Zee and the Storm-Petrel

Zee will be lying low in the coming months, while I head to New Zealand to sketch seabirds for a Fulbright-National Geographic Storytelling Fellowship. (See more Adventures of Zee.)

Here's one last sighting of Zee with the long-lost New Zealand Storm-Petrel. This little seabird, thought to be extinct for the entire 20th century, was recently found nesting on an island just 50 miles from New Zealand's biggest city.

The storm-petrel's tenuous recovery depends on ongoing conservation efforts, including constant vigilance to keep invasive cats and rats away from its breeding grounds.

Stay tuned to learn more about this storm-petrel and other seabirds of New Zealand, appropriately known as the "seabird capital of the world" (and as a global leader in saving these very important, very endangered animals!).