Parade of Plumage Challenge

The National Museum of Wildlife Art, the Biodiversity Institute, and the University of Wyoming Museum of Vertebrates have teamed up to bring you the Parade of Plumage Challenge. The goal of the challenge is to get folks to identify birds in French artist François Nicolas Martinet's bird engravings. The National Museum of Wildlife Art is currently displaying 98 of Martinet's engravings, many of which either lack species names, are misidentified, or have outdated names. Some of the world's leading ornithologists have identified these birds, and now its your turn!

To participate, visit this site: http://paradeofplumage.com/

Contest rules are available on the website. Fantastic prizes are available to those who identify all of the species correctly.

Board meeting

We will hold a board meeting this Thursday, November 20 at 6:30 pm. We will meet in room 227 of the Berry Center. Our board meetings are open to the public; if you are interested in the behind-the-scenes of the Laramie Audubon Society, feel free to join us.

Upcoming talk by Tim Banks

The last speaker for this fall is our very own Tim Banks. Please join us for his talk entitled "Sandhill Crane Natural History and Behavior (and More!)" next Wednesday, 19 November at the Berry Center auditorium. We will also hold board member elections during this meeting; if you are a member of the Laramie Audubon Society you can vote to confirm or oppose election or re-election of board members. If you can't attend the talk, you can vote online here.

Schedule of events
6:30 pm - Mingling and refreshments
7:00 pm - Election of board members
7:15 pm - Sandhill Crane program

Below, Tim gives us a sneak peek of his talk.

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Sandhill Crane. Photo © Tim Banks.

Cranes are the stuff of magic, whose voices penetrate the atmosphere of the world's wilderness areas, from arctic tundra to the South African veld, and whose footprints have been left on the wetlands of the world for the past 60 million years or more. - Paul Johnsgard

Standing up to 46 inches tall and with a wingspan of six feet, a sandhill crane is an impressive bird. Put together 500,000 of them during the peak of spring migration in central Nebraska, and you have one of the most awe-inspiring wildlife spectacles in North America. That alone may make a road trip to view these magnificent birds well worth the effort, but there is much, much more to their story.

For one thing, these birds have charisma! They dance, they bicker, they fight--sandhill cranes, like all cranes, are social and their interactions suggest that there is a lot more drama within the flock than you might imagine at first glance. The more you know about their behavior, the more fascinating these birds become.

The goal of this talk is to introduce you to some of "the rest of the story" of cranes in North America, to inspire you to take a trip to see them, and to  entertain you with amusing anecdotes about just how the speaker came to learn some of these things. You will learn, for example, how this guy contributed to a lifetime of fascination with cranes.

Upcoming field trip: Raptors of the Laramie Plains

UPDATE: The raptor trip has been moved back a week due to inclement weather. Corrected dates included below.

Chad Olson will lead a field trip next Saturday, November 22. Chad will help us search the Laramie Plains for raptors and teach us about the natural history of the local species. This is a great trip for birders of all skill levels. If you aren't very familiar with the raptors around Laramie, don't worry--come on out and we'll help you strengthen your skills.

We will meet at Night Heron at 8:15 am. We should be back to Laramie by 12:30 pm. We try to carpool as much as possible, because this trip involves a lot of driving.

All Laramie Audubon field trips are free and open to the public; families are welcome. Bring water and snacks, binoculars, a spotting scope if you have one, and dress for the worst weather.

This is our last field trip of the fall--hope to see you there!

Ferruginous Hawk. Photo © Shawn Billerman.

Upcoming talk by Beth Fitzpatrick

Our next fall speaker is Beth Fitzpatrick, a PhD candidate at the University of Wyoming who studies the effect of development on Greater Sage-Grouse. Please join us for her talk entitled "Using Science to Solve Problems: Planning Future Restoration for Long-term Persistence of a Species" this coming Wednesday, 29 October. The talk will begin at 7 pm at the Berry Center auditorium, but refreshments and mingling will start at 6:30 pm.

For a sneak peek, here is Beth's description of her work:
"This research focuses on the effect of development on genetic connectivity of Great Sage-Grouse leks. Leks are found at specific locations within sagebrush habitat and many habitat or landscape characteristics may influence those locations. Development is known to increase the likelihood of lek abandonment and has been associated with sage-grouse population declines. One process that helps breeding sites persist is dispersal of offspring to different lek sites. This can be assessed by measuring gene flow or connectivity between pairs of breeding sites. Certain habitat and landscape characteristics may also be associated with successful dispersal. Habitat and landscape characteristics found to influence connectivity of leks can then be used to predict how connectivity of leks might change with development or restoration of sagebrush habitat. This will allow both land managers and developers to make decisions on where to prioritize restoration efforts."

