Counting birds at Sandy Key in Florida Bay contributes valuable data to a variety of partners. With a loud splash, Shauna Sayers drops the anchor, then plops the first kayak into the shallow waters around Sandy Key in Florida Bay. Sayers, a wading bird specialist at Audubon’s Everglades Research Station in Tavernier, makes regular visits to this island and 62 other keys each spring to monitor the nesting efforts of wading birds. One species in particular, the Roseate Spoonbill, is targeted because it can tell us about the health of the Everglades ecosystem. On any given day, Sayers expertly captains a small vessel, loaded with kayaks, other gear, and a small team, through a maze of channel markers denoting shallow waters, no-wake zones, and seasonal no-entry zones established by the National Park Service.…