Miguel Mejias’s dream was to become a marine biologist but his plan fell to pieces when he discovered he couldn’t dive.

A chance meeting with David Wingate gave him a new purpose.

As part of the Bermuda College’s virtual 2022 Roche Science event on Wednesday, Mr Mejias will share how the former government conservation officer fuelled his passion for songbirds and seabirds, most notably the white-eyed vireo, and discuss the history of birds here.

“We’d like to give viewers a chance to see what bird life was like before humans arrived,” said Mr Mejias, an ornithologist, conservationist and naturalist who hopes to finish his doctoral thesis in biology in the coming months. “We've learnt through the fossil record that many endemic species of birds have gone extinct; endemic meaning that an animal or plant is unique to one place or region in the world. I will document what species are still here in Bermuda today, especially the migrant ones that travel all over the world in the fall and winter.”

He continued: "And then basically that's going to bring us to the present, to what species are here today, with a special emphasis on the white-eyed vireo or the ‘chick-of-the-village’, which is an endemic subspecies to the Bermuda islands. It essentially survived human settlement which is amazing considering it is such a small little songbird, no bigger than like a drumstick."

One of the messages he hopes to get across during the talk is just how important bird photography is for record-keeping.

“The birds are actually declining,” he said. “It's good that we have people who are out there photographing birds so we can document what species are still occurring, even the migrant and vagrant ones that turn up during their migration."

Mr Mejias was drawn to the outdoors from an early age. With marine biology in mind, he signed up for a diving course at age 21 but “learnt pretty quickly that I actually couldn't equalise my ears to reduce that pressure”.

“I was pretty upset, pretty down about it. But not too long after that, probably a week or so later, a friend of mine introduced me to David Wingate who, ironically, was my neighbour.

“I remember seeing David when I was a child, holding the binoculars, looking at the trees — I didn’t know what he was doing. But in hindsight I'm like, ‘Oh, he was birdwatching.’”

Dr Wingate took Mr Mejias out birding and he instantly “fell in love”.

“We went to this golf course in Tucker’s Town and there was this pond in the middle of the golf course and there was this exotic duck sitting there, floating. I had never seen anything like it.

“To me it looked like something from a different universe. At the time I was only familiar with the mallard, the classic duck. But I saw this black-and-white duck with a blue bill and white on the base of the bill and I'm like, ‘What is this beautiful thing?’”

From Dr Wingate he learnt that it was a male ring-necked duck that had flown here from North America, something Mr Mejias hadn’t previously known was possible.

“So yeah, just seeing this migrant bird on this golf course, in this pond is what triggered me,” he said. “It made me realise birds are pretty cool and Bermuda isn’t boring. People always say there’s nothing to do in Bermuda but at least 200 species come here every year and it's amazing.

“I realised that it's not just bird watching; it’s ornithology, it’s conservation and there are jobs out there for people who are into this kind of thing.”

In 2009 he graduated from Bermuda College and left for Trent University in Canada, where he completed his undergraduate degree. Mr Mejias then went to the University of Newfoundland where he earned his master’s and is on his way to receiving his doctorate.

His plan is to eventually take over from Jeremy Madeiros, Bermuda’s current conservation officer.

“I think I'm definitely an outlier,” he said of his career choice. “I definitely deviated from what most people are interested in. Most people look at being accountants or electricians, they get jobs in construction. There’s nothing wrong with those but I was always into nature, even as a child.

“I was always outside in the trees looking for lizards, playing with bugs; daydreaming and looking at butterflies and fennel. My mind was always in the clouds. So the signs were there for sure.”

He was already working towards his PhD when the pandemic hit.

“I had all my data so the pandemic didn't like disrupt my fieldwork thankfully, but it did mean I had to come back to Bermuda and finish like writing physically here,” said Mr Mejias, who had made the white-eyed vireo the focus of his work.

He was drawn in by the “complex song, known onomatopoeically as ‘chick-of-the-village’ ” which gave the bird its nickname and which males to attract mates and for territory defence.

"Myself and Paul Watson, a fellow birder, have colour-banded several white-eyed vireos across the island and learnt that males inhabit the same patch of woods, ie, territories, year-round,” he said. “One such male banded at Ferry Reach in 2016 was seen in the same territory in January 2022. Their ability to adapt to the invasive tree species in Bermuda, which humans are also responsible for, is remarkable."

He is hoping to hand in his PhD defence in May or June, after which he will spend “a few years [working] overseas”.

“My dream goal is to come back home and hopefully do the same role that my mentor David Wingate did, which was being a conservation officer looking at the petrels and the environment.

Miguel Mejias will speak at 6.30pm on Wednesday as part of the Bermuda College’s virtual Roche Science Week. Access the free talk on Facebook and the College’s YouTube channel