Using birds to connect us

Want to connect to other people who share the same kind of passion you do, but who you've never met?  Then get involved in bird conservation!

Prothonotary Warbler is one of our focal bird species.  Photo --
Creative Commons.

I am the chair of the Conservation Action Committee of the Cayuga Bird Club, and Founder of the Sister Bird Club Network.  I am passionate about bird conservation and connecting with other who are as passionate as me.  Luckily, I am surrounded by many people locally who share that passion for birds and conservation.

Recently, our Club decided to roll up our collective sleeves and take on several related projects to benefit the birds we love.  We are collaborating with the City of Ithaca and the Cornell Botanic Gardens on projects on two parcels at the south end of Cayuga Lake.

One parcel, Renwick Woods Wildlife Sanctuary adjacent to Stewart Park, exists today because our first Club President, Louis Agassiz Fuertes, worked tirelessly in 1913 to protect these seasonally flooded woods from development.  Today, these woods are degraded by a combination of over-browsing by deer and a plethora of invasive, non-native plant species.  This parcel is owned by the City of Ithaca.

Lighthouse Point  Woods (a.k.a. Jetty Woods)
is one of the parcels we are working in to improve habitat
for migratory birds.  Photo credit - Jody Enck.

The second parcel, owned by the Cornell Botanic Gardens, is officially named Lighthouse Point Woods although many birders know it as Jetty Woods for the jetty that extends from its north end out into Cayuga Lake.  If anything, the habitat in this parcel is even more degraded in terms of being less diverse than over in Renwick Woods.  These two parcels are only about 150 meters apart at their closest points, and they are separated by Fall Creek and part of a public golf course.

We chose 3 focal bird species after doing some research using eBird and other information about bird species populations and migration.  The species are Purple Martin (a declining migratory aerial insectivore), Wood Thrush (a declining migratory species that breeds in the understory of mature woods), and Prothonotoary Warbler (a locally rare migratory species that breeds in flooded forests). 

Cayuga Bird Club members painting some of the sections
of our Purple Martin apartment complex.
Photo Credit -- Jody Enck.

Part of our habitat improvement efforts involve constructing and erecting nest boxes for Purple Martins and Prothonotary Warblers.  I'll post more information about these efforts in the near future.  For now, I'll just say that we had fun building and painting the boxes! 

I'll also post more later about our efforts to improve the habitat in the parcels by removing invasive plant species and planting native species.  How many stems of privet do you think can sprout and grow in one 10m x 10m plot?  Stay tuned for the answer in an upcoming post.

Another important aspect of our habitat improvement effort is community engagement.  We want to raise awareness of the need for bird

One of our Club members used her extensive expertise in
conservation education to put together information kiosks for
our Community Nest Box Build.  Photo Credit -- Jody Enck.

conservation among residents of the broader Ithaca area.  Earlier today, we hosted a Community Nest Box Build.  Families built 19 nest boxes to take home to attract cavity nesting birds to their neighborhoods.  They learned about our focal species, their habitat needs, and how planting native plants can help birds like these.  They also learned that other resident birds like Black-capped Chickadees, White-breasted Nuthatches, and House Wrens might also use the boxes they made and took home.

The smiles on the faces of the kids and adults who were there today let us know that our outreach efforts were very successful in making our initial contact.  Now, we want to go beyond the fun, and stimulate a deeper interest and conviction in helping to conserve birds.  Some of our next steps will be to connect with birders and other community members in places where Purple Martins, Prothonotary Warblers, and Wood Thrushes spend the winter.  Stay tuned for more about that!

Two happy community members took home nest boxes to
provide places for cavity nesting birds to nest in their
neighborhood.  Photo Credit -- Jody Enck.

Birding with kids

Birding with kids

      During summer of 2018, the American Birding Association podcast features two segments on birding with kids (May podcast July podcast).  The podcasts included great interviews with birding parents and/or bird trip leaders who offer bird walks for kids.  The speakers provided excellent advice, and I encourage all readers to check-out the podcasts.

      I, too, am a birding parent.  This post is 

What do you do when you take kids birding?

about some of my experiences of birding with kids.  

         First, a little background for context.  I've been a birder just about all my life.  When I got married, my spouse tolerated my birding, but she didn't get much enjoyment out of it herself.  So, when our kids were born, there was not a lot of natural socialization into a birding culture going on for the boys.  It wasn't easy to even maintain a bird feeder in the backyard or walk around our woods with binoculars looking for birds.  We ended up separating and getting divorced when the boys were about 9 and 12 years-old.

     Life as a birding parent post-divorce has looked very different than life as a birding parent pre-divorce, although in many ways, I was a single-parent birder in both of those lives.  Here are a couple of vignettes about birding with kids from each of those lives.

