HONOLULU (AP) -- A pack of 10 gooney bird chicks - still fuzzy
and flightless - flew into Kauai Friday - on a chartered plane.
Japanese researchers are set to raise the wild birds and thus
get a leg up on saving their country's own endangered golden
gooney. The birds, also known as Laysan albatross, will be held
in quarantine for about three days, according to the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service. The nests of nearly 500,000 gooney birds
blanket the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge about 1,000
miles northwest of Kauai. Japanese researchers hope that through
learning how to nurture the one-month-old chicks of the
relatively numerous Laysan albatross they will better understand
how to bring Japan's short-tailed albatross, or golden gooney,
back from the edge of extinction. "This unique pilot project
allow us to share our previous knowledge and experience with our
Japanese counterparts across the Pacific while also expanding
that knowledge and experience through cooperative efforts to
recover this endangered