When the world’s oldest known wild bird, Wisdom, comes soaring in from a multi-week foraging trip to the North Pacific and drops her spatula-size feet onto the sands at Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge, she could be any one of a million Laysan Albatross. With a six-and-a-half-foot wingspan, they are one of the smaller species of albatross, but what distinguishes this 67-year-old from any other Laysan is a simple stop-sign-red band on her right leg that reads Z 3 3 3. “I’ve spent a lot of time at Midway, but I can’t spot Wisdom if it weren’t for her band,” says Matt Brown, superintendent for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument (PMNM), the protected marine area encompassing Midway Atoll NWR. “I could be looking at Wisdom next to a bird 40 years younger and not know it was her.” The red auxiliary band helps USFWS easily monitor Wisdom’s comings and goings, which has become especially important in the past...