The Last of Their Kind
Recounted By TIM BARKSDALE AND GREGORY BUDNEY
Lab's expedition records last wild Alalas and other rare Hawaiian birds
 

Intelligent and aware: the last male Alala surviving in the wild was curious but unperturbed by a camouflaged microphone. David Ledig/USFWS

To record the Alala and other Hawaiian birds that face extinction, Greg Budney, curator of the Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds, and Lab associate Tim Barksdale traveled to Hawaii's Big Island in April 2002. On private land, they were given one day to film and audio record the last pair of wild Alalas.

To minimize impact on the birds, they agreed to set up the blinds before dawn and remain inside until nightfall. They faced an agonizing decision: where should they place their blinds to maximize their chances of seeing and hearing the Alalas? Ultimately they decided that Tim would shoot video footage near the nest, and Greg would record vocalizations near a fruiting koa tree about a quarter of a mile away.

Tim: I set up the blind in darkness near a tree where the birds were known to have a nest. The first couple of shots were kind of dark and grungy in the bad light of early morning. And there was a branch right in the way that I hadn't noticed in the darkness. But finally I was able to get a good shot of the male when he came out of the nest, hit a branch at the top, paused, and picked a couple of berries.

Greg: The astonishing thing is just how clearly intelligent and aware these creatures are. We had deployed the microphone in darkness and covered it with a camouflage cloth. About a half hour after dawn, I heard the bird's footsteps on the mike, and the next thing I knew, he was whaling away on the microphone. He knew instantly that this was something new.

At 4:00 P.M. the male flew in and I heard him land right above my blind. I looked out the window, a small slit, and saw him directly above me, about 5 meters away, seemingly looking right down at me. Then he moved to right behind me, about 4 meters away, and began foraging on a large root of a koa tree. It was a huge root, and he was pecking on it like a woodpecker, just whaling away. Then he followed that root, which cradled the blind, until he came to the end of the root and saw an ohia tree with large vertical flaps of bark. He stuck his whole head inside, probing for three or four minutes, then took off and disappeared from sight.

From a blind, Greg Budney watched, audio recorded, and jotted notes on the courtship of the only pair of Alalas remaining in the wild. The female repeatedly refused the overtures of her mate.

Tim: I was almost a quarter of a mile away and never saw all of this happen, of course. When I heard about it, I was just about in tears: "Oh no!" It was wonderful that Greg was able to record all the calls, of course. But even if we could get just one more day there, it would be so potentially valuable if I could film some of the behaviors he saw.

To my mind, footage like this is almost as rare and valuable as the only footage of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, which was recorded by the Lab in 1935. It's critical. There are 35 Alalas in a captive breeding program, but with the species down to the last two wild birds, you start to lose a whole behavioral repertoire in the natural context, and there is enormous archival benefit in filming it.

We also filmed other rare birds on the Big Island, including endangered Hawaiian honeycreepers such as the Palila, Akepa, Hawaii Creeper, Akiapolaau, and some of the really beautiful but more common birds like Iiwi, Apapane, and Common Amakihi. As far as we know, no one's ever really filmed these birds extensively before.

Both Greg and I were stunned by how desperate the situation is for Hawaiian honeycreepers and many other endemic species. Habitat loss, avian malaria, feral cats, rats, mongooses…the problems they face are absolutely unbelievable. It's the end of the road, unless we act fast to restore their habitats and control introduced pests.

Sound and video are such incredible tools, allowing us to share these birds with people who may never have the chance to see them otherwise. For example, the Iiwi is a spectacular bird with a pinkish curved bill, bright red plumage, and black-and-white wings. When people have a chance to see an image of a bird like that, it becomes like a seed planted inside of them. And that seed has the potential to open up and bloom if they want it to.

That's so important in really saving the earth. Birds are so colorful, and they make such great sounds. I mean, what other vertebrate gets up on top of a branch, flies up toward you, and sings a beautiful song?

The Hawaiian honeycreepers are remarkable for their great diversity in bill shapes and sizes. The Iiwi (left) uses its long curved bill to reach nectar in flowers. The Akiapolaau (right) hammers into bark with its straight lower bill and probes for invertebrates using its curved upper bill. Only 1,000 Akiapolaaus are estimated to remain. Tim Barksdale