FAIRHOPE, Ala. — The brown pelican was once on the brink of extinction, but their future is now much brighter. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced last week that the bird is being removed from the list of threatened and endangered species under the Endangered Species Act.

“At a time when so many species of wildlife are threatened, we once in a while have an opportunity to celebrate an amazing success story,” Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said in a statement released by FWS officials. “Today is such a day. The brown pelican is back!”

First declared endangered in 1970 under the Endangered Species Preservation Act (precursor to the current Endangered Species Act), the brown pelican witnessed its overall population decline due to DDT, a pesticide that softened the shells of their eggs and left the embryos vulnerable.

That all changed when former FWS biologist Rachel Carson published “Silent Spring,” warning of the dangers associated with unrestricted pesticide use. Her work led to the 1972 DDT ban.

State and federal efforts to protect or establish habitat, along with the help of individuals, conservation groups and businesses, also served to bring back the birds in a big way. There are now more than 650,000 brown pelicans found across Florida and the Gulf and Pacific coasts, the Caribbean and Latin America.

“They were removed (from the list) in our range, from Alabama eastward, in 1985,” said Roger Clay, a Spanish Fort-based wildlife biologist with the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Department of Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries. FWS removed the population in Alabama, Georgia, Florida and the Atlantic coastal states at the time, but left the designation in place for Louisiana, Texas and the West Coast because the numbers still weren’t there.

Part of the success story here is Gaillard Island, a 1,300-acre island established in 1979 using spoil dredged to build the Theodore Ship Channel. The island was completed in 1981, and four brown pelicans were found nesting there just two years later. It marked one of the first such sightings along the Alabama coast in decades.

Clay makes numerous trips to the triangular island each year, where he conducts a census of brown pelicans and the many other nesting species. Addressing the removal of the brown pelican from the list, he said, “It’s a process. It doesn’t happen overnight.”

FWS Director Sam Hamilton praised the coastal states for their ongoing efforts to restore this species. He said, “Brown pelicans could not have recovered without a strong and continuing support network of partnerships among federal and state government agencies, tribes, conservation organizations and individual citizens. This is truly a success story that the whole nation can celebrate.”

In the Southwest, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, The Nature Conservancy and other conservation organizations helped purchase nesting sites and developed monitoring programs to ensure pelican rookeries were thriving.

Louisiana and the Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission jointly implemented a restoration project. A total of 1,276 young pelicans were captured in Florida and released at three sites in southeastern Louisiana during the 13 years of the project.

Past efforts to protect the brown pelican led to the birth of the National Wildlife Refuge System more than a century ago in central Florida, according to a press release. German immigrant Paul Kroegel, appalled by the indiscriminate slaughter of pelicans for their feathers, approached President Theodore Roosevelt. This prompted the president to create the first National Wildlife Refuge at Pelican Island in 1903, when Kroegel was named the first refuge manager.

The system has today grown to 550 national wildlife refuges, many of which have played key roles in the recovery of the brown pelican.

“They just need food, cover, water and space to breed,” Clay said. “If you don’t introduce some detrimental factor (such as DDT), they get along fine.”

With total removal of the brown pelican from the list of threatened and endangered species, federal agencies will no longer be required to consult with FWS to ensure any action they authorize, fund or carry out will not harm the species.

However, additional federal laws, such as the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and the Lacey Act, will continue to protect the brown pelican, its nests and eggs.

“All of the birds, if they are not listed, are protected,” Clay noted. “You can’t take them or kill them.”

Surprisingly illegal is the collection of dead pelicans or any part thereof, such as their skulls or lost plumage.

Clay said, “It sounds so innocent, to pick up a feather off the ground. If it were legal to pick up a feather, there would be no way to enforce protection. But, no one is going to kick in a kid’s door.”

FWS has developed a Post-Delisting Monitoring Plan, designed to monitor and verify that the recovered, delisted populations remain secure from the risk of extinction. The agency can relist the brown pelican if future monitoring or other information shows it is necessary to prevent a significant risk to the brown pelican.

The monitoring will be done in cooperation with the state resource agencies, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Mexico, other federal agencies, non-governmental organizations and individuals.

FWS is working with state natural resource agencies where the brown pelican occurs to develop cooperative management agreements to ensure that the species continues to be monitored.

“Some people think if something is off the list, we don’t have to worry about it anymore — not so,” said Clay. “We still have to watch out for them.”

He pointed out there is no documentation indicating the brown pelican nested in Alabama prior to the establishment of the Gaillard Island rookery, but it is entirely possible the species had a prior toehold here.

The final rule removing the bird from the list of threatened and endangered species will soon be published in the Federal Register, and will take effect 30 days after publication.