Outdoor Writers Association of America (OWAA) 2024 Conference

From a mango-colored western tanager in Sequoia National Park to ancient sandhill cranes in the Bosque del Apache Wildlife Refuge to the white-breasted nuthatch that visits her in Sante Fe, for Kumar, birds are “a portal to a more vivid, enchanted world.” At a time when climate change, habitat loss, and the reckless use of pesticides are causing widespread extinction of species, Kumar’s reflections on these messengers from our distant past and harbingers of our future offer luminous evidence of her suggestion that “seeds of transformation lie dormant in all of our hearts. Sometimes it just takes the right bird to awaken us.”