The Great Petoskey Passenger Pigeon Nesting of 1878 Event – June 15-19, 2026
In just about a month, Petoskey is going to be home to a celebration of a bird that once blanketed northern Michigan skies. In the early 19th century, the passenger pigeon was the most abundant bird in North America. At its peak, it is estimated that there were 5 billion of them, and that they made up 40% of the entire bird population. John James Audubon once described a flock of passenger pigeons flying over Minnesota as being one mile wide and 240 miles long that “darkened the dome of the sky for three days as it passed overhead”. That was in 1813. And now, the species is extinct.
Starting Monday, June 15, for five consecutive days, Petoskey will be celebrating the life of the passenger pigeon with events and programming where people of all ages can come together to hear about the life and the tragic demise of this bird that was once so prevalent in and around Petoskey. There will be events all week long, culminating in the reveal of a new public art piece- a sculpture of a passenger pigeon that will be on display at the Danser Professional Building located at 308 State Street. All of the events are free and open to the public.
Here is a brief rundown of the week’s events. You can refer to the image for more details.
- Monday, June 15, at 7:00 p.m. at the Little Traverse History Museum, is the lecture The Unlikely Extinction of the Passenger Pigeon presented by Mackinac State Historic Parks Park Naturalist Kyle Bagnall.
- Tuesday, June 16, at 8:00 a.m., there will be a narrated bird walk along the Bear River hosted by the Petoskey Regional Audubon Society.
- Wednesday, June 17 at 4:00 p.m., there will be a guided nature walk led by Dylan Klinesteker, Director of Education at Little Traverse Conservancy and Jess Piskor, Inland Seas Education Association Grounds Supervisor at the Offield Family Viewlands.
- Also on Wednesday, June 17, at 7:00 p.m. is a viewing of The Lost Bird Project at Crooked Tree Arts Center with remarks by artist and filmmaker Todd McGrain.
- Thursday, June 18, at 10:00 a.m., Crooked Tree Arts Center is having their Coffee@ 10 with Todd McGrain who will talk about the design and casting of his bronze passenger pigeon monument.
- Also on Thursday, June 18, at 2:00 p.m., there will be family activities with Todd McGrain at the Little Traverse History Museum.
- Also on Thursday, June 18, at 3:00 p.m., teachers are invited to the Little Traverse History Museum to learn teaching approaches for sharing the story of the passenger pigeon with their students.
- The last event on Thursday, June 18, at 7:00 p.m., there will be a lecture at the Little Traverse History Museum by the museum’s executive director Jane Garver titled Passenger Pigeons in Petoskey.
- Friday, June 19, at 11:00 a.m. the new passenger pigeon sculpture and public art piece will be revealed at the Danser Professional Building at 11:00 a.m. The event will feature a reading from Aldo Leopold as well as a performance of the “Ballad of the Passenger Pigeon” by local singer-songwriter Linda Hammond.
- Also, all week long the Little Traverse History Museum will be open and have on display a mural depicting the killing of passenger pigeons in the Petoskey area in the late 1800’s as well as a taxidermy passenger pigeon.
Click here to see the calendar of events on the Little Traverse History Museum’s website.
Click here for an informative segment that Interlochen Public Radio recently did on the passenger pigeon.
Special thank you to Lisa Hoyt for providing most of the information for this blog. You may remember her name from my Audubon Day blog from 2024. If you need a refresher, you can reach that blog by clicking here.
I also gathered a lot of my statistics from the Smithsonian website which is an amazing collection of knowledge not only on the passenger pigeon, but all things art, history, science, and more.