“My eyes know, but they can’t talk…”

Each year around my birthday in mid-March, my two young sons and I plan a trip around the Finger Lakes looking for signs of spring.  We especially try to find some of the big flocks of migrating waterfowl that pass through here in March.  A few years ago when my boys were 7 and 10, we started our day at the south end of Cayuga Lake where they enjoyed counting individuals of the species of birds they could identify.  One son estimated that he saw 15 mallards while the other counted over 50.  The actual numbers didn’t matter, just finding species they could recognize and getting in the habit of trying to estimate their numbers made it fun for me and them.  As morning wore into afternoon, we had driven north to Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge.  The boys were hanging in there, but I knew we’d have to head home soon before they got bored.  I was just hoping to find that one thing that would make it a day for them to remember.  Several miles north of the refuge, we found it – thousands upon thousands of Snow Geese.  We parked to watch the spectacle and both boys climbed atop the car for a better view.  For over a half an hour, we couldn’t even talk to each other over the din of goose talk as wave after wave of birds lifted off and continued north on migration.  Finally, when the last, small flocks were straggling overhead, I asked my boys how many Snow Geese they thought they had just seen so they could add them to their lists.  My 7-year old responded, “I don’t know.  My eyes know, but they can’t talk. So I can’t ask them.”  My eyes know something, too – that my sons were becoming birders.

Getting up close and personal with spectacular numbers of
             birds can excite birders of any age.

A moral of this story is that even young kids will tolerate a lot if there is some amount of fun, excitement, or even spectacle for them to experience.

Pride and confidence

               In the summer of 2015, my then 12- and 15-year olds accompanied me on a trip to the west coast.  I wanted them to experience the ecology, sights, and smells of a part of the country that is quite different from the humid, mixed broad-leaf ecosystems with which they were familiar in the northeastern U.S.  We took this trip when much of the West was deep into a multiple-year drought, and you might think it would be hard to find birding opportunities that would pique the kids’ interest.  However, agriculture reins supreme in California in terms of water use.  So, many of the agricultural fields were an irrigated oasis of green amidst a see of parched landscape.  Huge numbers of raptors were attracted to these fields because the lush, green vegetation provided excellent habitat for small rodents and insects that served as prey for the raptors.  We sought these areas out because of the sheer number of raptors attracted to them.  The boys soon became good at telling apart two of the common Buteo species we encountered.  Both Red-tailed and Swainson’s Hawks are large raptors that often hunt by soaring although both also can be found stealthily acting as sit-and-wait predators on whatever perch site they can find.  Both also have variable plumage, so field marks sometimes aren’t all that diagnostic.  Add to that the fact that a lot of the birds that we saw were back-lit making them just a dark silhouette of a raptor.  Those silhouettes are pretty different, though, with Swainson’s tending to be thinner and longer-looking and Red-tails looking a bit like they are body builders.  The kids themselves came up with the mantra that Swainson’s are svelte and Redtails are robust!

    

Svelte or robust?  Can you make the call?

 A moral of this story is that kids like to be reminded that they do know a lot, and that the birding skills they are developing are useful and can be something that gives them pride.

          

Kids as co-leaders

               Most kids, mine included, don’t like to go along on field trips involving mostly older birders.  Let’s face it.  It can be incredibly boring for young kids to enjoy the company of birders substantially older than themselves.  What’s even worse is when the kids feel like they are not very good at birding, and people patronize them by telling them that they are better than they know they are.  This is not helpful, and kids see right through it.  That actually can be humiliating for them. 

 I have been lucky to stumble on a way for my kids to feel good about “having to go” with me while I led a field trip for older folks who were mostly new to birding.  We showed up early at the meeting spot to get out the scope and make a quick assessment of what birds were around.  About a dozen people showed up.  Most were pretty new to birding, and some had no optics.  We started with introductions, a bit of discussion about expectations, and some instruction on using optics.  My kids, in their early teens at the time, were tagging along with no expectations of helping out.  As we started our bird walk, I quickly got swamped with questions and requests for help.  On top of that, there were some people who clearly needed some help, but were too timid to ask “the experienced leader.”  The birders soon started asking my kids for help.  “How do you make both of these binocular thingies focus at the same time?”  “Where is that bird they are talking about?”  “Is that bird over there a goose?”  Later, as we were driving home, my kids were talking among themselves, and they expressed disbelief that they knew a lot more about birding than the adults on the walk. 

Let kids demonstrate their expertise.

       

     A moral of this story is that letting kids demonstrate their competence is much more confidence-boosting than showering them with false praise.

               There are a lot of ways to involve kids in birding and to help them to become better at it.  Many of those ways have more to do with building confidence, providing social support, allowing them to demonstrate what they’ve picked up, and getting them excited about nature than turning it in to a lesson about bird identification. 

Fall migration on the winds of the autumnal equinox

          Today, 22 September, is the autumnal equinox.  Twice each year, in spring and fall, the sun appears straight overhead at the equator.  To us humans in the northern hemisphere, this means that our daylight is about equal to the length of our dark night on this day.  Night will continue being a little bit longer each day until the winter solstice.  

 

Philadelphia Vireos have been on the move lately.  Photo
credit:  National Audubon Society

        To migratory birds in the northern hemisphere, the equinox signals even more changes in weather patterns.  Less day length and more cooling temperatures at night lead to lots of unsettled atmospheric conditions.  Stormy weather and shifts in winds, coupled with diminishing resources, help spur bird movement.  Of course, many species have been on the move for a month or two in some cases.  But, now that the calendar says "autumn," we humans seem to pay more attention to those bird movements.

