{"id":31135,"date":"2017-06-12T16:38:28","date_gmt":"2017-06-12T20:38:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/?p=31135"},"modified":"2022-06-22T17:31:33","modified_gmt":"2022-06-22T21:31:33","slug":"a-new-dawn-for-the-night-parrot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/a-new-dawn-for-the-night-parrot\/","title":{"rendered":"A New Dawn for the Night Parrot"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"alignright size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/NParrots-BHLibrary.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/NParrots-BHLibrary-720x1039.jpg 720w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/NParrots-BHLibrary-768x1109.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/NParrots-BHLibrary-1280x1848.jpg 1280w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/NParrots-BHLibrary-480x693.jpg 480w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/NParrots-BHLibrary.jpg 1639w\" sizes=\"\" alt=\"Night Parrots were rediscovered in 2013, a century after the last sighting of a living individual. Image courtesy of the Biodiversity Heritage Library via Creative Commons.\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><figcaption>Night Parrots were rediscovered in 2013, a century after the last sighting of a living individual.  <em>Image courtesy of the <a gref=\"https:\/\/flic.kr\/p\/rGemh8\">Biodiversity Heritage Library via Creative Commons<\/a>.<\/em><\/figcaption>\n              <\/figure><\/div>\n<p><small><em>From the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/living-bird-summer-2017-table-of-contents\/\">Summer 2017<\/a> issue of <\/em>Living Bird<em> magazine. <a href=\"https:\/\/join.birds.cornell.edu\/ea-action\/action?ea.client.id=1806&amp;ea.campaign.id=24577&amp;ea.tracking.id=CTA\">Subscribe now<\/a>.<\/em><\/small><\/p>\n<p>\u201cNext to the discovery of a new species, there is no event so exciting as the rediscovery of a lost one,\u201d a biologist named Hugh Wilson wrote 80 years ago in a paper about Australia\u2019s Night Parrot. At the time, there hadn\u2019t been a confirmed sighting of a Night Parrot in 25 years, and despite his hopeful tone, there were to be no more sightings for the rest of the century.<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-group sidebar-alignright sidebar-space order-bottom\"><div class=\"article-list list-style alignright\"><h2 class=\"article-list-header\">More From Living Bird<\/h2><ul><li class=\"article-item\"><div class=\"article-item-container\"><div class=\"article-item-media  content-living-bird-toc\"><figure class=\"article-item-media-ratio\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LB-TOC-FI.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LB-TOC-FI.jpg 658w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LB-TOC-FI-240x135.jpg 240w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LB-TOC-FI-480x270.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"\" alt=\"Kirtland's Warbler by Amanda Guercio\/Macaulay LIbrary\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure><\/div><div class=\"article-item-body\"><span class=\"article-item-header\">Living Bird Summer 2017\u2014Table Of Contents<\/span><\/div><\/div><\/li><li class=\"article-item\"><div class=\"article-item-container\"><div class=\"article-item-media  content-living-bird-toc\"><figure class=\"article-item-media-ratio\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/living-bird-latest.png\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/living-bird-latest.png 720w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/living-bird-latest-240x180.png 240w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/living-bird-latest-480x360.png 480w\" sizes=\"\" alt=\"Living Bird-latest issue\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure><\/div><div class=\"article-item-body\"><span class=\"article-item-header\">Living Bird Magazine\u2014Latest Issue<\/span><\/div><\/div><\/li><li class=\"article-item\"><div class=\"article-item-container\"><div class=\"article-item-media  content-article\"><figure class=\"article-item-media-ratio\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/living-bird-acrhive.png\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/living-bird-acrhive.png 720w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/living-bird-acrhive-240x180.png 240w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/living-bird-acrhive-480x360.png 480w\" sizes=\"\" alt=\"Living Bird archives\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure><\/div><div class=\"article-item-body\"><span class=\"article-item-header\">Living Bird Magazine Archives<\/span><\/div><\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div>\n<p>Even by the standards of Australian wildlife, the Night Parrot is an odd, almost fantastical creature. It\u2019s a bright yellow-and-green parrot with big eyes and stubby legs that creeps through the driest regions of Australia beneath a spiky, almost impenetrable kind of grass called spinifex. It only comes out under cover of darkness. And until recently, no one even knew what it sounded like.