After 43 years of operating at its current location, native wildlife hospital Pelican Harbor Seabird Station is packing up and moving out.
Those who have brought an injured bird to the station or been lucky enough to meet any of its ambassador animals have no need to worry, however, as the nonprofit isn’t traveling very far. Mowgli, a resident Eastern screech owl, and Maggie, the station’s Virginia opossum, will nestle with the rest of the Pelican Harbor bunch at their new home less than two miles away.
The new property is 14 times the size of the station’s current property, which it has been leasing from the county since the 1980s. Pelican Harbor Seabird Station purchased the 2.6 acres of land known as the “Little River Preserve” in January 2020 and has been looking forward to making its move ever since.
(Pelican Harbor Seabird Station/Facebook)
Maggie is a Virginia opossum living at Pelican Harbor Seabird Station as an ambassador animal.
Making an Upgrade
The hospital has long outgrown its present 950-square-foot facility, located on Biscayne Bay just off the 79th Street Causeway, where Pelican Harbor Seabird Station’s 17-member staff treats 2,000 patients representing more than 125 species – all on less than one-fifth of an acre.
“It’s just too small,” said executive director Christopher Boykin. “We started with one species, and now we’re doing all wildlife.”
All wildlife, except for rabies vector species, that is. But expanding patient intake to treat animals with rabies is just one of the upgrades that staff members are looking forward to with the new facility.
Plans for the site include an education center and an 8,000-square-foot hospital, more than eight times the size of the station’s current hospital. It will accommodate an intensive care unit for critical patients and an area for quarantine quarters, both of which were never feasible at the existing facility.
(Samantha Morell for Biscayne Times)
Pelican Harbor Seabird Station has outgrown its current location on Biscayne Bay off the 79th Street Causeway.
The new location at 399 NE 82nd Terrace is conveniently situated between Biscayne Boulevard and the I-95 corridor, providing seamless patient drop-off and reducing transport times, Boykin said. It’s also located roughly eight feet above sea level along the Little River’s living shoreline, minimizing hurricane impact and increasing survival and release rates.
Plus, the Little River breeding grounds make for a great manatee viewing area for residents’ enjoyment.
(Samantha Morell for Biscayne Times)
Christopher Boykin, Pelican Harbor Seabird Station’s executive director, leading a sunset cruise July 14, 2023.
“There’s a lot of synergistic points around this place for a magical property,” Boykin said.
Historic Land
Boykin, who has served as executive director for nine years, is particularly excited about the new property’s historic value – having been previously owned by Miami’s founder, Julia Tuttle, and before that, occupied by the Tequesta, one of South Florida’s first Native American tribes. The Tequesta will be honored with an archaeological preserve on the property displaying discovered artifacts that date back to as early as 750 A.D.
(Pelican Harbor Seabird Station/Facebook)
Pelican Harbor Seabird Station sees roughly 2,000 patients a year, including injured birds and other native wildlife.
As debates run rampant around Miami about how to deal with historic native land such as this, Boykin has proven that he and his staff are hospitable neighbors and keepers of the earth. Old-growth tree canopies and open fields will be preserved as a public park for residents to enjoy year-round, while unobtrusive and transportable wildlife habitats occupy other parts of the land.
Pelican Harbor Seabird Station has also hosted successful cleanups of Little River in the past. Additionally, Robert Carr, Miami-Dade’s first county archaeologist, has worked on the site and will continue to be involved as construction begins on the hospital.
(Pelican Harbor Seabird Station)
Pelican Harbor Seabird Station will soon move to a new location alongside Little River which will include a larger hospital and an education center and public park.
The hospital, Boykin notes, is the only building on the site and will be located near railroad tracks already dredged for development. That’s a drastic improvement from the 46 townhomes that had previously been proposed for the property before Pelican Harbor bought and rezoned the land.
The land’s rezoning, which gained city approval late last year, is just one of the reasons why construction has stalled. Pelican Harbor finalized its $2.4 million purchase of the property just before the COVID-19 pandemic took hold of the country. Since then, building costs have swelled. However, with more than $13.6 million of its $15 million goal secured through grants, donations and loans, the nonprofit is just about ready to finally break ground between September and October.
(Pelican Harbor Seabird Station)
Harry and Darlene Kelton are the founders of Pelican Harbor Seabird Station.
A Continuing Legacy
With the future knocking at its door, Pelican Harbor Seabird Station hasn’t forgotten to look back to where it started. The Tequesta land is a constant reminder to reach into the past, and for Pelican Harbor, that begins with Darlene and Harry Kelton.
The Keltons founded the station in 1980 after they were propelled into action by a pelican who had suffered a hook-and-line injury and showed up near the doorstep of their boathouse. The couple took in the injured animal and cared for it in their bathroom before releasing it back into the wild.
“That single act of kindness has spawned a multidecade organization that is continuing to grow,” said Chloe Chelz, Pelican Harbor’s assistant director.
The organization saw about 150 patients in its first year in 1980. In 2022, it treated 2,117. And though the mission started with one pelican, the station’s patients now consist of blue jays, Cooper’s hawks, Eastern screech owls, fish crows, Florida boxed turtles, great blue herons, squirrels, laughing gulls, mockingbirds, opossums and so much more.
Boykin notes that 64% of South Florida’s birds are migratory. Located at the southern terminus of the Atlantic flyway, Miami is often the last stop they make before crossing the Caribbean.
“Those in conservation know that Miami is more than this sexy Magic City,” he said. “It’s also a really important place for biodiversity … It’s so important that we are able to provide professional medical care to these native birds and patients that are impacted from our mere existence, from our buildings, from our skyscrapers, from our fishing tackle, from our pets.”
(Pelican Harbor Seabird Station/Facebook)
Pelican Harbor Seabird Station initially treated injured birds, only, specifically brown pelicans, but has since expanded to treat all native animals, including squirrels.
Each pelican that comes into the station gets banded with a unique number and sent back into the wild to continue its migratory cycle. The station has received band data back from as far as the Carolinas, Cuba and the Bahamas, solidifying the organization’s mission of releasing rehabilitated animals to enable future generations and a healthy ecosystem.
Everything that the Pelican Harbor Seabird Station has been able to accomplish thus far has been realized on a property less than the average lot size for a single-family home in Miami-Dade County. That’s on donations only, with an average cost of care of $535. Now it’s moving to a property whose grandiosity matches its impact.
“It’s just a beautiful thing for the community,” Boykin said, “and we’re really, really excited.”