          Most smaller species of birds, especially warblers, vireos, tanagers, orioles and many thrush species migrate at night.  The air is cooler then, and thus, is more stable.  That makes it easier to fly when you weight only a few ounces.  Cool nights when the air aloft is quiet make for good conditions in which to migrate.  Birders definitely pay attention to bird migration when those conditions exist.

          I was out paying attention today.  Yesterday was typical of late summer -- hot and humid, but it cooled off nicely last night.  This morning dawned to a thick fog.  I could hear chips and seeps outside even before I got out of bed.  I was anxious to get outside and see what migrants (also known as "eye-candy" to at least some birders) had come down through the fog and landed in my yard, fields and woods to refuel after a night of travel.  But, I had to first make sure my teenagers got up, ate, and made it to the school bus on time.

Feeding stations, water sources, flowering plants, and even
standing dead trees make an attractive stop-over site for
migrating birds.  Photo credit: Jody Enck.

          It was almost 8:30 until I got my morning chores done and got outside to see what "eye-candy" had appeared overnight.  It was still very foggy and calm.  The temperature was about 60 degrees F.  I could hear plenty of birds, but the fog made it difficult to see them at first.  Luckily, there is good habitat for hungry birds around my place.    I quickly walked past my feeder garden with just a quick glance to see if any birds were using the water bath.  

          I headed to the corner of the yard where I can look over the split-rail fence into an old, over-grown area.  This is an area with lots of wild flowers, young, shrubby plants, and some brush piles.  This year, the wild grapes, crab apples and viburnums are heavy with fruit, too, which act as additional attractions for migrants.

 

The brushy corner of my yard after the fog lifted.  Plenty of
food and cover here to attract birds and insects.
Photo credit:  Jody Enck.

        It didn't take long to start seeing lots of movement.  Many of the small birds were chasing after slow-moving insects, or after each other when more than one bird targeted the same tasty morsel.  

          I spied both Philadelphia and Red-eyed Vireos feeding there.  A mixed flock of resident birds (Black-capped Chickadees, Tufted Titmice, White-breasted Nuthatches, and Downy Woodpeckers) also were working the area.  As often happens, all this frenzy also included some of the "eye-candy" warblers I was after.

          Black-throated Green Warblers were interspersed with Magnolia Warblers.  Northern Parulas, with their spiffy blue heads, green backs, and brilliantly-colored breasts sparkled even in the fog.  More subtlety-hued, female Common Yellow-throats,  Tennessee Warblers and Nashville Warblers also were in this group.   

          Short-distant migrants also were around today.  

The wild grapes and Virginia creeper berries hanging on my
spruce trees also attract birds in good numbers.
Photo credit:  Jody Enck

I counted some Mourning Doves, Song Sparrows, mewing Gray Catbirds, and an immature male Yellow-bellied Sapsucker on my walk.  My yard is not huge, but it does have lots of nice bird habitat.  In the back, there are some White Spruce and Norway Spruce trees with lots of small cones this year.  Many of those trees also are covered in hanging Virginia Creeper and Wild Grape.  Insects like the fruit, too.  So birds, are attracted to these areas for both the fruit and for the insects.  

          I wouldn't call this a red-letter day in terms of fall migration.  Still, nearly two dozen species of birds in my little backyard is not too shabby either.  

Hard to say that Nashville Warbler isn't "eye-candy," but it
is more subtle in coloration compared to some of the warblers
I spied today.  Photo credit: Wikimedia commons.

How can the Sister Bird Club Network facilitate youth participation in conservation?

          I’ve spent most of my adult life training and working in the field of conservation.  So, I can say with some degree of certainty that conservationists are saddened and deeply concerned about things like diminishing habitats and the accompanying loss of species diversity and abundance.  Yet, I also know that conservationists are among the most optimistic of my fellow humans.  They are passionate about the world they live in, and are even more passionate about the world the next generation will experience.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard conservationists utter the adage: “youth are the future of the world!”  This is a rather obviously true statement, but it has another side to it that is equally true and just as important.  Without paying attention to conservation of natural resources now, those youth will not have much of a future world in which to live. 

Youth birders from Club Comunitario, Los Chipes, based in La Ceiba, Honduras.
Photo Credit: Club Comunitario.

          I gained first-hand experience with both sides of this "youth are the future of the world" coin when I spent almost five weeks in Honduras during fall 2016 on a trip to set-up contacts for the Sister Bird Club Network.  Twice during my travels around the country I had the privilege of visiting Montaña de Santa Bárbara - fuente de vida.  Translated to English, "Mountain of Santa Barbara -- source of life" is a cooperative of three small communities nestled in the Cloud Forest on the high slopes of Santa Barbara Mountain on the northwest shores of Lake Yojoa in north-central Honduras.

          Their website describes the cooperative this way...

 "our three communities - El Sauce, San Luis Planes and El Dorado - have come together

to form a project we have named ¨Montaña de Santa Bárbara – La Fuente de Vida¨. 