Beth's blog has more info on the project and great documentation of her adventures with sage-grouse.

Upcoming field trip: Plains Lakes and Hutton NWR

Tim Banks will lead a second Hutton Lake NWR and Plains Lakes trip this Saturday, October 18th. There are tons of waterfowl on the lakes this time of year! There could be rare gulls, or jaegers! Meet at 8:00 am at Night Heron Books to caffeinate and carpool. This trip usually lasts until 1 or 2 pm, but feel free to join us for only part of the time--though you may need to drive your own vehicle.

All Laramie Audubon field trips are free and open to the public; families are welcome. Bring water and snacks, binoculars, a spotting scope if you have one, and dress for the worst weather.

Upcoming Field Trip: Laramie Hotspots!

Clay-colored Sparrow © Shawn Billerman

Join us this Saturday, October 4th for a morning outing to some of Laramie's birding hotspots, including the Greenbelt Trail, Optimist Park, and Greenhill Cemetery. If we have time, we will also stop to scan the pond at LaBonte Park for migrant waterbirds. Join field trip leader Shawn Billerman as we search for migrant songbirds, with a strong focus on sparrows and lingering warblers. Other potential birds we could find include sapsuckers, finches, kinglets, and nuthatches.

Meet downtown at Night Heron Books and Coffeehouse at 8AM where we will caffeinate and carpool to our local birding destinations. We expect to be done no later than 12PM; if you can only join us for part of the time, be prepared to drive your own vehicle.

All Laramie Audubon field trips are free and open to the public; families are welcome. Bring water and snacks, binoculars, a spotting scope if you have one, and dress for the worst weather.

Upcoming talk by Charlotte Gabrielsen

 Laramie Audubon Society will initiate its fall speaker program this Wednesday, September 24, with a talk by Charlotte Gabrielsen, entitled “Climate change effects on amphibian persistence in the Plains and Prairie Pothole Region".

Charlotte is a University of Wyoming doctoral student and Laramie Audubon small-grant recipient. She will share her findings regarding wetland drying under various climate change scenarios and tell us how such changes might affect the amphibians that depend on these ephemeral water bodies.

The talk begins at 7 pm at the Berry Center auditorium, but refreshments and mingling will start at 6:30 pm. Laramie Audubon will be hosting this program jointly with the Travelle Chapter of the Izaac Walton League.

Field trip report: Hereford Ranch

This past Saturday six intrepid Auduboners awoke extra early for a pilgrimage to one of the best migrant traps in southeastern Wyoming: the Hereford Ranch.

True to form, the cottonwoods and willows of the riparian areas at the Ranch were hopping with migrants. The vast majority were Wilson's Warblers, but we did turn up an American Redstart and a Cassin's Vireo in company with Plumbeous Vireos. The Eastern Screech-Owl continues to cooperate--he or she is still occupying the willow cavity near the corral next to the parking lot.

We saw 48 species total--plus several Empidonax flycatchers, likely comprising two species. Below is the link to the eBird checklist and the complete trip list.

Wyoming Hereford Ranch

Species List

Canada Goose Gadwall Mallard Great Blue Heron Turkey Vulture Swainson's Hawk Red-tailed Hawk Killdeer Eurasian Collared-Dove Mourning Dove Eastern Screech-Owl Red-naped Sapsucker Northern Flicker Western Wood-Pewee Empidonax sp. Say's Phoebe Plumbeous Vireo

Cassin's Vireo Warbling Vireo Bank Swallow Barn Swallow Cliff Swallow Black-capped Chickadee Red-breasted Nuthatch House Wren Blue-gray Gnatcatcher Ruby-crowned Kinglet Townsend's Solitaire Swainson's Thrush Hermit Thrush American Robin Gray Catbird European Starling Northern Waterthrush

Orange-crowned Warbler MacGillivray's Warbler American Redstart Yellow Warbler Yellow-rumped Warbler Wilson's Warbler Green-tailed Towhee Chipping Sparrow Clay-colored Sparrow Song Sparrow Lincoln's Sparrow Western Tanager Common Grackle House Finch American Goldfinch House Sparrow

Photos by Libby Megna.

