Top Rare Birds at Manomet HQ in 2025 | Photos: Linda Fuller, USFWS, Lisa Schibley, Amy Hogan, and Simon Pierre Barrette. | | |
Rare Birds of 2025: Manomet’s Top 10 Sightings
From owls raising their young by our front door to a breeding plumage Pacific Loon spotted during the Alumni Reunion, 2025 delivered some unforgettable surprises at Manomet HQ. Our team ranked the Top 10 rare bird records of the year using eBird lists, banding data, and historic notes.
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| Group photo at the end of the Youth Forum. | Photo: Fundación Líderes de Ansenuza | |
Five Years of Youth Leadership with Experiencia Ambientalia
Experiencia Ambientalia is entering its sixth year, and what started at Laguna Mar Chiquita in Argentina is becoming a hemispheric youth network for saline lakes. From fieldwork and gamified team challenges to exchanges with sites like Mono Lake and Great Salt Lake, students are turning their connection to the lakes into real leadership.
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| Crowds gather to count shorebirds during the Tybee Shorebird Festival | Photo: Courtesy | |
2026 Tybee Spring Shorebird Festival
Each spring, Tybee Island becomes a vital stop along one of the greatest wildlife migrations on Earth. The Tybee Spring Shorebird Festival invites the community to celebrate the start of migration and learn how to be good friends to the shorebirds who call this coastline home. By learning how to share our beaches thoughtfully, we protect shorebirds and their habitats, safeguard biodiversity, strengthen coastal communities, and support the nature-based tourism that makes Tybee so special.
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| The banding crew processing birds at the Trevor Lloyd-Evans Banding Lab | Photo: Manomet/Andrea Ferreira | |
Fall 2025 Banding Lab Report
Another fall banding season is in the books at the Trevor Lloyd-Evans Banding Lab, and this one had surprises. In our 60th year of banding, fierce winds reshaped the season but could not stop it. We logged 2,025 records, welcomed 650+ visitors, and celebrated new and returning faces. Plus, a Black-billed Cuckoo and a rare Seaside Sparrow made headline-worthy appearances.
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Manomet was illuminated for a special holiday stroll in December 2025 | Photo: Manomet | |
Illuminate Manomet Lights the Way for Community and Conservation
On Thursday evening, December 18, Manomet Conservation Sciences welcomed the community to a truly unforgettable celebration as Illuminate Manomet transformed the headquarters campus into a glowing wonderland. The evening was a celebration not only of light and community, but also of Manomet’s conservation mission, inviting and inspiring people to connect more deeply with nature.
Nearly 300 friends, families, and neighbors gathered to stroll Manomet’s trails, take part in hands-on activities, and soak in the warm glow of 500 luminaries (candles) lining the paths of the nature trails. The soft candlelight, combined with the energy and enthusiasm of the attendees, created a magical atmosphere that captured the spirit of the season and the strong connection between Manomet and the surrounding community.
Manomet Conservation Sciences thanks everyone who joined us to make Illuminate Manomet such a success. We hope you’ll continue to explore our campus, support our work, and return for future events!
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| | 2025 Education Summer Intern Julia Beyer on the shoreline near Manomet HQ | Photo: Manomet | |
A Transformative Nine Weeks on the Bluff: A Reflection from Intern Julia Beyer
What do nine weeks at Manomet actually feel like? From holding her first bird during a dawn banding run to watching kids light up on a scope and collecting habitat data in the pine barrens, Education and Outreach intern Julia Beyer shares the moments that changed her. It’s a vivid, honest look at how conservation work is taught, learned, and lived, and why she’s already planning her return.
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| | Collage of Staff Photos | Photos: Manomet Staff | | |
Holiday Highlights
Over the holidays, Manomet staff were out in the field across the hemisphere. Brad Winn, Vice President of Resilient Habitats, joined the St. Catherine’s Island Christmas Bird Count on the Georgia Barrier Islands Western Hemisphere Shorebird Reserve Network (WHSRN) landscape. Shorebird Biologist Sam Wolfe photographed shorebirds at Padre Island National Seashore (Laguna Madre WHSRN site), from a Long-billed Curlew hunting the dunes to a Snowy Plover tucked into the wrack line and a Willet feeding at the water’s edge.
In Chile, Diego Luna Quevedo, Senior Specialist for Policy and Governance, visited the Maullín River Wetlands Nature Sanctuary for an exchange between fisher unions from the Mataquito–Huenchullamí and Maullín WHSRN sites, sharing best practices and exploring ways to link local fisheries, shorebird conservation, tourism, and community enterprise. On Hilton Head Island, Allie Hayser, Shorebird Biologist, continued winter Piping Plover monitoring and outreach, documenting individual color-band codes during monthly surveys. Rob Clay, Vice President of Flyways, shared a milestone from Paraguay: the country’s first record of a Hudsonian Whimbrel (Numenius hudsonicus), photographed by Ornithological Careers Institute alum Selene Davey during a shorebird census. And in Tierra del Fuego, Andrea Ferreira, Science Communications Manager, spent the weekend at the Costa Atlántica WHSRN site, finding 18 Ruddy Turnstones and 27 Whimbrels, a full-circle moment after seeing them on Cape Cod last year.
| | Photos: Manomet / Fisheries | | |
Seagrass Summit
With Friends of Casco Bay, Team Zostera, Maine Coastal Program and Casco Bay Estuary Partnership, the fisheries team recently co-hosted a Seagrass Summit, which brought together scientists, managers, industry, and community members to learn from each other and discuss the state of seagrass in Maine.
| Molly Jacobs, Vice President for Education and Environmental Outreach at Manomet, at the 2026 Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology conference | Photo: Manomet | |
2026 Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology Conference
Molly Jacobs, Vice President for Education and Environmental Outreach at Manomet, was recently at the 2026 Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology conference, where she served on the society’s leadership group and helped organize the meeting. She shared Manomet’s approach to external engagement with a poster co-authored with Lily Green, Manomet for All Coordinator, featuring the crowd-favorite block tower activity and plenty of proud “tower photos.” Molly also joined a packed workshop panel on alternative careers, connecting with hundreds of students, and stayed an extra day for science leadership training.
| | January Small Sit Webinar: Ducks and Shorebirds in the Mississippi Delta | | Thank you to our recent corporate partners for helping Manomet deliver its mission of improving the health of flyways, coastal ecosystems, and working lands and seas. | | | | |
