Audubon Florida, Tampa Bay Watch and many concerned volunteers joined forces to conduct the 20th Annual Tampa Bay Fishing Gear Cleanup on Saturday September 28.

The cleanup targets bird nesting habitat and places where birds may become entangled in discarded fishing gear. Volunteers and staff clean during the fall, outside of the bird nesting season, to avoid impacts to nesting birds and chicks.

This year, Audubon staff was joined by volunteers from the Tampa Audubon Society and had a great time on the water while getting a lot of work done.  While we were saddened by the sight of several first year juvenile Brown Pelicans hanging dead in the mangroves, our team was able to free one entangled bird and transport another to a rehabber for treatment.  We know that through our efforts and the efforts of all who participated over the weekend, we have spared many of our iconic wading birds from a similar fate.

While at the islands, we couldn’t resist sprucing up some of our signs and do a little bird watching, spotting juveniles hatched from the colonies this year including Black Vulture, Little Blue Heron, Reddish Egret (always a treat to see) and Great Egret.  We also found some of our winter visitors including Belted Kingfisher and Spotted Sandpiper.