A bird once declared extinct in the wild has just laid eggs in Hawaii.
The sihek, also known as the Guam kingfisher, has a striking burnt orange breast, electric blue wings, and a sharp beak. Native to the island of Guam, the tiny birds thrived until the accidental introduction of the brown tree snake in the mid-20th century. Sihek populations plummeted. By 1988, the bird was declared extinct in the wild.
The sihek became a feathered example of what can happen when an invasive species runs wild. The bird didn’t vanish entirely because of a last-minute rescue operation. Conservationists captured 29 of the remaining siheks and began a careful breeding program.
Several institutions have been raising siheks for the last few decades, trying to increase their numbers. Last year, some donated eggs to a special facility at the Sedgwick County Zoo in Kansas. Here, the hatchlings were cared for until they were old enough to journey to the atoll.
Researchers released nine of the hand-reared siheks in September 2024. They were rewilded in The Nature Conservancy’s (TNC) Palmyra Atoll Preserve, which lies around 1,600km south of Honolulu. They chose this area because the birds have no predators there, and the area is fully protected.
One lonely male
The four females and five males formed four breeding pairs. (One lonely male didn’t have a mate.) Less than a year later, all the pairs established territories, built nests, and laid eggs in the wild for the first time since the 1980s.
Photo: Martin Kastner TNC-ZSL
“This is a huge win,” said John Berry of the Cincinnati Zoo. “It means the birds are not just surviving—they’re beginning to thrive.”
Though everyone is excited about the new eggs, they also admit it is very unlikely that they will survive. The mating pairs are less than a year old and have never had to care for eggs and incubate them before. It often takes a few attempts at laying and looking after eggs for them to actually hatch.
Conservationists are now planning to release more young siheks onto the atoll later this year.
