Rebecca Heisman
Walla Walla
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Articles by Rebecca Heisman
Making Your Yard a Haven for Nesting Birds
Making Your Yard a Haven for Nesting Birds How to create safe places for backyard songbirds to raise their young in your yard or garden By Rebecca Heisman Conservation Jun 24, 2026 A Baltimore oriole, which nests in the tree canopy, feeds insects to its chicks in Michigan (above). Cavity-nesting species, such as bluebirds (below), will nest and raise young in birdhouses. DO YOU LOVE WATCHING CARDINALS, chickadees and other songbirds in your yard?
City Birds: New Study Shows Urban Habitat Matters for Migrating Species
This story is part of The 89 Percent Project, an initiative of the global journalism collaboration Covering Climate Now. It was originally published in The Revelator. Songbirds generally make their migratory flights at night, and during spring migration tens of millions of birds may be streaming north above us as we sleep. But when the sun rises, where do these tired birds choose to stop, rest, and refuel?
City Birds: New Study Shows Urban Habitat Matters for Migrating Species
Songbirds generally make their migratory flights at night, and during spring migration tens of millions of birds may be streaming north above us as we sleep. But when the sun rises, where do these tired birds choose to stop, rest, and refuel?
Why Do Nuthatches Coat Their Nest Entrances With Sap?
Red-breasted Nuthatch at its nest cavity entrance, ringed with a layer of sticky resin. Photo by Danielle A. / Macaulay Library. From the Spring 2026 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now.
Will Your State Bird Disappear?
Conservationists and wildlife biologists have been raising concerns for years about how wildlife species’ ranges will shift and contract due to climate change, but less consideration has been given to how that could damage humans’ relationships with the ecosystems we call home. A new study published in December examines this question through the lens of state birds and finds that tens of millions of American could lose the chance to experience their state birds in the decades to come.
Will Your State Bird Disappear?
If you’re a U.S. resident, do you know the official “state bird” of where you grew up or currently live? If so, is it a bird you can easily see in your neighborhood? And if that changed, how would it affect your relationship with the place where you live?
The Surprising Connection Between Spruce Trees, Pine Siskins, and Salmonella Outbreaks
In the winter of 2020 and 2021, Ben Tonelli was a new Ph.D. student at UCLA—but the COVID-19 pandemic meant that instead of moving to Los Angeles, he was starting his doctoral program remotely from his home in Seattle. While he worked, he enjoyed watching through his office window as flocks of Pine Siskins visited his bird feeder. “It was very entertaining,” he says.
After a devastating bird flu outbreak, Scotland's seabirds are slowly recovering—and so are the scientists who witnessed their decline
Bass Rock, a guano-covered hunk of rock off Scotland's east coast, boasts the largest northern gannet colony in the world. With steep sides and a rounded top, Bass Rock is prime nesting territory, and in the spring of 2022, tens of thousands of the birds did what they always do—pack the island to lay their eggs and raise their young. But by the end of summer, things had gone horribly wrong. Highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) had reached the island.
After a Devastating Bird Flu Outbreak, Scotland's Seabirds Are Slowly Recovering-and So Are the Scientists Who Witnessed Their Decline
The world’s largest colony of northern gannets was decimated by bird flu in 2022. Now, as their numbers climb again, researchers are collecting data to understand the virus’ lasting effects Bass Rock, a guano-covered hunk of rock off Scotland’s east coast, boasts the largest northern gannet colony in the world.
Studies: Extreme weather fueled by climate change is adding to bird declines
This story was originally published by The Revelator. Subscribe to their newsletter. By Rebecca Heisman Bird populations across the globe have been decreasing sharply for decades. A landmark study published in 2019 estimated that the total number of breeding birds in North America had dropped by almost 30% since 1970, and similarly sobering declines have been reported in Europe, the Neotropics, and other regions.
The Secret to Song Sparrows' Extraordinary Success Lies in Their Genome
From the Summer 2025 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now. If you’re a birder in North America, you’re almost certainly familiar with Song Sparrows. Because they’re found everywhere—from the deserts and volcanoes of Mexico to the outlying islands of Alaska. That’s exactly what makes them so interesting to some researchers: How did these little brown birds conquer the continent? The answer, at least in part, is local adaptation.
Trump vs. Birds: Proposed Budget Eliminates Critical Research Programs
Science Experts say there’s “no substitute” for the Bird Banding Laboratory or the Breeding Bird Survey, which help reveal the health and status of avian populations across the country. Two federal programs that experts consider indispensable for bird research and conservation in the United States could be eliminated under the Trump administration’s proposed budget for 2026.
