World
World’s oldest known wild bird lays her first egg in four years at age 74
The world’s oldest known wild bird is hatching a plan to continue her legacy.
Wisdom, a 74-year-old Laysan albatross, just laid her first egg in four years in Hawaii, according to U.S. Wildlife officials.
The queen of seabirds returned to Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge in the Pacific Ocean last week and began interacting with a new male partner, the Pacific Region of the US Fish & Wildlife Service said in a post on X on Tuesday.
Wisdom returns to the same nesting site each year to reunite with her mate, and if possible, lay one egg, USFWS Pacific said. This is customary behavior for the Laysan albatross species, called mōlī in Hawaiian.
Each year, millions of them return to Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge to nest and raise their young. Wisdom, specifically, has been doing this since the Eisenhower administration, according to a Facebook post from USFWS Pacific.
For decades this wise bird reunited with the same partner, Akeakamai, but he hasn’t been seen for many years, USFWS Pacific said.
Officials aren’t sure how old Wisdom’s new partner is, but said he was given a leg tag last week for future monitoring. By the looks of it in a video USFWS Pacific posted on X, the two wild birds are getting along egg-cellently. Wisdom can be seen rubbing her head against her new partner before he sat down to incubate their egg.