<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-group sidebar-alignright sidebar-space order-bottom\"><!--HubSpot Call-to-Action Code -->\r\n<span class=\"hs-cta-wrapper\" id=\"hs-cta-wrapper-096b8ce3-0e2d-46c5-bbf7-12de3323c8da\">\r\n    <span class=\"hs-cta-node hs-cta-096b8ce3-0e2d-46c5-bbf7-12de3323c8da\" id=\"hs-cta-096b8ce3-0e2d-46c5-bbf7-12de3323c8da\">\r\n        <!--[if lte IE 8]><div id=\"hs-cta-ie-element\"><\/div><![endif]-->\r\n        <a href=\"http:\/\/cta-redirect.hubspot.com\/cta\/redirect\/95627\/096b8ce3-0e2d-46c5-bbf7-12de3323c8da\" ><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"hs-cta-img\" id=\"hs-cta-img-096b8ce3-0e2d-46c5-bbf7-12de3323c8da\" style=\"border-width:0px;\" src=\"https:\/\/no-cache.hubspot.com\/cta\/default\/95627\/096b8ce3-0e2d-46c5-bbf7-12de3323c8da.png\"  alt=\"subscribe to Living Bird magazine\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/a>\r\n    <\/span>\r\n    <script charset=\"utf-8\" src=\"https:\/\/js.hscta.net\/cta\/current.js\"><\/script>\r\n    <script type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n        hbspt.cta.load(95627, '096b8ce3-0e2d-46c5-bbf7-12de3323c8da', {});\r\n    <\/script>\r\n<\/span>\r\n<!-- end HubSpot Call-to-Action Code -->\r\n\r\n<\/div>\n<p>Night Parrots were recorded into the early 20th century, but Australia was changing. European settlement during the late 1800s brought invasive plants, predatory cats and foxes, and different fire regimes to the continent\u2019s dry interior. Alongside many of Australia\u2019s small desert mammals, Night Parrots drifted into extinction. Or so it seemed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf we had intentionally gone out and tried to make these things extinct, we couldn\u2019t have done it better,\u201d says Steve Murphy, a Night Parrot expert with the nonprofit Bush Heritage Australia.<\/p>\n<p>Now, in just the last five years, a flurry of unexpected breakthroughs has changed the whole story. With two sightings on opposite sides of the continent, recordings of the bird\u2019s call, a better understanding of their habitat, and even the discovery of a nest, a new view is emerging of this enigmatic bird.<\/p>\n<p>Hope for the Night Parrot started to return in 1990, when a group of ornithologists stopped to bird along a remote highway in western Queensland. They happened to pull up beside a pile of feathers that turned out to be a roadkilled Night Parrot, a tantalizing confirmation that somehow, somewhere, a population endured.<\/p>\n<p>Inspired by their story, a birder named John Young spent 15 years searching for that population. In 2013 his persistence paid off: he discovered Night Parrots in remote southwestern Queensland, the first living birds recorded in over a century.<\/p>\n<p>Young had heard unfamiliar calls that he suspected were Night Parrots in 2008, but it still took five years before he successfully called a bird into a spotlight to get photo documentation. After his discovery, Bush Heritage Australia, state and federal governments, and scientists swung into action, protecting the location through a secret reserve known as Pullen Pullen and forming a Night Parrot Recovery Team.<\/p>\n<p>Young\u2019s audio recordings were kept under wraps to protect the few known birds, and only released in February 2017 to aid searchers in other parts of Australia (playback is still banned around Pullen Pullen). The hope was that birders equipped with the calls &nbsp;would be able to find new Night Parrot locations.<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n              <figure class=\"size-large alignnone\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-flush-1280x853.