After a Devastating Bird Flu Outbreak, Scotland's Seabirds Are Slowly Recovering—and So Are the Scientists Who Witnessed Their Decline
REPRINT AUTHOR PLACEHOLDER; Rebecca Heisman; Biographic
Bass Rock, a guano-covered hunk of rock off Scotland’s east coast, boasts the largest northern gannet colony in the world. With steep sides and a rounded top, Bass Rock is prime nesting territory, and in the spring of 2022, tens of thousands of the birds did what they always do—pack the island to lay their eggs and raise their young. But by the end of summer, things had gone horribly wrong. Highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) had reached the island. The result was devastation—for the...