Trump vs. Birds: Proposed Budget Eliminates Critical Research Programs
Two federal programs that experts consider indispensable for bird research and conservation in the United States could be eliminated under the Trump administration’s proposed budget for 2026. If you’re not an ornithologist, you’ve probably never heard of the Bird Banding Laboratory or the Breeding Bird Survey, two federal programs managed by the U.S. Geological Survey.
Researchers Favor Beautiful, Colorful Birds in Scientific Studies, New Analysis Finds
Silas Fischer, a PhD candidate at the University of Toledo, has been studying Gray Vireos since they were an undergraduate.
New Analysis Reveals That ‘Beautiful' Birds Are Studied Much More Than ‘Drab’ Species
Silas Fischer, a PhD candidate at the University of Toledo, has been studying Gray Vireos since they were an undergraduate.
‘Flashy, Sexy Warblers’ and Other Beautiful Birds Are Studied Much More Than ‘Drab’ Species: New Study
Silas Fischer, a PhD candidate at the University of Toledo, has been studying Gray Vireos since they were an undergraduate.
10 Charming Facts About Chickadees
These active backyard birds are more than just cute—they’re hardy survivors that have conquered the continent and are teaching scientists new things about avian evolution. Even the most casual backyard birder in North America is familiar with chickadees. These charismatic, noisy little birds visit our feeders and enliven our hedges.
Komodo Dragons and Cockatoos
BirdNote® Komodo Dragons and Cockatoos Written by Rebecca Heisman This is BirdNote. [Yellow-crested Cockatoo calls, ML 518060, 0:10-0:13] Yellow-crested Cockatoos are victims of their own charisma. Talkative and sociable, they stand over a foot tall, with snowy white plumage and a showy yellow crest. Due to widespread trapping for the pet trade, this bird has disappeared from many of the Southeast Asian islands where it once lived. Today it’s considered critically endangered.
Field Inclusive: A Small Nonprofit Aims to Make Fieldwork Safe for All
From the Autumn 2024 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now. In spring 2020, Covid-19 restrictions forced then-PhD student Murry Burgess to conduct her field research entirely alone. Driving to the rural North Carolina barn where she was studying the effects of light on Barn Swallow chicks, Burgess, who is Black, passed Confederate flags and endured suspicious glares when she stopped at a local gas station.
Hybrid Chickadees Reveal How Species Boundaries Can Shift and Blur
Chickadees, those adorable bandit-masked visitors to bird feeders, are among the most familiar and beloved backyard birds in North America. They’re so good at spotting and scolding predators that other birds keep an ear out for their alarm calls, and they’re so fearless that they can be coaxed to snatch seeds from people’s hands.
In Graphic Detail: By-caught Birds | Hakai Magazine
When commercial fishers haul up their nets, they often find dolphins, sharks, sea turtles, and other creatures entangled amid their catches. These accidentally caught, nontarget species are known as by-catch, and millions of animals worldwide are killed this way each year. A significant proportion of these trapped animals are seabirds—ocean-adapted species including gulls, albatrosses, and cormorants.
In Graphic Detail: Avian Flu around the World | Hakai Magazine
On May 22, 2024, a Michigan farmworker was stricken with conjunctivitis, or eye redness, a common symptom caused by bacterial or viral infections. But this case was unique: an avian influenza virus caused the condition. That was the third-known human infection of bird flu in the United States and the second time cows were responsible for its spread.
Counting Calories for Seabirds | Hakai Magazine
One hundred and eighty years ago on a small Icelandic island, fishermen killed the last of the great auks. Related to puffins and murres, these flightless seabirds were huge, standing at half the height of an adult man. With the great auks went many of the most basic facts about them—from how many fish they ate each day to how far they ventured from their breeding colonies. Modern scientists, however, have developed a technique that can reconstruct lost details of the birds’ lives.
Environmental Change, Written in the DNA of Birds
Two studies of California bird populations show how shifting environments can rewrite animals’ genomes — for better or worse. As the environment shifts — due to climate change, habitat destruction, or other threats — we can often observe some of the ways that wildlife responds. Populations may decline. Individual animals may move. Some species may alter their behavior.
Environmental Change, Written in the DNA of Birds
As the environment shifts — due to climate change, habitat destruction, or other threats — we can often observe some of the ways that wildlife responds. Populations may decline. Individual animals may move. Some species may alter their behavior. But at the same time, scientists warn, wild plants or animals may experience harder-to-detect changes — for example, alterations to their genomes, the very DNA that defines them.
