Meet the Artist Who Wants to Tattoo Every Bird Species in Florida

The Gulf Coast city of St. Petersburg is a place where art and nature blend together to create a whole vibe: The Dalí Museum overlooks mangrove-lined waters, bird-themed murals dot the streets of downtown, the Florida Wildlife Corridor-led Wild Space Gallery hosts nature-themed art exhibits. Just outside of downtown at Tootsie's Tattoo, artist Harley Babst (a.k.a. Grouchy Goblin Ink) is adding to the city’s art-and-nature reputation with a project of her own that’s getting a lot of attention.

In April, Babst launched her tattoo bird guide project with a goal of tattooing every bird species found in Florida. After a feature in the local lifestyle newspaper, the project has exploded, with more than 45 requests in a matter of weeks. Babst also appeared on the local news to talk about the project.

More than 500 bird species are found in the Sunshine State, including those that migrate, spend winters, and live here year-round. Babst has a running spreadsheet where she records each species, from the iconic Roseate Spoonbill to the seldom seen Bananaquit, and tracks her progress. So far, she has completed nine tattoos, with many more scheduled.

Though she grew up hiking and exploring nature in the foothills of her native Alabama, Babst’s interest in Florida’s birds ignited when she moved to St. Pete and found herself surrounded by a variety of new habitats.

“The environment here is so diverse. I really love that I can experience all different ranges from the beach to the swamps and sloughs, to the pine scrubs all within a drive,” says Babst. 

Exploring the wild places along the Gulf Coast with her partner, Babst has plenty of opportunities to get reference photos from which to draw up her designs. She loves Crescent Lake for its abundance of American White Pelicans and Wood Storks, and Oscar Scherer State Park is a favorite for the Florida Scrub-Jay, an iconic Florida species with ever-dwindling available habitat.

Babst tattoos in the American traditional style, with bold black outlines and rich fields of color. Her birds are right at home in American traditional — eagles and swallows are common motifs in the style, which originated with sailors at the turn of the 20th century — but for this project, Babst has had to find the right balance to ensure the species are recognizable.

“I think the challenges for me come with stylizing them while keeping them true to the living creature,” she says. “It is important to me that they look like the birds I intend them to be.”

When dreaming up her project, Babst knew she wanted it to support conservation in some way, so she offers a $50 discount to anyone who donates at least $10 to Seaside Seabird Sanctuary in Indian Shores, Owl’s Nest Sanctuary in Odessa, Friends of the Pelicans, Inc., or St. Pete Audubon. The excitement around the tattoo project has been a boon for the organizations, and Babst was even invited to visit Owl's Nest.

Of course, people’s reasons for getting bird tattoos are as diverse as the species themselves, and Babst loves learning the stories behind each one. She recently tattooed a Chuck-will’s-widow on someone who grew up hearing their strange calls every evening, and on another client, a Limpkin to honor the little family that visits their pond each year. One of the first birds Babst ever tattooed, long before this project began, was a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker for a friend who found one after it struck a window at her office. The bird did not survive, but it inspired the friend to learn more about window strikes and advocate for protections — researchers estimate that around 1 billion birds are killed by window strikes each year — and to memorialize it on her body, permanently.

As she checks off more species on her list, Babst hopes to turn the project into a book, modeled after the Audubon bird guides she frequently turns to for inspiration. With hundreds of birds to go, she plans to spread her wings to visit further-flung birding hotspots across the state, like Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary and Orlando Wetlands in search of more inspiration for her art.