The Long Fight to Teach an Endangered Ibis Species to Migrate

February 20, 2025 at 03:52AM

Over the course of 51 days, Johannes Fritz, flying a microlight along with two “foster mothers,” led a flock of Ibis birds seventeen hundred miles, from Germany to Spain. It’s a bizaare enterprise, brilliantly described by Nick Paumgarten in a piece that shows the lengths some people are prepared to go to repair the damage humans have caused.

The birds fell in again behind the microlight. They all started south, receding. Komme, komme, Waldi—it was happening. The heart leaped. But within moments they were back, without their escort. The microlight, at the edge of earshot, tracked toward the sea. Maybe Fritz was giving up, and fleeing with Helena for Ibiza. Fuck off with your ducks. But after a few moments he turned back and landed. Helena got out and began herding the birds back into the aviary. They ducked right in, eager for the comfort of the cage, like dogs in a thunderstorm.

The theorizing resumed. Had they started too late? Was it Helena? To go by the recriminations coming across the radios, the foster mothers were miffed about several camera placements and an incursion by a photographer from a local birding club. The film crew convened at the edge of the camp, aware that perhaps they were under some fire. Schiffman, grinning in the way he did when he was especially anxious, motioned me over and pointed toward the camp, at a fence line. “What the fuck?” he said. “There’s one rule!” There was a tent hanging in the sun to dry. My tent. One side of it was bright yellow.

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