American Redstarts Can Speed Up Their Migration, but There's a Cost
From the Spring 2024 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now. For a small migratory songbird like an American Redstart, driven by an evolutionary imperative to pass on its genes to the next generation, every day—and every spring—counts. A delay during spring migration can cause a bird to arrive late to its breeding grounds and miss its best chance at claiming a territory and finding a mate.
In Bermuda, the signs of spring are changing
This story was originally published by Hakai Magazine and appears here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. White-tailed tropicbirds spend most of the year at sea, out of sight of people. When the seabirds make their annual descent into Bermuda to breed, though, their long, streamer-like tails, snowy white plumage and shrill calls are impossible to miss. To locals, the birds’ return to the islands is a reliable sign of spring.
In Bermuda, the Signs of the Season Are Changing | Hakai Magazine
White-tailed tropicbirds spend most of the year at sea, out of sight of people. When the seabirds make their annual descent into Bermuda to breed, though, their long, streamer-like tails, snowy white plumage, and shrill calls are impossible to miss. To locals, the birds’ return to the islands is a reliable sign of spring. But long-term records kept by birdwatchers hint that white-tailed tropicbirds, known locally as longtails, have been turning up in Bermuda earlier and earlier.
Is Our Food Waste Creating a Murder of Crows?
Ongoing research finds that trashcans can feed and boost crow populations, which comes with a potentially deadly cost for some other bird species. Last summer a team of researchers from the University of British Columbia headed into the field to study the food web linking a local bird community. But their destination wasn’t a temperate rainforest or rocky coastline — it was urban Vancouver on trash day.
Is Our Food Waste Creating a Murder of Crows?
Last summer a team of researchers from the University of British Columbia headed into the field to study the food web linking a local bird community. But their destination wasn’t a temperate rainforest or rocky coastline — it was urban Vancouver on trash day. Their goal: untangling hidden ways in which food in the city’s trash cans may shape its ecosystem.
The Revelator - Rebecca Heisman
Climate Change Really Gets This Researcher’s Goat Will mountain goats be able to shed their thick winter coats in time for earlier warm seasons? The Mountain Goat Molt Project wants your help to find out. Will mountain goats be able to shed their thick winter coats in time for earlier warm seasons? The Mountain Goat Molt Project wants your help to find out.
To Catch Voles Under the Snow, Great Gray Owls Must Overcome an Acoustic Mirage
From the Winter 2024 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now. Perhaps no species of owl is as superbly adapted for hunting in snow as the Great Gray. Found throughout the boreal forests of the Northern Hemisphere, Great Gray Owls dine primarily on small mouselike rodents called voles. In winter, voles retreat to tunnels deep under the snow—but that doesn’t stop Great Grays.
Letter: Vote yes on both Walla Walla school levies in February
I want to encourage every Walla Walla voter to vote yes on both school levies on the ballot in February. The first, the Learning Levy, is a replacement levy for one that is expiring, meaning it involves no increase in taxes. This levy helps fund a wide range of crucial enrichment programs for our kids, including art, music, theater, gifted programs, drivers’ ed, libraries, and too many others to list here.
How Did Bobwhites Get to Cuba?
BirdNote® How Did Bobwhites Get to Cuba? Written by Rebecca Heisman This is BirdNote. [Cuban soundscape] Cuba is home to a unique population of Northern Bobwhites, with plumage patterns and short bills that set them apart from bobwhites on mainland North America. But where these quail came from has been a mystery. [Northern Bobwhite song] Did humans introduce them from the mainland? If so, when, and why do they look so different? The first written record of bobwhites in Cuba is from 1839.
These Birds Are Never, Ever, Ever Getting Back Together | Hakai Magazine
Scientists who study animals sternly warn their trainees about the dangers of describing research subjects in human terms. Sometimes, though, the parallels are impossible to ignore. “Human beings and seabirds are very different, but there are some things that we definitely share,” says Fionnuala McCully, a PhD candidate studying seabirds at the University of Liverpool in England.
The Top 50 Science Books of 2023
At its best, science is an act of love for the world around us. It’s a desire to explore, to discover, to find out what wonders lie beneath our everyday experience of life. That inquisitiveness is a beautiful thing—and it runs through every read we’ve added to this list. Our curators Malcolm Gladwell, Susan Cain, Daniel Pink, and Adam Grant pick two exciting books per season to share with Next Big Idea Club members.
All North American Birds Named After People Will Soon Get New Names
Popular Stories How to Tell a Raven From a Crow How to Make Hummingbird Nectar What Should Be Done About Flaco, the Eurasian Eagle-Owl Loose in New York?