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-flush-720x480.jpg 720w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-flush-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-flush-1280x853.jpg 1280w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-flush-480x320.jpg 480w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-flush.jpg 1666w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px\" alt=\"Night Parrot in flight by Nigel Jackett\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><figcaption>In 2017, four birders found this Night Parrot in Western Australia, more than 1,000 miles away from the Queensland sightings\u2014adding to optimism that the species still survives in the Australian outback. <em>Photo by Nigel Jackett<\/em>.<\/figcaption>\n              <\/figure>\n            <\/div>\n<p>The very next month, 1,200 miles away from the Queensland site, four birders discovered a second population. \u201cIt was all very surreal,\u201d says Nigel Jackett as he recalls flushing the first Night Parrot seen in Western Australia in over a century. For Jackett and his fellow birders, it was the culmination of a seven-year search that had begun even before Young\u2019s discovery in Queensland.<\/p>\n<div class=\"article-list list-style alignright\"><h2 class=\"article-list-header\">More On Birds Coming Back From the Brink<\/h2><ul><li class=\"article-item\"><div class=\"article-item-container\"><div class=\"article-item-media  content-article\"><figure class=\"article-item-media-ratio\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/KirtlandsWarblers4x3.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/KirtlandsWarblers4x3-720x540.jpg 720w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/KirtlandsWarblers4x3-240x180.jpg 240w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/KirtlandsWarblers4x3-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/KirtlandsWarblers4x3-480x360.jpg 480w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/KirtlandsWarblers4x3.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"\" alt=\"Kirtland's Warbler perches on branch\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure><\/div><div class=\"article-item-body\"><span class=\"article-item-header\">Jack Pine Juggernauts: What Will Happen to Kirtland&#8217;s Warblers After Delisting?<\/span><\/div><\/div><\/li><li class=\"article-item\"><div class=\"article-item-container\"><div class=\"article-item-media  content-article\"><figure class=\"article-item-media-ratio\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LostBirds4x3.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LostBirds4x3-720x540.jpg 720w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LostBirds4x3-240x180.jpg 240w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LostBirds4x3-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LostBirds4x3-480x360.jpg 480w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/LostBirds4x3.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"\" alt=\"Cherry-throated Tanager on branch\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure><\/div><div class=\"article-item-body\"><span class=\"article-item-header\">Lost Birds: The Search to Rediscover Species That Might Not Yet Be Extinct<\/span><\/div><\/div><\/li><li class=\"article-item\"><div class=\"article-item-container\"><div class=\"article-item-media  content-article\"><figure class=\"article-item-media-ratio\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/condor-CC-Gregory-Smith-1280x720.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/condor-CC-Gregory-Smith-720x405.jpg 720w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/condor-CC-Gregory-Smith-240x135.jpg 240w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/condor-CC-Gregory-Smith-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/condor-CC-Gregory-Smith-1280x720.jpg 1280w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/condor-CC-Gregory-Smith-480x270.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1280px) 100vw, 1280px\" alt=\"soaring California Condor by Gregory Smith\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure><\/div><div class=\"article-item-body\"><span class=\"article-item-header\">Soaring in Circles: Two Road Trips to See California Condors, Thirty Years Apart<\/span><\/div><\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div>\n<p>Despite the timing, Jackett says the Queensland recordings didn\u2019t help the group so much as confuse them. They heard strange calls, but \u201cthey didn\u2019t really match the quality of the released calls\u2026 there\u2019s definitely some sort of regional dialect,\u201d he says. Instead, Jackett says their success lay in their understanding of Night Parrot ecology, pieced together from historic accounts and recent, undocumented sightings from a team led by Neil Hamilton of the Department of Parks and Wildlife in Western Australia, along with Tegan Douglas and Aneta Creighton. Traditional Martu landowners from the Matuwa\/Kurrara Kurrara Indigenous Protected Area were also key collaborators.