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(WATER BABBLING)

(BIRD COOING)

NARRATOR: Their haunting calls
stir our souls.

(HOOTING)

For millions of years,
common loons have migrated

the lengths of North America.

Breeding on northern lakes
each summer,

they enchant cottagers and campers
with their mysterious beauty.

Lakes, rivers, they're the
archetypal bird of these landscapes.

(HOOTS)

Now their numbers are plummeting.

Biologists are in a race
against time to understand why.

We need to figure this out now.

We love loons and we want
to keep them for forever.

Will silence fall across our lakes?

Or can we save the common loon?

Few places on earth
are as peaceful

as Ontario's Algonquin Provincial
Park in early spring.

(SNORTING)

Its 7,800 square kilometres
of boreal forest

are home to more than
200 animal species.

As soon as the ice retreats,
the first loon arrives,

ending his long journey
from the Gulf of Mexico.

If all goes well, he will find
a mate, raise a family

and ready his chicks
to fly south alone,

all before the end of autumn.

For now, his main task

is to claim his territory
with a yodel...

(HARSH YODEL)

..warning other males
to steer clear.

For me, hearing a loon return
to its lake,

that's really the official
start of spring.

When you hear that, it just sort of
goes right through you.

It's a melting kind of feeling.

Doug monitors loon populations
across Canada.

These days, every spring arrival
is cause for celebration.

His research shows Canada's
beloved bird is in trouble.

If it goes where it appears
to be headed,

then we're gonna start to see fewer
and fewer nesting pairs.

I think we need to really figure
this out now.

So we're on the clock.

Nearly 600,000 common loons

migrate to breeding grounds
in Canada and the northern US

each spring.

Ontario is the favoured
destination.

More than a third of common loons
breed here.

Some of the best lakes are
in Algonquin Provincial Park.

(HOOTING)

Oh! There's one, way down there.

Doug has been coming here
since childhood,

observing loons with his father
Ron, a retired park naturalist.

Let's head out and see if we can get
a closer look.

Algonquin Park is ideal for loons.

We have cold clear lakes.

This is a bird
that hunts fish visually.

Murky, muddy lakes are not
very suited to loons.

The total number of common loons
in Algonquin Provincial Park

would be on the order of
several thousand birds.

Some trickle in first,
and then a few days later

the whole bunch of them
come back all at once.

Here, and across Canada,

volunteers will monitor
their progress all season long.

At Birds Canada, Doug and
his team track loon populations

using observations from cottagers
and other citizen scientists.

Today we're preparing our Canadian
Lakes loon survey mail-out.

So far we have
about 400 people registered.

We've had over 4,500 participants

over the decades that have
contributed to the programme.

The big thing that
the survey is telling us,

is that they're not raising
as many babies

through to independence
over the years.

We're right on the doorstep
of them producing so few chicks

that their populations are going to
start to decline,

and we're gonna lose a part of us,
I think, if that happens.

It's not just happening here.

There's trouble in Wisconsin
and Minnesota, too.

Biologist Walter Piper
is bearing witness.

Loons are really resilient
to still be here.

I just hope they can sustain it.

I started studying them in 1993.

We banded 4,800 adults and chicks
in Wisconsin

and now more recently we've added
some birds in Minnesota.

Our data show that
the population of loons

was declining at the rate
of 6% a year.

I mean, that's a very rapid decline.

Put Walter and Doug's research
together

and it paints an alarming picture.

Population studies
in three regions

show loons are struggling.

That's got me concerned.
I think that the data

are beginning to accumulate that
the loons are in some trouble,

possibly throughout
the range of the loons.

Loons are really good indicators
of the health of our lakes.

Being on the top of the food chain,
they're producing fewer chicks.

It really tells us that there's some
kind of problem in the system.

This summer will be crucial
to figuring out why,

as Canadian and American
research teams search for answers.

