Meet the next generation of coastal changemakers.

The WildLife Guards program develops young conservation leaders in Bridgeport and West Haven, Connecticut. In coastal locations like Pleasure Beach (Bridgeport) and Sandy Point (West Haven), high school students are given the opportunity to work alongside field biologists stewarding, monitoring, and raising public awareness about the beach-nesting birds that share our shores. 

Their goal? Help biologists track the wildlife and plants in the area, and engage and inform the public about how to share the shore with important beach-nesting birds like the Piping Plover and American Oystercatcher.

Project Partners
Audubon Connecticut
Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History (RTPI)
City of Bridgeport
City of West Haven

For questions about the WildLife Guards Program, contact Corrie Folsom-O'Keefe, Bird Conservation Programs Manager, by email.

American Oystercatcher

Latin:  Haematopus palliatus

Common Tern

Latin:  Sterna hirundo

Least Tern

Latin:  Sternula antillarum

Piping Plover

Latin:  Charadrius melodus

Meet the WildLife Guards of Pleasure Beach

Lazy summer Fridays are not a thing on Pleasure Beach. For a handful of high school students in Bridgeport, Connecticut, neither is a relaxing summer. While most of their peers are blindly hitting the snooze button on their phones at 10 in the morning, you can find Ichell Perez, Anthony Love, Derien Young, Sara Gallo, Nivea Ortiz, Natalie Sinclair, and Nicole Llivisaca in bright blue shirts at the Pleasure Beach Water Taxi. These seven teenagers are the stewards of Audubon Connecticut’s WildLife Guards program. Read more >>