<\/p>\n<p>With help from Hamilton, \u201cwe figured out that what these Night Parrots are likely to live in is very old spinifex,\u201d Jackett says. \u201cOnce we tried that, it was actually the very first place where we found them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ancient spinifex hummocks\u2014some nearly 90 years old\u2014are uncommon in Australia. Most were eliminated by massive fires fed by years of fuel build-up from European settlers\u2019 fire suppression, leaving barely any old spinifex to shelter Night Parrots. Cats and foxes preyed on any parrots that were left, along with many of central Australia\u2019s native mammals.<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"alignright size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-and-murphy.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-and-murphy-720x509.jpg 720w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-and-murphy-768x543.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-and-murphy-1280x905.jpg 1280w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-and-murphy-480x339.jpg 480w, https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/night-parrot-and-murphy.jpg 1393w\" sizes=\"\" alt=\"Night Parrot in hand\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><figcaption>Biologist Steve Murphy holds a male Night Parrot in Queensland, Australia, and prepares to attach a tiny GPS tag. Data on the bird's movements will help scientists learn about how this mysterious bird uses its habitat. <em>Photo by Rachel Murphy.<\/em><\/figcaption>\n              <\/figure><\/div>\n<p>\u201cBasically, if you\u2019re a mammal [or a Night Parrot] in central Australia about the size of a rabbit, you\u2019re either extinct or critically endangered,\u201d Murphy says.<\/p>\n<p>Despite these pressures, Night Parrots seem to have persisted in areas that managed to resist the changes. In the so-called \u201cChannel Country\u201d of southwestern Queensland, bare patches of rock surround spinifex hummocks, keeping them safe from fires. In Western Australia, networks of dry salt lakes, with soil too alkaline for plants to grow, serve a similar function. Better yet for the parrot, foxes are rare in both areas.<\/p>\n<p>So if their habitat didn\u2019t completely vanish, how did two different populations go unnoticed for a century? Hamilton thinks Night Parrots and other aridland birds and mammals have rebounded thanks to long-running restoration efforts. These include work to remove introduced cats and keep out spinifex-eating cattle and camels. Add to that a stroke of luck in the form of recent heavy rains, which cause spinifex to bloom and spur the parrots to call more frequently as they scramble to begin breeding, Hamilton says.<\/p>\n<p>Jackett\u2019s team made their discovery in the remote Australian outback in Western Australia, where the population density is 300 times lower than Wyoming, the least populated U.S. state.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhere Night Parrots live is probably a thousand kilometers from any capital city, and it\u2019s really a hostile place,\u201d Jackett said. \u201cYou need to be fully self-sufficient. Where we were going, if it rained, we would have been trapped there for potentially a week.\u201d On their expedition, the group traveled with a week\u2019s food and water, a generator, and a backup vehicle.<\/p>\n<p>Now that Night Parrots been found in two widely separated places, Jackett believes the birds may live on in other remote areas. \u201cI think they\u2019ve just been overlooked due to lack of knowledge about their ecology,\u201d he says. \u201cI think figuring out this habitat, a lot more birders are going to have the confidence to look for them in the right way.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Murphy concurs: \u201cOne of the places that always jumps out at me is northern South Australia.\u201d [Update: Researchers discovered <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/world-australia-41262832\">evidence of Night Parrots living in South Australia<\/a> in September 2017.]\n<p>While they\u2019re still anything but common, there\u2019s a good chance that more Night Parrots are out there in the Australian outback, foraging by moonlight in ancient riverbeds and slumbering by day in the thick, spiny protection of spinifex.