Linda Grenzer is one of
Walter's field naturalists,

monitoring eight lakes
around her Wisconsin home.

My son came across a loon nest

when he was trying to find
turtles.

I fell in love
and I was mesmerised by them,

and they're my passion.

Her first love is an ageing male
she calls Clune.

He and his mate, Honey,
have been breeding here

for more than a decade, allowing
her to record their progress.

Over the course of the years,
I could paddle right up to them

and they were fine with me.

I think they truly trust me.

Clune was banded in 1998.

He's been a chick-producing
machine throughout his life.

Honey. Linda claims
that I named her Honey.

I didn't mean to. But anyway,
that's struck.

For about ten or 12 years,
he and Honey

were really cranking out the chicks.

He's probably the tamest bird
in our study area,

and that makes him very photogenic.

Each year we think, "Oh, is Clune
gonna come back or not?"

As a loon gets older, they lose
their body mass and their strength.

They're older, just like
we get older, you know.

Many males sort of hit the wall
at about age 15.

Clune is 24 years old.

There's a layer of ice out.
I saw one loon,

I went and ID'd him. I was excited
because it was Clune.

Every year's a blessing
he does come back.

Clune has claimed his lake
for one more year.

Now he waits for Honey.

Loons separate at the end
of each breeding season.

So there's no guarantee that even
a long-time mate will return.

Meanwhile, the Algonquin Park male
has some luck.

In late April, a female arrives.

Since Ontario loons aren't banded,

no-one knows if she's last year's
mate or someone new.

A lot of folks think
that loons mate for life

and they never change partners.

Nothing is different
from the truth.

The loon comes back and its mate
from last year doesn't show up

and they've been replaced
by some other loon,

then, hey, no problem, just accept
the new mate and move on.

That's the way it works
in the loon world.

PIPER: To be fair to loons,
they probably would choose
to mate for life,

but once they get on a territory,

their allegiance is to that
territory and not to the mate.

As temperatures rise,

the two Algonquin loons
start to bond.

They swim and dive side-by-side
and become almost inseparable.

In Wisconsin,
it's a different story.

As April winds down,
there's no sign of Honey.

Linda is sure
she's gone for good.

I was devastated, because I knew,
you know, that long run is over.

14 chicks they raised on our lake.

PIPER: She was a big, big,
vigorous female.

Also a fierce defender
of her chicks.

We don't know what happened to her.

She probably died on
the wintering grounds somewhere,

but we haven't got a record
of her death.

Most loons die
without us getting a record.

They could die and wash up
on a beach and no-one finds them

and no-one thinks to report them.

Loons are one of the oldest living
bird species on earth,

dating back 70 million years.

(YODELLING CALL)

The same iconic calls
we know today

would have echoed
across the Ice Age,

heard by mammoths and mastodons.

Alright, Waylin, let's go find
some loons.

Sheldon McGregor's ancestors,
the Algonquin people,

have plied the waters
alongside loons for centuries.

I grew up from a fairly traditional
Algonquin household.

My mom wanted me to grow up here
in the community

and she wanted me to understand
where my roots were from.

So we always spoke Algonquin
in the house.

You good?Yeah.

Almost flipped, huh?
Yeah.OK.

Now Sheldon passes along traditional
Algonquin knowledge

to his son, Waylin.

How do you say loon in Algonquin?

Mongo.
Mongo?Yeah.

'In the Algonquin culture, animals
are our greatest teachers

because we were nomadic.

We would study the animals
we hunted.'

Because our survival
was dependent on it.

So, a lot of legends and stories
were made out of different animals.

I think I see a loon over there.
Let's go take a look.

Do you see its head popping up?

Yeah. Let's go take a peek.

'When you see loons,
they're alone, they're solitary.'

Loons represent independence
in Algonquin culture,

because of hunting.
Learning how to be alone

is a very important thing.

They're very elusive too,
the way they dive under water.

