EXPLORE WILD HOPE

The Hawaiian archipelago is a tropical volcanic island chain with high biodiversity on land and in the surrounding waters of the Pacific Ocean. The mountainous terrain is home to many species found nowhere else on Earth, including 5000 insect species, 1000 plant species, 145 fish species, and 60 bird species.  But Hawai’i’s wildlife has been […]

About 21.5 million acres of the Western United States are nationally protected, and thousands are being managed or co-managed by Native American tribes reclaiming ancestral relationships with native plants and animals. It’s no surprise, then, that Wild Hope hit a rich vein of conservation stories grounded in the West. 

When a disease is brought to a location where it wasn’t previously present, it is considered an introduced disease. Introduced diseases typically have a bigger impact on wildlife than native diseases, because exposed species haven’t had time to evolve natural defenses to fight off the novel pathogens. 

Chytridiomycosis — often called chytrid or BD — is a highly infectious fungal disease linked to the widespread decline of more than 200 amphibian species around the world.

Millions of years ago, a single rosefinch species arrived on the Hawai’ian islands and evolved into over 50 species of honeycreepers — a phenomenon known as adaptive radiation.

One of the major threats to Hawaiian honeycreepers is a deadly, mosquito-borne disease called avian malaria. Similar to malaria that infects humans, the disease is caused by parasites that enter honeycreepers’ bloodstreams when they are bitten by a disease-carrying mosquito.

Hawai’i is home to a broad, beautiful array of birds species found only on its islands—like the stunningly diverse honeycreepers, many on the border of extinction. Now, a local team is removing invasive predators, restoring habitats, and battling mosquito-borne diseases to protect honeycreepers from their latest threat: avian malaria.

Christa Seidl is a disease ecologist with over 10 years of experience leading research and conservation projects in Hawai'i, Aotearoa (New Zealand), Madagascar, Ecuador, and California with private, public, and industry partners.

The endangered wedge-tailed shearwater — also known as the ‘ua‘u kani — was in critical danger after many nesting sites in Hawaii were overrun by predators like weasels, rags, or feral cats. Fortunately for the birds, locals banded together to protect nesting sites and the local population went from just 30 nesting birds to more than 3000!

A group in Maui has restored a safe haven for endangered seabirds to come home and nest: it’s completely fenced-off from predators and restored with native plants, but the birds still need some convincing! The team is using decoy “neighbors” and audio recordings of bird calls to make the seabirds feel at home — and at long last, the colony is growing!