<\/p>\n<p><em>Sarah Toner is a Biological Sciences major at Cornell University (Class of 2019) and current president of the Cornell Student Birding Club. Her work on this story was made possible by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology Science Communication Fund, with support from Jay Branegan (Cornell \u201972) and Stefania Pittaluga.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>From the Summer 2017 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now. \u201cNext to the discovery of a new species, there is no event so exciting as the rediscovery of a<a class=\"excerpt-read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/a-new-dawn-for-the-night-parrot\/\" title=\"ReadA New Dawn for the Night Parrot\">&#8230; Read more &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":53237,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_tec_requires_first_save":true,"_birdpress_living_bird_toc":0,"_birdpress_living_bird_toc_title":"","_birdpress_featured_image":false,"_birdpress_hero_toggle":false,"_birdpress_hero_type":"image","_birdpress_hero_image_type":"image","_birdpress_hero_style":"default","_birdpress_hero_ratio":"","_birdpress_hero_h1":"","_birdpress_hero_media_id":0,"_birdpress_hero_media_array_id":[],"_birdpress_hero_media_array":[],"_birdpress_hero_media":0,"_birdpress_hero_video_id":0,"_birdpress_hero_video":0,"_birdpress_hero_youtube":"","_birdpress_hero_content":true,"_birdpress_hero_byline":"","_birdpress_hero_byline_bottom":"","_birdpress_hero_button_link":"","_birdpress_hero_button_text":"","_birdpress_hero_button_color":"","_birdpress_hero_date":false,"original_guid":"","_birdpress_hide_search":false,"_birdpress_page_width":"","_birdpress_global_cta":false,"_birdpress_widget_sidebar":"","_birdpress_next_article":0,"_birdpress_next_article_title":"","_birdpress_prev_article":0,"_birdpress_prev_article_title":"","_birdpress_sub_navigation_id":0,"_birdpress_sub_navigation":"","_birdpress_sub_navigation_title":false,"_birdpress_anchor_navigation_id":0,"_birdpress_anchor_navigation":"","_birdpress_postType":"both","_birdpress_categoryID":0,"_birdpress_tagID":0,"_birdpress_parentPostID":0,"_birdpress_parentPostTitle":"","_birdpress_menuID":0,"_birdpress_menuName":"","_birdpress_listHeader":"","_birdpress_listLayout":"card-display","_birdpress_listColumns":"","_birdpress_maxItems":12,"_birdpress_listPaginate":true,"_birdpress_displaySort":true,"_birdpress_sortOrder":"DESC","_birdpress_sortBy":"date","_birdpress_listID":"","_birdpress_listClass":"","_birdpress_displayImages":true,"_birdpress_displayCaptions":false,"_birdpress_displayExcerpts":false,"_birdpress_attTop":"","_birdpress_attBottom":"","_birdpress_showLogos":false,"_birdpress_post_logo":0,"_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_tribe_blocks_recurrence_rules":"","_tribe_blocks_recurrence_description":"","_tribe_blocks_recurrence_exclusions":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_topic":0,"wds_primary_content-format":0,"wds_primary_cornell-lab-project":0,"wds_primary_host-project":0,"wds_primary_read-more-tag":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"topic":[998,1043],"content-format":[1055],"cornell-lab-project":[1069],"host-project":[],"read-more-tag":[],"class_list":["post-31135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","topic-news-and-features","topic-science-conservation-news-and-features","content-format-article","cornell-lab-project-living-bird-magazine"],"metadata":{"associated-posts":[""],"wpa_off":[""],"_edit_lock":["1655941577:1"],"_edit_last":["1"],"wdsi_message_id":[""],"wdsi_do_not_show":[""],"_wds_meta-robots-adv":[","],"custom-byline":["<h5>By Sarah Toner<\/h5>"],"banner-video":[""],"banner-image":[""],"fallback-videobanner-image":[""],"original_guid":[""],"banner-text-style":["light"],"banner-style":["default"],"featured-image-display":["no"],"hide-from-search":["no"],"_birdpress_next_article":[""],"_birdpress_prev_article":[""],"_webdados_fb_open_graph_specific_image":["https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/NIghtParrot16x9.jpg"],"_webdados_fb_open_graph_specific_description":[""],"_wds_trimmed_excerpt":["From the Summer 2017 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now. \u201cNext to the discovery of a new species, there is no event so exciting as the rediscovery of a lost one,\u201d a biologist named Hugh Wilson wrote 80 years ago in a paper about Australia\u2019s Night Parrot. 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