Purple Martins and people have a long history. Native Americans started a practice of providing homes for the birds, which was copied by European colonizers. But those colonizers released invasive species and cleared habitats to the point that the species is entirely reliant on man-made…

Names have power. In North America, more than 100 species of birds have eponymous names, many honoring white colonizers. The “Bird Names for Birds” movement to change these names, or “verbal statues,” can be traced to Ph.D candidate Robert Driver’s 2018 proposal about the Thick-billed…

Sheridan Alford helps organize Black Birders Week, which celebrates Black people who love birds with a week of interactive events. She’s passionate about the mental health benefits of birding, especially for people who have experienced trauma. Sheridan says that sitting and journaling…

Migratory birds use starlight to find their way on their long journeys — which makes light pollution a serious threat. Drawn off course by bright, artificial lighting, birds can wind up fatally colliding with windows or wasting precious time and energy that they need to survive. “Lights…

Tenijah got hooked on birding at the start of the pandemic, and during the last season of Bring Birds Back she learned a lot about our feathered friends. This season, she’s ready to learn and share more simple ways to help birds — while discovering new birding skills from experts. After…

Last year, Tenijah Hamilton discovered her love of birds – and found out that birds are in trouble. On a mission to help bring birds back, Tenijah joined bird enthusiasts from different backgrounds, identities, and communities to learn and share simple, everyday actions people can take to…

Tim Arnold leads the Tybee Clean Beach Volunteers in keeping Tybee Island, Georgia, free of plastic pollution and other trash. His favorite bird is the Brown Pelican. Its bulky, awkward appearance contrasts with its agility as it dives for fish. But Arnold worries that pelicans are…

Most coffee is grown industrially in wide-open fields with few places for birds and other species to live. But some farmers are returning to a more sustainable method, growing coffee under layers of natural tree canopy. The Smithsonian Institute certifies coffee as Bird Friendly if it…

In the Bring Birds Back season finale, host Tenijah Hamilton heads to Tybee Island off the Georgia coast for a day at the beach... picking up trash. She joins Tim Arnold, founder of Tybee Clean Beach Volunteers, to see firsthand how plastics and trash can pose a threat to migratory…

Host Tenijah Hamilton hears firsthand from coffee grower Oswaldo Acevedo in Colombia how shade-grown coffee farms offer better wildlife habitat and working conditions than most industrial coffee plantations. She speaks to Ruth Bennett and Justine Bowe from the Smithsonian Institute…