Generally, you can predict
where ducks dive underwater,

they come back usually
in the same spot.

Loons will dive and come out
at another spot.

So, the loon is seen
as a mysterious one.

We don't know a lot about loons.

Their elusive nature makes them
hard to study and conserve.

To save the species, biologists
need to learn more about loons,

how they interact with each
other and their environment,

raise their chicks and even
how they choose a nest site.

One of the surprising
things is that for some reason

we don't understand, male loons

are the ones that choose
the nest location,

and who picks the nest location
makes a tremendous difference

to nesting success.

That is, if you put the nest
on an island,

then a racoon is going to have
difficulty getting to that nest.

But sometimes males choose
very bad sites,

usually when they've just settled.

They're just blundering around
and they keep moving the nest

until they...they're able
to have chicks.

Clune is a veteran by now.

Years of accumulated knowledge
tell him where to nest.

And now he has a new mate,
an unbanded female.

I knew it wasn't Honey because
it didn't have Honey's behaviour.

That female does not want me
nowhere near as close

as Honey allowed me to be.

The good news is,
Clune and the new female

are getting along just fine.

She's sticking to him like glue
as he chooses a nest site.

Clune's picked three nest sites
on this lake.

He's nested here. He's nested
way on the far south end,

and he's also nested
in the conservancy area

since he started nesting in 2009.

Loons actually don't build
much of a nest.

Sometimes it's just a little
scrape in the ground.

Otherwise, it can be a big mound
of vegetation that they pile up.

Back in Ontario,

the Algonquin male has chosen
HIS nest site...

..a secluded spot on a quiet lake,

with lots of vegetation
to hide from predators.

Now they're ready for perhaps
the most important moment

of the breeding season...

(SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC)

..something rarely captured
on camera.

They mate at the water's edge.

It's over in a few minutes.

Then the male slips back
to the safety of the water,

followed by the female.

A few days later, two eggs appear.

The clutch size is almost always
just two eggs

and then it's a 29-day incubation
on average.

So, pretty much they're sitting
on them for a month,

and males and females
share incubation.

It's about half and half.

A successful breeding season
now hinges on these two eggs,

keeping them warm,

turning to ensure
proper embryo development,

and most of all,
keeping them safe.

There's predators that
can come along and eat the eggs,

especially when
the adults are absent.

The main predators are racoons,
minks,

mammals that travel
along the lake shore.

Leaving the nest
puts the eggs at risk.

But staying put is hard work
for the parents on a hot day.

And a changing climate
means more and more hot days.

Biologists who study climate change

believe it's at least partly
to blame

for falling reproduction rates.

What we're finding is that
climate change forces species

to endure temperatures close to
the limits they can tolerate.

We found that this is causing them
to decline.

I studied bumblebees,
but we think that the results

we are finding are applicable
to loons and other birds.

Loons nest at the edge of water

and so it makes them
really sensitive to fluctuations

in those water levels
from climate change.

If there are really rains that
might wash out eggs off the nest,

that can play a role as well.

In Wisconsin, on a hot day
at the tail end of May,

Clune's new mate lays eggs.

But they don't last long.

It happened at 3:30 in the morning.

There was a lot of commotion
going on

that woke up my neighbour
across there.

I came to check it out
and Clune was hoo-ing real softly

and I saw the eggs were destroyed.

My guess, a snapping turtle
in the middle of the night

went up and totally tore up
the nest.

It's a major setback.

But Clune has time on his side.

Nest failure is so common in May

that many loons re-nest

and go on to raise healthy chicks.

Will he try again?

In early June,
things are looking up.

Clune is cruising around,
looking for a new nest site.

And now his mate has a name.

We're calling her Lucy.

My husband thought of the name,
and I thought it sounded good.

I still miss Honey, but, you know,

I'm hoping she warms up to ME,
let's put it that way.

The Algonquin pair
are midway through incubation.

