A rare, finely feathered tourist’s visit to the Las Vegas Strip interrupted a famous water show at a hotel-casino before wildlife biologists captured a yellow-billed loon and transported it unharmed Wednesday to an unspecified, remote location where they expect it will resume . its migration route to the north.
This is stated in a statement from Bellagio. post on social networks It suspended its fountains on Tuesday after a loon “found solace on the Bellagio’s own lake in Las Vegas.”
The bird was removed Wednesday by the Nevada Department of Wildlife and the resort’s musical and choreographic show resumed that afternoon, said Brian Ahern, a spokesman for MGM Resorts International.
yellow-billed loon It is an international species of concern, considered “one of the 10 rarest birds that breed regularly on the mainland United States,” according to the National Park Service.
The fountain show was initially put on hold while officials decided how to proceed, Ahern said.
Concerned birders asked state wildlife officials to intervene, agency spokesman Doug Nielsen said. The young bird was likely seeking shelter from the storm, Nielsen said, noting that migratory birds often visit the valley.
“They usually nest in the Arctic Circle and winter in Canada, the United States, Norway or Siberia,” said Kurt Busard, an experienced bird watcher who said he believed he saw the same distinctive bird a week ago at the sanctuary. Henderson Bird Viewing southeast of Las Vegas. “I think he’s lost and probably disoriented.”
Buzard said the last time he heard of a yellow-billed loon in southern Nevada was in the late 1990s at Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge in Nye County, northwest of Las Vegas.
He worried that since there were no fish in either the man-made lake at Bellagio or the former municipal wastewater treatment pond at the Henderson Wildlife Refuge, the bird he saw would be too hungry to continue on its migratory path.
Security officials working with wildlife biologists initially hoped the intruder would leave on his own, unaccompanied.
But Nielsen said in an email to The Associated Press that they decided Wednesday morning to capture and move the bird “to a more suitable and remote location where it has space, food and a quiet environment.”
“According to the biologist who supervised the capture, the bird had no visible injuries and appeared healthy,” a state wildlife department spokesman said.
Nielsen said the birds sometimes get slightly off course during their annual migration due to factors such as high winds or poor weather conditions.
“The important thing for now is that the bird has the opportunity to reorient itself and resume its migration north,” he said.