How do you teach a bird how—and where—to fly?

Maybe we should ask another question first. Why on Earth would you have to?!

Here’s why. Birds called northern bald ibis got into a major predicament a few hundred years ago. People loved to eat the red-headed, curved-beaked, shiny black and green birds at fancy dinners. They hunted them. Soon almost none remained alive.

People worked hard to bring the baldies back. They bred birds from zoo colonies. They introduced their offspring back into the wild. In Europe, the population went from zero to almost 300. The problem: Bald ibis don’t know how to migrate by instinct. They have to learn from older ibis born in the wild. 

But the world is fresh out of that kind of ibis. People have to stand—no, fly—in the gap. 

Bald ibis still have the urge to migrate. But they don’t know where to go. Ibis are designed to travel to wintering grounds such as Tuscany, Italy. Instead, released birds flew in different directions. Eventually, they died.

 “We have to teach them the migration route,” says biologist Johannes Fritz.

Scientists take tiny chicks to an aviary. They work with them in hopes of the chicks “imprinting” on them. (That’s what it is called when birds bond with humans.) 

“We feed them, we clean them, we clean their nests,” says team member Barbara Steininger. “But also we interact with them.”

Ms. Steininger and others then climb aboard microlight aircraft. They wave and shout encouragement through a bullhorn.

The aircraft looks like a flying go-kart with a giant fan on the back. A yellow parachute holds it up. It doesn’t seem very birdlike. Still, three dozen birds follow it!

The helpers hope that once many birds learn the way, in time they will teach the next generations of ibis without human help.

Why? People can help restore populations of animals. Sometimes that involves getting close and bonding with the creatures.