If all goes well, in two weeks,
the eggs will hatch

and a new life as chicks will begin.

Doug is in the park with
biologist Kristin Bianchini,

trying to figure out
why fewer chicks

are surviving the summer.

Climate change is one factor.

But is something else happening
in the water loons live on?

Where do you think is best
for the water sample, Kristin?

I guess in the middle.

So we're measuring different
chemicals in the lake

like calcium, sulphate
and bicarbonate,

and they give us an idea of
the overall health of the lake.

Loons are vulnerable
to heavy metal in the water

because those pollutants
make their way up the food chain.

A small fish gets eaten
by another fish,

the heavy metals are concentrated
more and more

at every step of the way,
so it really causes problems

in the loons at the end of the line.

Lake water analysis
in other parts of Ontario

has identified one metal
that's especially bad for loons.

Mercury makes loons anaemic

and it also affects their brain.

So, a loon that has really
high mercury

won't do as good of a job
taking care of its chicks,

it won't search for food as much,

and so the chicks just don't get the
type of care they need to survive.

The real problem is that
there's so many different factors

that are affecting loons.
Mercury and acid rain

and climate change, habitat loss,

and so, together, all these factors
are affecting loons.

In the face of so much
environmental change,

loons persevere.

In mid-June, Lucy lays eggs
on a new nest site

selected by Clune.

(PIPING)

And in Algonquin, the parents
have protected their eggs

for the next miraculous
transformation.

On June 17th,
they're still on the nest.

Overnight, they hatch.

And by dawn,
two fluffy little chicks

are already on the water.

With all these declines
in productivity

right across the country,
it's really great to see.

The newborns can swim,

but will spend much of their first
two weeks hitching a ride.

Their parents' feathers
keep them warm

and safe from predators.

They're just floating fluff balls
being fed.

You've got that big bill
of the parent

and you've got to this tiny little
mouth to feed,

but they're so gentle

and they're able to manipulate
the small little pieces of food

into the chicks' bills.

Sometimes it's a fish
every five minutes.

It's a big responsibility
for the parents.

Luckily, loons are built to hunt.

They're really fast swimmers
underwater.

Their legs are attached right
at the back of their body,

and when they dive under,
they stick out their big feet

to do fast turns,
so they can outmanoeuvre

and pick off fish underwater

by doing these fancy turns
with their feet.

What works in water
is a hindrance on land...

and lift-off!

With their heavy, solid bones,

loons need almost half a kilometre
of open water to get airborne.

It'll be a couple of months before
these chicks attempt flight...

..if they make it that far.

The odds are stacked against them.

Maybe 30% to 40% actually make it
through to adulthood.

You can get eaten, you can get
separated from your parents

by a motorboat. A lot can go wrong.

(HOOTING)

Those chicks that get bigger quicker

have much higher odds at surviving
to be breeders themselves.

Growing fast requires lots of fish.

But finding them can be a challenge
as lake environments change.

Climate change can increase
warming waters,

which increase algal blooms, which
makes things more difficult to see.

For visual predators like loons,
that can have a big impact

in their ability to hunt prey.

PIPER: In Wisconsin there's also
been a great increase in rainfall,

probably related to climate change.

Rainfall washes lots of sediment,
and water clarity takes a hit.

And that correlates very closely
with the chick mass decline.

So if it's good water clarity,

chicks will be relatively fat
and sassy.

But in a year when the water clarity
is poor,

the chicks will lose body condition

and that's associated
with a lower survival.

It's not just water clarity.

Pollution from decades of acid rain

can kill off the fish loons feed on.

When I was little, my grandparents
used to come out in the fall

for the trout spawn, cos that'll
attract a lot of birds

that prey on fish.

I've not seen the trout spawn
in the past few years.

Because the trout spawn
hasn't happened,

I don't hear the loon calls
anymore,

like even just a difference
in ten years.

