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Thursday, May 01, 2008

Event Teaches Visitors About Birds, Migration

By Laura Nesbitt /
Mountain View Telegraph
      Sighting unusual bird species happens a lot by chance.
       “Sometimes we train our binoculars and just happen to see them,” said neotropical bird specialist Hart Schwarz.
       More than 100 species of migrating birds flying over Quarai Pueblo Mission for the last 10 years have been attracted by the cottonwoods of the Salinas Pueblo Missions National Monument.
       In 2002, Schwarz saw a Virginia rail, a rare bird for this area, and the only one sighted over his 10 year period of tracking birds.
       “It's a bird of the marshes. It's very secretive” and a rare thing to see around this area, Schwarz said.
       Over the years at Quarai, bird species sightings have varied from 47 to 67 different species on International Migratory Bird Day.
       In two weeks, on May 10 from 8 to 11 a.m., there will be a morning bird walk along the creek and into the piñon and juniper uplands led by Schwarz and Nick Vaughn.
       “An easy, leisurely ramble (with) as its primary focus the identification of birds by sight and sound,” information states.
       From 11 to noon, participants can meet in the museum to listen to Schwarz talk about bird migration seen at Quarai, look at photographs of birds and listen to bird songs.
       From noon to 1 p.m. participants can picnic under cottonwood trees.
       From 1:30 to 2:30 p.m. listen to “Tundra to Tropics,” Schwarz's presentation about bird habitats.
       From 3 to 3:30 p.m., posters, climate change mugs and T-shirts will be presented to participants.
       All day until 4 p.m. there will be “shade grown coffee and cookies for everyone,” according to the Cibola information.
       The event is free of charge.
   

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