of DDT and related pesticides,
contributed to their eventual survival.
But, life is not easy. A
Vanishing Habitat
Pelicans face many challenges
to survival
Survival for pelicans
is challenging, to say the least.
They face many dangers, especially
loss of habitat due to development,
and even weather. Wetlands, coastal
areas, and islands, prime breeding
and nesting habitat, have increasingly
become developed real estate. Recent
storms like Hurricane Ivan and Charley
destroyed large portions of prime
nesting habitat in the coastal areas
of the Southeastern United States.
As fishing has become more popular
as a sport, discarded fishing line,
hooks and other plastic trash that
stays in the environment have become
lethal to birds and other animals
in the areas they depend on to feed
and nest. Red tides, domoic acid
poisoning, starvation, botulism,
oil spills and other pollution make
life tenuous for many populations
of seabirds.
What you can do to help
As an individual, you
may feel you can’t help pelicans.
You can. Help the non-profit organizations
that help pelicans. If you live
in a coastal area where you can
see pelicans, there is an organization
struggling to help them –
support it. If you live in California,
you can help an individual pelican
in need through IBRRC’s
adoption program.
For a complete history
of pelicans, the perils they face
and laws that have been enacted
to protect them, please visit: Pelican
history
|
|
More
photos
News stories:
Almost 200 pelicans
back in wild after oil spill. Details
Opinion piece on spill
from The
2Advocate
Rescue groups scramble
to clean oil off pelicans. Details
Saving birds is expensive,
painstaking. Details
|