10 Facts About Ivory-Billed Woodpeckers, North America’s Most Famous (Probably) Extinct Bird
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10 Facts About Ivory-Billed Woodpeckers, North America’s Most Famous (Probably) Extinct Bird Original
It seems like some expert is always announcing that ivory-billed woodpeckers are A) definitely extinct, or B) they definitely still exist somewhere. If you’ve seen news stories about ivory-billed woodpeckers over the past few years, you might, very understandably, be confused: It seems like some expert is always announcing either that the birds are definitely extinct, or, that they definitely still exist somewhere. But how much do you really know about the charismatic “Lord God bird”?
Birds of a Feather Flock … With Whoever Is Nearby | Hakai Magazine Original
In a dimly lit barn in the Netherlands, a tiny ball of fluff tottering on comically oversized feet pecks at some chicken feed before settling in for a nap under a heat lamp. This baby black-tailed godwit is only a few days old, and it needs the rest. For in a few weeks, it will set off on an extraordinary journey. First, it will be carefully loaded into the back of a van with nine other young godwits and driven 1,000 kilometers east to Poland.
Moon-Watching for Migrating Birds
BirdNote® Moon-Watching for Migrating Birds Written by Rebecca Heisman Michael Stein: This is BirdNote. [Barn Swallow flight calls] Before the high-tech gadgets used to track bird migration today, a Louisiana ornithologist studied migration with one simple tool: a telescope aimed at the moon. George Lowery dreamed up moon-watching in the 1940s to prove that birds regularly migrated across the Gulf of Mexico.
How a study of so-called “trash birds” revealed conservation clues for urban species
What makes a city bird? To look at shared traits among urban birds on a global scale, Neate-Clegg and his collaborators turned to several massive datasets. First, to determine which species preferred city habitats and which avoided them, they downloaded the entire database of sightings submitted to eBird, the popular online platform where amateur birdwatchers around the world can upload their observations. “It’s basically like an Excel sheet with more than a billion rows,” says Neate-Clegg.
Gut Check: Evolution Shapes the Microbiomes of Warblers
From the Summer 2023 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now. There has been a lot of medical news in recent years about the importance of a healthy gut microbiome for humans. Recent studies have linked the beneficial bacteria in our guts to everything from immune function to mental health, and grocery store shelves are stocked with probiotic products from yogurt to kombucha to sauerkraut that claim they’ll help us cultivate the right microbes to improve our well-being.
Letter: Speak up to safeguard old-growth forests
As a mom living in Walla Walla, I regularly take my nature-loving 5-year-old on walks in the Umatilla National Forest. Recreation and conservation on public lands are very important to me, and I want to make sure there are still healthy, thriving, wild, beautiful ecosystems out there for my son to enjoy when he’s an adult. As the climate crisis intensifies, this future feels more and more precarious.
What City Birds Around the World Have in Common
Why do some bird species seem to flourish alongside humans, eating our crumbs and nesting in our backyards, while others prefer to live as far as possible from dense human populations? Researcher Monte Neate-Clegg first began to ponder that question while attending the American Ornithological Society’s 2019 conference in Anchorage, Alaska.
When Birds Get Lost, Space Storms May Be to Blame
Popular Stories How to Tell a Raven From a Crow How to Make Hummingbird Nectar What Should Be Done About Flaco, the Eurasian Eagle-Owl Loose in New York? 13 Fun Facts About Owls Get to Know These 20 Common Birds Birders all over the world are fascinated by vagrants—birds that turn up in unexpected places, well outside their species’ normal ranges. Vagrancy can have many causes, from young birds getting lost due to inexperience to hurricanes blowing migrants off course.
FLIGHT PATHS by Rebecca Heisman Read by Allyson Ryan
This audiobook explores the mysteries of bird migration--how they do it and why. The author, an ornithology writer, takes a journalist's approach to the topic, focusing on the people who over the past century have unraveled the secrets of birds' travel. This format adapts well to audio. The largely declarative sentence structure makes the text easy to follow and the concepts easy to understand. Allyson Ryan offers an able narration.
The Science We Need to Save Migratory Birds
Migratory birds are almost a perfect metaphor for hope—so much so that Emily Dickinson’s line “hope is the thing with feathers” has become a cliché. Every year, just when we feel like the cold, gray months of winter may never end, migratory birds return from their wintering ranges to refill our fields and forests with color and song.
Bright Lights and Big Data: Radar Ornithology and the Rise of BirdCast
From the Spring 2023 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now. Excerpted from Flight Paths, by Rebecca Heisman, and reprinted with permission of Harper, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. Imagine you’re a Ruby-throated Hummingbird. It’s May, and after a winter spent in the tropics, you’re finally on your way home to the forests of eastern North America. Soon, instinct will compel you to build a nest, lay eggs, and hopefully pass your genes on to another generation.
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