In the last days of the Trump administration, the Department of Interior ended some protection of migratory birds. The rollback consisted of removing penalties for actions that killed or injured birds but were perpetrated without the intention of killing birds. One past example of such an act was popularly cited: the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster which released millions of gallons of oil and destroyed hundreds of thousands of birds (and many other creatures). One that resonated with me would be a person or company who deliberately used a banned pesticide. Even if that poison killed many birds, the perpetrator would not be liable under the Trump Administration's revised regulations because the intent was to kill some sort of pest, not birds. This loss of protection changed the interpretation of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act that has protected migratory birds for decades.

Photo by Monica Hall