Thousands of people depend on Montaña de Santa Bárbara for food, water and shelter and 

income. It is truly the source of life - la fuente de vida - for all of these people. 
Because of its incredible biological diversity it is also the source of life for the innumerable 

plants and animals that call the mountain home.  Our communities are working together to
develop new sources of income based on ethical and sustainable tourism in the hope that 

these additional resources will enable us to improve our livelihood while protecting this 

critical environment and maintaining our cultural values.  This project aims to build the 

capacity of our communities to manage the ecotourism opportunities and develop and

implement conservation programs on our own terms rather than being overwhelmed
by external commercial interests.”

Community members and visiting birders at Montana Santa Barbara -- Fuente la Vida.
Photo credit: Montana Santa Barbara.

          Although youth are not mentioned specifically in the paragraph above, they play a very important role in the story of Fuente la Vida, both as visitors fro outside the cooperative and as residents in those communities.  Here are a couple of stories about some of those youth. 

The first time I had the pleasure to visit Fuente la Vida, I was participating in the Lake Yojoa Birding Blitz – a three day event that brings together birders and bird clubs from around Honduras and beyond to monitor bird diversity and abundance.  Part of the fun of the Birding Blitz was that several youth were taking part, including Daniel Torres and

Here I am with Daniel (left) and Norman (second from right)
and their faculty mentor, Franciso Rovelo.
Photo Credit: Francisco Rovelo.

Norman Espinosa from a youth club called “The Hummingbirds” out in the western city of Gracias, and Abiel Martinez from the local club, Las Clorofonias. 

Here is Abiel Martinez (right)
with the U.S. Ambassador to
Honduras, James Nealon.
Photo Credit: Oliver Komar.

One of the field trips for which I signed up was to spend a morning at Fuente la Vida, and Daniel and Norman joined me on this trip.  We arrived early in the morning and were met by two local guides, Juan Pablo and Denis, who live in these communities. 

I was quite excited to bird there because Santa Barbara National Park was established to protect the higher elevation slopes (~8,000 feet elevation) of the Santa Barbara mountains that surround the northwestern portion of Lake Yojoa.  Another National Park called Cero Azul Meambar protects the slightly lower slopes (~6,500 feet elevation) on the east side of the lake.  Lake Yojoa is the largest lake in Honduras and provides drinking water for millions of people.  In addition, there is a large Talapia fish farming operation that provides both food and employment for many Hondurans.  Protecting the steep, higher elevations of these mountains and their amazingly diverse cloud forests is aimed at protecting water quality and minimizing soil erosion and siltation of the shallow lake that already is experiencing substantial pollution and spread of invasive plants associated with the Talapia fish farms.  

The communities of El Sauce, San Luis Planes, and El Dorado occur in the Cloud Forest Zone of Santa Barabara Mountain.  This mountain is the tallest limestone massif in all of Central America. As warm moisture-laden air pushes in from the Caribbean Coast to the north, it pushes up the slopes and condenses into persistent fog banks that provides substantial moisture to the always-green forest here.  These communities also occur in the buffer zone for the National Park – a working landscape of coffee plantations, corn and bean fields, and communities interspersed within the forested slopes and semi-protected areas of the National Park boundaries.

Birders participating in the Lake Yojoa Birding Blitz enjoyed
seeing many species of birds at Fuente la Vida.  Local guides,
Juan Pablo with binoculars in front center, and Denis on the far
right are accomplished birders.  Note Daniel Torres (second from
right) was never far from all the action.
Photo Credit: Jody Enck

After a fairly long bus ride from the other side of Lake Yojoa, I was anxious to get birding.  Local guides, Denis and Pablo,  led our group of birders along village roads, and past young coffee fincas containing catimor coffee bushes (relatively easy-to-grow, resistant to leaf rust, but requires a lot of sun and fertilizer input), and paca bushes (a specialty coffee bean that is more valuable, but susceptible to leaf rust and harder to grow).  Some of these fields were shielded from direct sun-light by plantain plants.  In these areas, I saw Central American birds like Rufous-collared Sparrows, Yellow-winged Tanagers, Yellow-billed Caciques, and Cinnamon Hummingbirds.  I also observed lots of neotropical migratory species in these disturbed habitats, such as Wilson’s Warbler, Black-throated Green Warbler, Chestnut-sided Warbler, Summer Tanager, and Tennessee Warbler.      

Leaf rust on paca coffee leaf.
Photo Credit: Jody Enck

Daniel and Norman never were far from the front of the group.  Each had been birding for a couple of years, but they eagerly sought out sightings of life birds and inquired about field marks and vocalizations that made a given bird a MacGilvray’s Warbler (which we saw) rather than a Mourning Warbler (which we didn’t).  The other thing these teenagers did was to help this out-of-towner learn something about resident bird species that they knew so well.  They gave me a run-down on many of the bird species we were seeing and gave me hints on how to remember their names.  They also gave me a primer on some Spanish phrases for finding birds arriba (above) or abajo (below) things like “that red patch of flowers on the hillside.”

