MAY 13,
2019
by Kevin
Spear, Orlando Sentinel
Three of
the rarest birds in Florida took an extraordinary adventure this week, slipping
out of a large pen into the freedom of an expansive, treeless prairie south of
Orlando.
The
year-old Florida grasshopper sparrows were hatched and raised in captivity, and
designated as pioneers in a perilous bid to save their kind from oblivion.
Staffers
of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service and other organizations lined a dirt road Monday, observing
the pen in the far distance as a pair of biologists removed panels from the
enclosure.
Then,
with a light breeze, clouds of love bugs and an air of worry and optimism, the
group waited quietly for an hour for the secretive birds to make their move.
"One
flew out," came a text
message, followed a short while later by a text suggesting the other
two had fled, as they are programmed to do, by running unseen through shrubs
and grass.
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