In December 2023, at a luxurious resort on the Island of Hawaiʻi, three nēnē goslings hatched on a manicured inexperienced garden. Inside 72 hours, two have been lifeless. One was discovered lifeless in a pond, and the opposite had merely vanished—probably the sufferer of mongoose predation, I’d quickly study. Invasive predators, mongooses have decimated native fowl populations since being delivered to the islands within the nineteenth century, and the scene that probably performed out on the Mauna Lani resort, whose lush vegetation and contemporary water draw the geese and mongooses, has grow to be a well-recognized one for these working to guard the birds.
It was the one remaining gosling that drew me into the nēnē’s most up-to-date wrestle to outlive. Whereas staying on the sprawling beachfront property on a household trip, I couldn’t resist photographing the grey fuzzy gosling along with his mother and father. I seen mongoose traps on the grounds and shortly realized the in regards to the brood’s backstory and the challenges nēnē face—previous and new.
Colonies of feral cats prey on them, rushing automobiles run them over, and flying golf balls may even break their bones.
Regardless of being the world’s rarest goose, the birds have tailored to dwell in a variety of human-altered habitats, and other people incessantly spot them grazing on golf programs, waddling by way of parking tons, and constructing their nests beside paths in native parks. However throughout these websites, nēnē are combating a spread of recent dangers: Surging colonies of feral cats prey on them, rushing automobiles run them over, and flying golf balls may even break their bones. As I realized about how all of those challenges threaten to upend the species’ hard-won restoration, I started photographing them to deliver consideration to the nēnē and the individuals working to assist them.
Often known as the Hawaiian Goose, the nēnē is exclusive to the island chain and was as soon as widespread throughout the archipelago. However by 1949, solely 30 remained within the wild after colonization introduced elevated searching, habitat destruction, and new predators just like the mongooses. Intensive rescue efforts, together with a captive breeding program, stored the species from going extinct, and right this moment the nēnē —Hawaiʻi’s state fowl and final surviving endemic goose—is hailed as a conservation success. As of 2025, an estimated 4,323 birds lived throughout the islands of Hawai‘i, Maui, Moloka‘i, and particularly on Kaua‘i, the one island with no significant mongoose inhabitants. Although nonetheless listed as endangered within the State of Hawaiʻi, nēnē have been downlisted from federally endangered to threatened in 2019.
But within the trendy world, this historic fowl’s continued comeback isn’t assured. Populations on a number of islands, together with Hawaiʻi Island, have dropped once more prior to now decade. Many dangers stem from the nēnē’s excessive visibility and frequent contact with individuals, says Hawaiʻi Division of Land and Pure Assets biologist Raymond McGuire. “Nēnē being in public areas and coming into contact with people is the massive situation I’m coping with,” he says, because it encourages dangerous conduct from the birds and exposes them to new risks. “That’s how the inhabitants goes to slide away from us once more.”
New Tech for New Threats
Few have achieved extra to assist the nēnē by way of this pivotal second than Jordan Lerma, who has grow to be a pacesetter in guaranteeing the birds’ survival by combining know-how and the facility of group. In his day job, the Native Hawaiian marine biologist works to guard obscure ocean animals like dwarf sperm whales. However since his daughter was born in 2021, he’s additionally grow to be targeted on nēnē, which provide a extra accessible option to join individuals with conservation. “It makes me and my household actually blissful to see nēnē on the parks,” he says. “It is likely one of the few native species you’ll be able to see at decrease elevations.”
In 2022, Lerma based the nonprofit nene.org to assist save the birds whereas supporting the work of state and federal companies. Biologists have banded 70 p.c of the nēnē inhabitants and intently monitor their whereabouts by way of surveys and sightings reported by the general public. To help in monitoring, Lerma created an app that makes use of AI to determine a fowl from a photograph of its band, so biologists can snap an image throughout a survey and immediately pull up the nēnē’s life historical past—detailing info equivalent to the unique banding location, most up-to-date sighting, and any previous accidents.
On the Island of Hawaiʻi, Lerma has additionally deployed distant cameras to trace the birds.
On the Island of Hawaiʻi, Lerma has additionally deployed distant cameras to trace the birds. The cameras ship photographs in actual time to nene.org’s server, which logs the band quantity and updates the fowl’s profile with the situation. The mixture of the app and the cameras present speedy, intensive knowledge about inhabitants measurement and well being, informing conservation selections. “When biologists are searching for a fowl particularly, they will simply take a look at the app and [say] ‘OK, it’s been out on this golf course for the previous week,’” Lerma says. “That’s drawing on our cameras, that’s drawing on group, and I feel it’s a win-win.”