Next Pablo and Denis led us into some harvested, and over-grown-with-weeds corn and bean fields.  Even in these disturbed habitats, we saw an amazing diversity of birds, including Green-throated Mountain Gem, Prevost’s Ground-

Birding in a harvested and very weedy corn and bean
field at Fuente la Vida.
Photo Credit: Jody Enck

Sparrow, Emerald Toucanet, and Rusty Sparrow.  And, we saw more neotropical warblers, vireos, and orioles.  Even though we were birding in a working landscape, the youth and I were excited to see many species we had never seen before.

We ended the morning with a hike in a patch of protected cloud forest.  This area is private land (still within the buffer zone of the national park, though) and is protected by Fuente la Vida to provide habitat for birds like Resplendant Quetzal, Collared Trogon, Scaly-throated Foliage Gleaner, and Slate-colored Solitaire.  Oh, and we also found lots of neotropical warblers, vireos, and orioles there, too.

Daniel (center) and Norman (far right) birding with our group
at Fuente la Vida.  Photo Credit: Jody Enck.

More than a dozen of us birders ate lunch in a private home (part of the experience when you visit Fuente la Vida).  Norman and Daniel chose to sit with me and talk about their interest in birds.  Both hope one day to become bird guides, and both are keenly interested in making a real difference in terms of bird conservation.  Visiting Fuente la Vida gave them a chance to watch the local guides, Denis and Pablo, work with us birders to see wildlife and to learn a little something about the cooperative and its efforts to conserve habitat in the Cloud Forest.

          Exactly four weeks to the day later, I was back again visiting the same fields and forests at Fuente la Vida.  This time I was on a team with 9 other birders competing in the Honduras Birding for Conservation Tour.  We were 8 days into a fairly-grueling, 9-day competition.  We were tired but focused.  I had told my team mates that we could easily pick up about a dozen new species for our aggregated competition list just in the working landscape around the houses and farmed fields of Fuente la Vida.

The working landscape in the buffer zone of Santa Barbara
National Park.  Photo Credit: Jody Enck.

          I was ready to grind out an intense, next-to-last day of birding for the competition, and trying to stay focused even though I was just days away from leaving Honduras to head home after nearly five weeks in the gorgeous country.  But, I was totally unprepared for two things that I experienced that day.

          First, I somehow had not expected the working landscape at Fuente la Vida to be, well, “worked” in the month since I had been there.  The really weedy, harvested corn and bean fields that had held so many birds on my first visit were being prepared for the next plantings.  Individual farmers using machetes had cleared acre upon acre of hillside.  Without the weeds and other plants, the bird abundance and diversity were greatly reduced.  Also without the weeds, I could see that the corn and beans were being planted among young coffee bushes that were also growing in those fields, but were too young to produce beans yet.

During my first visit, the corn and beans
had been harvested and the field had
grown up with weeds.  This provided lots
of structure for birds that use early-
successional habitat.
Photo Credit: Jody Enck

During my second visit to Fuente la Vida, the working landscape had been "worked."
The senescent corn and beans, along with all the weeds, had been cut down in preparation
for planting the next crop, and exposing young coffee plants that were not yet
producing beans.  This is the same field as above.  At the near, far right of
this photo is the tree that appears in the left foreground of the photo above.
Photo credit: Jody Enck.

          Luckily, the Cloud Forest was still being preserved (in most places – some cutting for firewood and other purposes occurs in a few places).  Still, the change in habitat structure

A farmer preparing the field for the
next crop.  Photo credit: Jody Enck.

that occurred between my first and second visit was a stark reminder of how fast habitat can disappear in Honduras and other places in Latin America.  In many places outside of conservation-minded communities like those at Fuente la Vida, the forest itself is being cut at an alarming rate.  The need for bird conservation was driven home dramatically that day.

          The second thing that was unexpected for me was that our team of 10 birders (plus a Honduran guide, Esdras Lopez, and an “international” guide, Jeff Gordon, who is President of the American Birding Association) grew to a group of over 30 people as we birded our way through both the working landscape and the protected forest.  Why?  Because of kids!

Local kids followed us while birded.
Photo credit: Jody Enck

          During my first visit to Fuente la Vida, the kids in the community had been in school.  I didn’t give that much thought at the time.  On my second visit, these kids were out of school on break.  So, they tagged along the us.  They all kept a respectfully quiet and back behind our group so they would not interfere with the competition.  But, they were curious to see what these birders were doing and wanted to find out why we were so interested in encountering birds.

          These kids were the same ones who often could be found working the landscape with other family members.  These were the same kids who often were tasked with collecting firewood for cooking.  These were the same kids who families’ entire

Denis (in yellow shirt) showing local kids what birds we
were seeing in the field guide.  Photo credit: Jody Enck.

existence depended on the environment on Montaña de Santa Bárbara.  These were the same   kids whose future will depend on what happens on that mountain.  These were the same kids who can affect the future of what happens there. 