All the animals are
very dependent on each other,

and so if one thing's affected,

the other thing gets affected
as well.

Everything's interrelated.

(BOTH SPEAK ALGONQUIN)

Sheldon's Great-uncle Joe
lived off the land in his youth,

trapping and fishing.

(SPEAKS ALGONQUIN)

He says loons
helped guide him on the water.

(WAILS)

(COOS)

Algonquin Park lakes are clean,

a refuge for these two chicks.

They're growing fast.

But summer is around the corner,
and with it,

the next stage of life -
the path to independence.

In peak summer,
cottagers and campers

flock to Algonquin
to enjoy the great outdoors.

The bigger lakes bear
the brunt of the traffic.

It's quieter here,

where the Algonquin loon family
lives on a small lake

off the beaten path.

As the loon chicks get to
the two-week marker,

they're almost double the size
they were on hatch day.

Their bills are getting longer,

they're looking more of that longer
loon shape.

They stop back-riding
because they're big enough now

that they can hold
their own temperatures.

As the chicks grow,
so does their confidence

to venture out on their own.

But they're still fed
by their parents.

And as the chicks grow,
so do the portion sizes.

Even feeding takes
a little practice.

Across Canada, hundreds
of loon families like this one

are being monitored by volunteers

for the Canadian Lakes Loon Survey.

Journalist Phill Morgan
is one of them.

So, they surveyed here?
Yep, there's a column for each pair

and the maximum number of young
that you've observed.

I'm writing about the experiences of
people of colour in nature.

This is an experience that people
like me should have,

to go out and smell the air
and observe the loons.

These are such beautiful
and transformative experiences.

There's a loon there,
just swimming around.

Oh! There's two! Oh, there's a pair!

Monitoring loons this season
is really important

because we really need to know
the status of these birds

right now to get
at what the mystery is

behind the declines in productivity.

OK. So, now I see an adult
with two babies.

Both chicks look healthy,
but the first-born

has better odds of survival.

PIPER: They will compete for food

and the older chick will often peck
the younger chick,

the younger chick falls behind,
doesn't get as much food,

becomes much smaller,
often is taken by a predator.

Adult loons can be
even more vicious

when defending or taking over
precious territory.

Your average loon pair
is visited quite often

by these unattached
non-breeding birds.

If it's a male loon visiting,
he's seeing if that resident male

is old enough and whether he might
be able to kick him out,

and if it's a female, same thing.
She's checking the resident female.

In Wisconsin, Clune and Lucy

are a couple of weeks away
from hatching chicks

when an intruder arrives.

Clune leaves the nest
to defend his turf.

At age 24, this could be
his last battle.

PIPER: If a young vigorous male
comes along

who's reached peak size
and peak fighting ability,

likely the older male is gonna
perish as a result of it

or at least lose his territory.

This rare footage of an intruder
moving onto a lake in New Hampshire

shows how fast and furious
it can get.

(HONKS)

They grab each other's
bills and heads

and then they whack each other as
hard as they can with their wings,

an apparent effort
to tire each other out.

The stronger one,
the one able to sustain this

for the longest time
and stay up in the water,

often dunks the head
of the weaker one.

We think that a common cause of
death in these battles is drowning.

Clune has survived
plenty of battles.

He sizes up the competition,

before Lucy joins them
in a circle dance.

It's almost like a stare-down.

They'll come within 20cm
of each other,

looking very closely at each other,

and circle very close to each other.

Attacks usually come from below.

But Clune held his own
and I think he went under

and gave him a little jab
and said, "Goodbye!"

And he took off.

Clune has lived to fight another day

and has protected the eggs,
his future progeny.

Linda has been keeping daily watch
on Clune and Lucy's nest.

Finally, the first chick appears.

Straight into the water they go.

But they don't venture far.

Another egg is still on the nest.

A day later,
the younger sibling arrives.

But it's smaller than the first
and struggles to move.

The whole family waits.

