This is Bird Note.

Emily Rabbito's book Lessons for Survival begins with a bird.

Well, a painting of a bird.

In New York City, actually in West Harlem where I teach and it was a mural of two birds, a pair

of burrowing owls and I found the mural to be really delightful

and also kind of surprising in the context of like the cityscape.

After the burrowing owls painted on the security gate of a local business,

Emily saw another mural and another.

She later learned the paintings are a collaboration between artists

and the National Audubon Society to highlight bird species at risk of extinction due to climate change.

Scattered throughout New York City, Emily decided to seek out all the murals and photograph them.

Because as you know with street art, it's going to disappear probably.

It's not going to be there forever.

Grime is going to change it or it's going to get tagged over by another graffiti artist or the business is going to change hands and the bird's going to disappear.

So I wanted to document them before they were gone.

My project was also, it's about loss. It's about like recognizing beauty while it's here in an act of love and devotion and

conservation in the same way that people participate in bird counts,

participating in something that's bigger than myself.

You can learn more in Emily Rabbito's new book. something that's bigger than myself.

You can learn more in Emily Rabbito's new book, Lessons for Survival, Mothering Against the Apocalypse.

For Bird Note, I'm Michael Stein.