          Our group of competing birders did little more than spark a little curiosity among the youth of Fuente la Vida.  Oh, the kids got to see first-hand that a group of avi-tourists mostly from the U.S. were coming to their community to see birds, and as a result, hired local bird guides and provided some additional funds for the local communities. 

          The important work was being done by the adults from the cooperative.  Denis and Pablo were role models for these kids, showing them through their actions how passionate they are about birds and bird conservation.  While Pablo helped us avi-tourists find more birds for the Conservation Tour competition, Denis sat down with the kids and showed them some pictures in a field guide of the birds we were seeing.  It was a spark, maybe only a little spark, but still a spark. 

What future will these kids help create at Fuente la Vida?
Photo Credit: Jody Enck.

          As these kids grow up, they will have choices to make.  They can contribute to more habitat loss, or they can work with others to protect habitat for the future of birds and for their own future on Santa Barbara Mountain.  The best way we avi-tourists can help is to make plans to go visit them.

          The Sister Bird Club Network can help interested birders make connections and visit Fuente la Vida.  Individual birders and clubs can easily visit the cooperative or make plans to help them on any of their various service projects.  Youth clubs might want to establish pen pals or other connections with youth there.  If you are interested, see the Fuente la Vida website or contact Beaks and Peaks Birding and Adventure Tours at info@beaksandpeaks.com. 

Help Build the Sister Bird Club Network

          Neotropical migratory birds link birders throughout the Americas.  Many species of Warblers, Vireos, Orioles, Flycatchers, and Shorebirds breed in Canada and the U.S. and winter in Central and South America.  Birders who live and enjoy encountering birds

Ever think about the people in other parts of a bird's

migratory pathway that observe the same birds that you see?

Wouldn't it be neat to know what those other people think

about those birds, and know what they do to help with bird

conservation?

all along the migratory pathways of these birds have an incentive to know what is going on with those birds and the habitats on which

they depend when those birds are away from a Club's geographic area.  In an effort to facilitate this, I have been working with others to establish a Sister Bird Club Network.  You can read about that effort here.

   
               We've also designed a website to provide more information about the Sister Bird Club Network, to provide a way for people to join the Network, and facilitate their interaction.  Now, we need your help to further design the website.  You can view the draft site at the Sister Bird Club Network.
    
          The core aspect of this site will be a searchable database of information about clubs, individuals, and other groups who make up the network.  To create that database, we need to make available an electronic form through which we can collect information that people in the network need to have.  This is where you come in.

          What do you want to know about other clubs?  What do you want those clubs to know about your club?  So far, we have had inquiries from school teachers and members of youth clubs who

want to link up with groups of students or other youth clubs as part of a school project following bird migration.  We have had clubs say they want to be able to write a column about birds and bird conservation in their home country and "publish" it in newsletters of clubs in other parts of the migration pathways.  We have had clubs mention that they want to put together visits to other clubs.  Some clubs want to focus on bird conservation efforts.  Others want more of a social relationship among their members.

          Anything is possible, but only if you tell us what you want.  Please look over the draft website.  Then send me comments by email at jodyenck@gmail.com. 

          Thanks in advance for your help!

A plea to use eBird and a plea for eBird users

What is eBird?

          eBird is a scientific database of bird observations from every country on the planet.  It was conceived by a team of conservationists from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society.  From it's beginnings in 2002 as a database mostly of bird sightings in U.S., it has grown to where more than 250,000 birders have entered their cumulative observations of more than 370 million individual birds accounting for 10,313 different bird species around the globe.  With a week left to go in 2016, more than 3.75 million complete checklists were added by birders in this one year.

          The numbers listed above are huge ones, and they have been put to good use for conservation.  Conservationists around the world have used eBird data for decision making, policy analysis, and on-the-ground conservation for bird species.  You can read about the uses of the eBird database just in 2016 here.  Certainly, eBird is impressive as a conservation tool, and it is constantly being improved by a cadre of hard-working, dedicated conservationists at the Lab of Ornithology.

A Love-Hate Relationship

         I have mixed personal feelings about eBird.  I love eBird for its conservation value.  So far in 2016, I have submitted 163 checklists from a single location in the woods near my house.  Each of these checklists was for a 30-minute stationary count.  During these 81.5 hours of observation time, I recorded 67 species.  More important, eBird helps me understand the seasonal occurrence that exists among the diversity of species I observed.  The bar charts below show this seasonality for some flycatchers and vireos, while other species like crows and jays were observed throughout the year at this location.
 

A screenshot of an eBird barchart of some of the 67 species of birds I recorded in my local patch in 2016. 

The inquisitive, information-seeking birder in me loves these data.  They allow me to ask new questions and learn something about the behavior of the birds right in my local patch.

          On the other hand, this same inquisitive, information-seeking birder in me hates the idea that my very personal interactions with birds in nature is used as a measure of how "good of a birder" I am by somebody else's idea that birders use eBird to show off to each other.  eBird now has a profile page for birders (yes, you can hide it if you want) that shows all of your birding statistics.  According to eBird, my life list stands at 827 species recorded in six countries.  Apparently, I reported observing 470 bird species to date in calendar year 2016, including 387 of those in Honduras. 