But the newborn does not leave
the nest.

(CHIRPS)

I left and came back
four hours later

and the chick and the parents
were way out there

and no other chick,
and I even checked the nest.

So, I don't know what happened
to the second chick.

There are abnormalities

that keep the chick from being
able to seek out its parents

or keep its body temperature up.

That second chick looked like
it had adult-like feathers

instead of the downy feathers

that are good for keeping
the chick warm.

And so, it probably had
thermoregulatory problems and died.

In Algonquin,
both chicks are plump and healthy.

They're now four weeks old.

It's a gawky phase -
downy chick feathers

mixed with new juvenile plumage.

If they can survive two more weeks,

the chicks will reach what
biologists consider a key milestone.

At six weeks old, loon chicks
can fend for themselves
and collect their own food,

and so they're much more likely
to survive and become adult loons.

July is peak loon-watching season
on lakes throughout the park.

Everyone is keen to see
cute little chicks,

Doug and his family included.

Yeah, they're right there.

CHILD: There's no way to tell a male
or female loon apart at all?

Only males yodel. So if you hear
a yodel, it's the male.

(HIGH-PITCHED CRY)

PIPER:
Each male has a distinctive yodel.

So, some are... (MAKES RISING CRY)
"Er-er!"

It can put 20 of those
er-ers at the end

or just one, or even none.

That indicates how aggressive
that male is likely to be.

(WAILS)

That's a wail.
Usually they give a wail

when they want to reunite with
another member of the family.

People describe it
as sounding like a wolf howl,

it's sort of "Wooo!"
That's a terrible imitation.

But tremolo is the call
that sounds like laughter,

the "Ha-ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha!"

(TREMOLO WOOPS)

It's not laughter at all.

It's an alarm call
that humans often hear

because they are usually
the cause of it.

If you hear that,
you should back off.

(TREMOLO WOOPS)

Alright, here we go.
Alright, good.

As July winds down,

Walter Piper is in the thick of
his research, banding loons.

We work 9 to 5
it's just the other 9 to 5.

We can only catch them
with any efficiency at night.

You can creep up to them by putting
a powerful spotlight right on 'em.

(YODELLING)
Shine it right at them.

(HOOTS)

(YODELS)

Get that left...that right wing.

The first capture of the night
is an adult female.

Three, two, one...

Yeah, I think you got it.
Good. Good work, you guys.

Now they're going back
for her chick.

I use an adult call, a hoot,

similar to what the adults use
when they're calling the chick.

(SHORT HOOTS)

You got the top?
No, we don't have to, it's...

Molly, Molly. OK...
One, two, three...

OK, OK. Then I'll take it.

Each bird gets
a unique colour combination.

We got The red stripe over yellow.
Orange over silver.

11-28.11-28.

It has a nine-digit code,

so that if somebody is walking along
the beach in Tampa Bay in the winter

and sees a banded loon
that's washed up on the beach,

they can look at that number and
send it to the bird banding lab

and they're able to give us
really valuable information

on things like migration routes,
also survival patterns.

So now we're taking a drop of blood
for PCR analysis.

Make sure you guide the bird
all the way in there.

3.90.
3.90kg.

And then the chick real quick.

1.18.
1.18.

They just get a few lacerations
every once in a while.

They'll nip you.
You can't blame them,

after what
we're putting them through.

Throughout the summer,
Walter and his team check up

on all their banded loons.

We came to this territory today

to see whether silver or green
stripe, red over blue,

the male was still there,

and white over silver,
cream over yellow

was still there, the female.

And whether they still had
their chick,

their three-week-old chick.

Red over blue on
the left circle, check.

And if we make another visit
a week from now and it's gone,

then it was lost
between three and four weeks.

So that's one important piece
of data that we gather.

I'm gonna get a location
on lake and GPS of the chick.

One look at our banding records
across hundreds of territories,

you're able to piece together

return rates and survival rates.