One in every of Lerma’s first huge successes got here in 2023 when he harnessed knowledge to guard nēnē from highway strikes, which pose a serious danger throughout the breeding season as birds transfer between nest websites and meals sources. At one restoration space, situated close to town of Hilo and bordered by a busy highway, nēnē have been repeatedly killed by automobiles, and native advocates tried for years to get the velocity restrict lowered. To help their case, Lerma arrange 6 customized velocity screens on the highway for 10 days; he discovered that out of 5,000 automobiles recorded, 81 p.c exceeded the velocity restrict. After he shared the info with the county, they lowered the velocity restrict from 35 mph to 25 mph inside two months and shortly thereafter put in raised crosswalks and traffic-calming velocity tables. No nēnē have been killed on the location because the adjustments have been made.
One other current and politically charged drawback for nēnē are the feral cat colonies which have boomed throughout the Hawaiian islands as individuals abandon pet cats and others take care of them. On the Island of Hawaiʻi, cats collect in areas the place colony “managers”—usually non-native Hawaiian residents, which provides to the controversy—cease by every day to fill water bowls and dump giant portions of dried cat meals in aluminum pans and takeout containers. Although nēnē usually eat grass and vegetation, they unexpectedly developed a style for the cat meals, luring them towards these colonies and into hazard.
Just some miles from the Mauna Lani, feeding stations at a shopping center draw dozens of cats. Nēnē have began nesting within the rocky areas subsequent to the colony—an inhospitable space full of flies, dried cat feces, mongooses, and even cat stays—risking predation of each adults and goslings. Strolling by way of the adjoining car parking zone, the geese additionally danger getting hit by automobiles. Plus, nēnē can contract toxoplasmosis, a parasitic illness, from the cats, which will be deadly and can also be correlated with elevated risk-taking conduct equivalent to crossing roads.
Nēnē have began nesting within the rocky areas subsequent to the cat colony, risking predation of each adults and goslings.
Regardless of these threats, nobody was formally monitoring the cat colonies, so Lerma created a group science platform the place anybody may submit their cat observations. Constructing on that idea, he created FeralMap, which permits individuals to report extra launched species like pigs and mongooses and publishes the sightings in a publicly accessible database. “Folks see nēnē every single day. Folks see mongoose and cats and pigs every single day,” Lerma says. “What we needed to do was to create a method for people to simply have the ability to share what they’re seeing.” Moreover, he’s engaged on rules that will remove cat colonies and make cat abandonment tougher. In late 2025, the County of Hawaiʻi passed a new law banning feeding feral cats on county property.
Lerma can also be making an attempt to deal with the longstanding drawback of mongooses by way of a trapping venture. Plantation homeowners introduced the small carnivores to Hawaiʻi to kill rats in sugarcane fields, however their plan confronted an issue: Rats are nocturnal and mongooses are diurnal. The mongooses didn’t make a dent within the rat inhabitants, as a substitute turning into a devastating predator for Hawaiʻi’s many ground-nesting birds. After gosling deaths on the Mauna Lani in 2022 and the one I realized about in 2023, Lerma and a crew of volunteers started year-round mongoose trapping on the resort and close by golf course nesting websites. Along with conventional field traps, they imported trendy traps from New Zealand, that are elevated off the bottom and depend on liquid scent attractant. The efforts led to profitable nesting seasons on the resort in 2024 and 2025—and after I returned to the Mauna Lani final 12 months, I used to be blissful to see the gosling I initially fell in love with all grown up and nonetheless residing within the space.
Such success is promising, however the nēnē’s survival nonetheless hangs within the stability. Whereas the inhabitants has elevated total because the Fifties, progress is uneven: 61 p.c of the full inhabitants is on Kauaʻi, whereas nēnē on Maui and Molokaʻi have typically declined since 2019 and Oahu’s inhabitants disappeared solely. After a interval of decline, the inhabitants on the Island of Hawaiʻi seems to be growing, thanks, partially, to Lerma’s efforts. As new threats emerge, biologists should invoke new methods, as a result of the work, as Lerma notes, “by no means ends.” He’s banking on innovation, group science, and cultural stewardship to maintain Hawaiʻi’s state fowl from quietly slipping backward. “To me, it’s a species that exhibits that people are a supply of extinction but additionally there’s this underlying energy that may reverse these actions,” Lerma says. “It makes me blissful to see that we’ve been capable of impact some good in a brief period of time on Hawaiʻi Island.”