          Also to date, I have submitted 460 eBird checklists this year, with 70 of those submitted in December with one week left to go in the year.  I also submitted 72 eBird checklists from Honduras during the five weeks I was there in the fall.  I can find maps on my profile page that shows what counties

eBird map showing the 10 Departments (States) in which

I birded during October and November 2016.  Darker colors

indicate more species recorded.  aption

I have birded in a particular state, all color-coded by the number of species I've reported from each. I can find life-lists of birds seen at particular locations.  I can see where I stand in terms of number of species recorded for every location in the world where I have birded.

          There is an explicit assumption on the eBird website that birders use the platform to track their life lists (at all geographic levels), find out where they can go birding to add species to their lists, and that birders use eBird to participate in competitive games surrounding birding.  Undoubtedly, many birders do these things.   But, data from a 2013 scientific study found that the vast majority of eBird users (~79%) neither participate in, nor even enjoy, these competitive aspects of birding.  For most of them, the conservation value of eBird is what motivates their participation.

A Plea for More Birders to use eBird

          As noted above, I use eBird.  I use it a lot.  I use it to satisfy my own birding curiosity, and I especially use it to add conservation value to my sightings.  If you are a birder and don't use eBird, I implore you to start using it.  Birds and bird conservation both can benefit from having more people participate in eBird.  Signing-up for a free account is easy.  You can enter your sightings via smart phone right from the field, or on your laptop in the comfort of your own home like I do.

          It took me a while, but I have entered almost all of the bird sightings I recorded in field notebooks going back to 1965 (I still have 2014 and 2015 to enter).  Also, I still keep my own excel database of my sightings by location (state/provincial level on up) because I have embedded formulas that provide me with information that eBird does not.  Plus, it contains information on plumages (by sex and age of birds observed), behaviors observed and various vocalizations heard.  At 41,047 lines and 400 columns, updating this file each year provides me with more fun than a guy should ever have.  Yes, I am a data geek with all this, but it is a private file that nobody but me ever sees.  Plus, I submit many of my sightings to eBird because I want to contribute to bird conservation that way. 

A Plea for eBird Users to up the Conservation Value of Their Sightings

          My experiences birding in Honduras in October and November really opened my eyes about how visiting birders make decisions about where to go birding and how to eBird.  This is where the competitive, listing game part of eBird gets very much in the way of conservation value of entering sightings.

          First, let's say you go birding some place you don't know very well.  That might be in your home state or in a different country.  eBirders are encouraged to use the website to locate hotspots where you can go birding.  Many of the places I birded in Honduras already were identified as eBird hotspots.  You can use the eBird website to locate hotspots where you can see the most possible species or see a particular set of target species.  That is all great if you want to do that kind of thing.

          Another benefit of birding at, and submitting your observations from, hotspots is that multiple observations from the same location over time provides a long-term data set that is quite valuable for conservation purposes.  So, by all means, find out where the eBird hotspots are, bird there, and record your observations.  Those sightings will be very useful.

          However, please know that the eBird hotspots are identified and labeled as such by birders, not ornithologists or conservationists.  Indeed, most of the hotspots I birded in Honduras were identified as hotspots by the people with whom I birded.  Thus, I found out without any doubt that these areas were selected out of convenience or tradition, rather than for their conservation value.  There is nothing wrong with that, especially for visitors who want to go birding in places where they know what to expect in terms of species diversity and abundance.  All you have to do is check the species list for that hotspot in eBird, or search on particular species and find a hotspot to bird.

         But, my plea to eBird users is to consider habitat when deciding where to go birding as much as going where others have gone before and found a bunch of neat birds.  This is particularly true when you go birding in the tropics, like I did this past fall. 

          I had the pleasure of making several trips to the north coast of Honduras, and birding around the Lodge and Spa at Pico Bonito.  This is in Atlántida Department, shown in darkest red on the map above because I reported the greatest number of species there (243) compared to the other nine Departments from which I submitted eBird lists.  The Lodge and Spa property is adjacent to Pico Bonito National Park. 

Satellite map showing eBird hotspots near Pico Bonito Lodge and Spa in
Atlántida Department, Honduras.  The Lodge and Spa is a great place to stay
and to bird. It is designated as the orange hotspot pin on this map.  Images are
from maps with eBird.

  In the picture to the right, the National Park occurs in the lower right quadrant.  It is steep, mostly primary rain forest, and largely inaccessible except for intrepid hikers who are willing and able to bushwack up steep slopes under less than ideal hiking conditions. 

A closer view of the satellite image above, providing more detail about the habitat at the Lodge and Spa at Pico Bonito (labelled orange pin), at lower elevation along the entrance road (yellow pin near top center), and higher elevation on Lodge and Spa property (white pin near center of image).  Habitat disturbance decreases notably from top to bottom in the image.  The pin in the lower right quadrant is a trail within Pico Bonito National Park which traverses mostly primary rain forest.  Images are from maps within eBird. 