Walter's data has uncovered
a crucial piece of the puzzle

in population decline.

One key age group is disappearing
at a staggering rate...

Young adults migrating north
for the first time.

Many of them come back
at age two to five,

and we used to get about 40%
of all of our chicks come back.

Now it's about 15%. So there's been
a huge unexplained decline.

They are the future.
They're the future breeders,

and so
I'm enormously concerned about it.

In their southern lives,

without their striking
breeding feathers,

loons don't command much attention.

But figuring out
what's going wrong here

is critical to saving the species.

We don't understand
what the reason is.

We suspect that it could be
something going on in Florida

that's costing them their lives.

It could be something between here
and Florida that's killing them.

We want to take a closer look.

So, loons that wash up
on the shore

in the wintering grounds,
we want to get those carcasses

and have a formal examination done

to get good information as to
why the bird might've died.

Did it starve?
Did it get hit by a boat?

Did it get exposed to pollution?

(HOOTS)

More research is needed to help
the Algonquin siblings

survive the wintering grounds,

and make it back here to breed.

But for now, there is hope.

Both chicks are still thriving.

Every time we see a two-chick brood
survive through like this

to that late in the summer,
it's great to see,

it really contributes to
the population as a whole.

(TREMOLO HOOTS)

As fall approaches, while parents
tend to their offspring,

other loons have
a different focus...

Expanding their social circle.

People often see
large groups of loons

and say, "Oh, they all got together,
they're doing cooperative fishing."

But that's not what's going on.

These groups of loons are actually
non-breeders and failed breeders.

And it is really the equivalent
of a singles bar,

where loons get together
and size up what's available

for future opportunities.

(WAILS)

In late August, Clune's lone chick
passes the six-week milestone,

with enough time to fledge
before the ice arrives.

I feel very happy
because every day it's growing,

it's got a better chance
of making it.

The swift transformation from
newborn to juvenile loon

is astonishing.

In one summer,
in Algonquin and Wisconsin,

they have grown to two thirds
the size of their parents.

Now they must build strength

for the biggest journey
of their lives.

(CHORUS OF WAILS)

In September, as temperatures dip,

sleek flight feathers emerge

and the young birds start
preparing to leave

the only home they've ever known.

It takes practice
to master a new skill.

Commons loons are like us humans.

A chick can look almost full-grown,

it looks like
it should know everything

that it's going to know,
but just like adult kids,

there's a lot to learn
and it takes time.

As with human teenagers,

a free meal is always welcome.

But soon it will be time
to fend for themselves.

(ATMOSPHERIC MUSIC)

The parents
don't really help them much

with preparing for migration.

The adult loons actually leave first
and head south,

and the young loons head south later
on their own.

piper: A typical young loon,

its parents might leave
in October or so.

The young wait until November,

till the ice is starting
to cover the lakes.

It's a perilous few weeks,
alone on the frigid waters.

They need time to get stronger,

but not too much or the ice
will close in on them.

Instinct tells them when to soar.

No-one can say if they'll be back.

But making it this far is a victory

amid so much uncertainty
about the survival of the species.

The projection is that loons will
eventually be lost from the US

and they'll probably be lost from
the southerly portions of Canada too

in the next few decades.

(WAILS)

And that would be
absolutely devastating.

To be camping in Algonquin and not
hear that call in the evening,

that would be a huge loss.

That would be a huge missing element
of what makes it so relaxing

to be out on a lake
in the North Woods.

If there weren't loons,
it just wouldn't be the same.

GRENZER: I hope it's not
Clune's last summer here.

I hope I have a few more years
with him.

But there's a lot of things
that can happen

when he goes to
his wintering grounds.

I've been studying loons
for 15 years now,

and I'll keep studying them
for as long as I need to,

because loons are such a critically
important part of the environment,

and especially of our culture.

We love loons and, you know, we
wanna keep them forever if we can.

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