Upcoming field trip: Hereford Ranch

Orange-crowned Warbler, Albany Co, WY. Photo © Shawn Billerman.

Our next field trip is this Saturday, September 13th. Note that we'll be leaving from Night Heron Books at 7 am (one hour earlier than usual) because we are heading to the Hereford Ranch on the east side of Cheyenne. Libby Megna will lead the search for songbird migrants; in particular, we should find good sparrows, vireos, and warblers.

Again, meet downtown at Night Heron Books at 7 am to caffeinate and carpool. We will be back to Laramie by noon--if you can only join us for part of the time, be prepared to drive your own vehicle.

All Laramie Audubon field trips are free and open to the public; families are welcome. Bring water and snacks, binoculars, a spotting scope if you have one, and dress for the worst weather.

Ed Scholes at UW this week

Ed Scholes, evolutionary biologist and Curator of Video at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's Macaulay Library, will be visiting the University of Wyoming this week. Scholes, with National Geographic photographer Tim Laman, recently finished a project documenting all species in the birds-of-paradise family. Check out the Birds-of-Paradise Project for more info and great video of gorgeous birds.

Scholes will give two talks:

Video analysis, specimen imaging and 3D modeling: New perspectives on courtship displays in a bird-of-paradise
     Friday, Sept. 12, 12:10 pm, Berry Center 138
     Part of the weekly Zoology/Physiology Departmental seminar, co-hosted by Biodiversity Institute

Birds of Paradise: Revealing the World's Most Extraordinary Birds

     Friday, Sept. 12, 7:00 pm, Berry Center 138

     Booksigning to follow

     Hosted by the Biodiversity Institute

Additionally, the Biodiversity Institute will show the National Geographic film "Winged Seduction: Birds of Paradise" on Wednesday, September 10 at 5 pm and on Sunday, September 14 at 2 pm.

All events are free and open to the public. 

Click on the image below to download a poster that you can share with interested parties.

Field trip report: Plains Lakes & Hutton NWR

Yesterday's inaugural field trip of the fall did not disappoint: the birds were great, the weather flat-out exceeded expectations, and the company was convivial. The major avian highlight of the trip was a juvenile Sabine's Gull at Lake Hattie. A juvenile Sanderling in fresh, crisp plumage at Meeboer was another group favorite.

Waterfowl are increasing in number on Hutton and Hoge Lakes. Lake Hattie is still relatively devoid of waterfowl but that will change over the next few weeks--and as evidenced on the trip, rare gull season is in session! Several raptor species were conspicuous, especially the Swainson's Hawks, which are amassing before their southward migration.

We saw 73 species total; below are links to the eBird checklists for each hotspot and the complete trip list.

Blake's Pond
Meeboer Lake
Twin Buttes Reservoir
Lake Hattie Reservoir
Hutton Lake NWR

Species List

Canada Goose Gadwall American Wigeon Mallard Blue-winged Teal Cinnamon Teal Northern Shoveler Northern Pintail Green-winged Teal Canvasback Redhead Lesser Scaup Bufflehead Common Merganser Ruddy Duck Pied-billed Grebe Eared Grebe Western Grebe Double-crested Cormorant American White Pelican Great Blue Heron Golden Eagle Northern Harrier Bald Eagle Swainson's Hawk

Ferruginous Hawk Virginia Rail Sora American Coot Black-necked Stilt American Avocet Killdeer Spotted Sandpiper Greater Yellowlegs Willet Lesser Yellowlegs Sanderling Baird's Sandpiper Least Sandpiper Semipalmated Sandpiper Wilson's Phalarope Red-necked Phalarope Sabine's Gull Franklin's Gull Ring-billed Gull California Gull Lesser Black-backed Gull Eurasian Collared-Dove Mourning Dove

Common Nighthawk Northern Flicker Prairie Falcon Loggerhead Shrike Common Raven Violet-green Swallow Bank Swallow Barn Swallow Marsh Wren American Robin Sage Thrasher European Starling Chestnut-collared Longspur McCown's Longspur Common Yellowthroat Yellow Warbler Brewer's Sparrow Vesper Sparrow Savannah Sparrow Song Sparrow Yellow-headed Blackbird Brewer's Blackbird Great-tailed Grackle American Goldfinch

 

Photos of Auduboners at Lake Hattie by Libby Megna.