          I was fortunate to go birding at all four eBird hotspots near to and including the lodge area (orange pin on map above).  The hotspot designated with a white pin above the orange pin nearly always was quite birdy.  This hotspot is a transect along the entrance road,   

This is the  planted palm habitat one can find at the top, white pin on eBird

map above.  Pico Bonito National Park is in the background.  This view is

standing at the white pin and essentially looking in the direction of the bottom

of the map above.

and is dominated by disturbed habitats due to various agricultural and forestry practices.  This hotspot was easy to get to and travel along. 

     I've written a lot about the area around the lodge in a previous

blog post.  As you might guess, it also is disturbed habitat although it has substantial forested habitat, too.  There are ample trails near the cabins, reception area, restaurant, and other buildings.  There

Looking from the reception area toward the restaurant at the Lodge and Spa

at Pico Bonito.  Note the abundance of flowering plants maintained

along the walkway to attract birds and other wildlife.  Photo credit

Jody Enck.

are also open lawn areas, a plethora of well-maintained flowering and fruiting plants, and bird feeders containing fruit and other tropical delights. 

          The habitat just upslope from the main compound is less disturbed as you can just make out in the more detailed satellite image above.  Still, it is not primary forest.  It contains well-used and maintained trails, observation platforms, and a water filtration plant.  When standing in the forest here, you can tell that it is not particularly old.  Still, there is a multi-story forest here.  The bird list from this part of the property reflects the change in habitat.  

View from the observation tower above the Rio Corinto.

Photo Credit:  Jody Enck.  

         One starts to pick up more forest species here and observes fewer species that either are obligate open land species or are robust enough to use highly disturbed habitats.  For a first-time visitor to this part of the world, it is heady stuff.  You can see Lovely Cotinga, Common Black-Hawk, Greater Potoo, Purple-crowned Fairy, Collared Aracari, Tawny-crowned Greenlet, and White-collared Manakins along this trail that corresponds to the hotspot.  But, this part of the property still does not reveal the deep-forest birds.

Go where the Wild Things are.

          If you are a birder who really wants to see rainforest species, you have to go into the rainforest proper.  When I birded the rough Tango Trail in Pico Bonito National Park, I got to see species that I saw nowhere else in Honduras because I did not bird in the deep forest anywhere else.  Species like Plain Antvireo, Cocoa Woodcreeper, Buff-throated Foliage-gleaner, Nightingale Wren, Ruddy-tailed Flycatcher, and Golden-crowned Warbler crossed my path in the deep forest and nowhere else.

Big trees, big mountain, and big adventure in Pico Bonito

National Park, Honduras.  Photo Credit: Jody Enck.

          I previously wrote about a morning hiking in the deep, dark forest with my friend and guide Katinka Domen from Beaks and Peaks Birding and Adventure Tours (here).  The main point is that I spent 33 days in Honduras, and only spent a relatively few hours birding in deep forest.  (Luckily, I had time on a couple other days to bird deep in two other National Parks).  Not only is this the only kind of habitat where you can find a whole host of specific bird species, but it is the type of habitat under the gravest threat in Honduras and throughout Central America.             

              If you are going to go birding in a place you don't know very well -- especially if that place is in the tropics -- my plea is for you to bird in under-birded habitats.  Don't just look for hotspots chosen for their convenience, or maybe because you can see a bunch of species there.  Go where the Wild Things are.  Ask the locals to take you to places that others don't bird much, but which will get you looks at birds you simply can't find elsewhere. 

          I'll leave you with one last reason to choose carefully where to go birding and to report birds from habitats that are birded less frequently.  When I went on my hike with Katinka in the deep rainforest, we made another important ornithological discovery.  We saw at least three Fan-tailed Warblers.  These are not particularly rare forest birds, but they had never been recorded from this part of Honduras before we found them.  You never know what you'll find when you go birding in places that are off the beaten path, and in habitats that are not birded very frequently.

How do you find these under-birded places?

          One way to find a place to find habitat-specific birds in places that are not part of existing hot spots is to enlist the help of local birders.  I already mentioned Beaks and Peaks Birding and Adventure Tours.  William Orellana and Katinka Domen are ready and willing to help you out.  Another option is to contact any of the local bird clubs in Honduras.  Each club has several birders who are ready to help visiting birders. 

Here are some clubs for you to contact.

Club Las Tanunas (named for the Lesser Roadrunner) in the western town of Gracias.

Club Hummingbirds, which is a group of high school students associated with Las Tanunas.


Club Cotinga (named for the Lovey Cotinga) in the north coast city of La Ceiba.

Club Clorofonia (named for Blue-crowned Chlorophonia) in the Lake Yojoa area.

Club Los Jigueros (named for the Slate-colored Solitaire) in the southwestern town of Marcala.

Club Los Zorzales (named after Clay-colored Thrush) in the northwestern city of San Pedro Sula.

Club Los Alzacuanes (named for Swainson Hawks) in the capital city of Tegucigalpa.

Club Las Aguilas in Catacamas in eastern Honduras.

          All of these clubs are part of a network of sister bird clubs between the U.S. and Honduras.  Beaks and Peaks can put you in touch with any of these clubs.  All you have to do is ask for help.