New chapter Meeting time & place
We are changing both the program and chapter meeting time and the place! Starting with our first fall meeting & program on September 27th, we will be meeting at the Taber Museum. We look forward to seeing you!
When: September 27th, October 25th, November 15th
Time: 6:30 pm
Location: Taber Museum in Williamsport. Parking is available behind the Museum, and in the lot behind Trinity Church. Enter through the doors off the parking lot.
Zoom: If you can’t attend in-person, please join us by Zoom at https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82822075187
September 27 at 6:30pm
Benjamin Jacobs-Schwartz
Topic: Feathers and Flight: A Journey to the New World Tropics
Join Zoom Meeting: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82822075187
Delving into topics of migration, tropical speciation, and biodiversity, this media-rich journey will share some of the fascinating and unique birds that inhabit the new world tropics. Sure to both educate and entertain, this presentation will leave you with a deeper understanding of tropical ecology, and knowledge about where some of our backyard birds spend their winters! Benny Isaac Jacobs-Schwartz owns and operates a bird-guiding business and lifestyle brand called BIRDS by BIJS (pronounced Bee-jus). Working professionally for over 10 years as a naturalist guide, expedition trip leader, and international bird guide, Benny has worked in a variety of locations coast to coast, including exotic places such as; coastal Alaska, Central America, Trinidad and Tobago, and the Ecuadorian Amazon.
Based in Los Angeles, Benny is a passionate educator and photographer, specializing in birds! Benny uses his ample collection of nature-based content to leverage an active social media presence. BIJS uses his passion for the natural world to inspire others to put down their phone and pick up their binos.
October 25 at 6:30pm
Dr. Mark Bonta
Topic: Northeastern Mexico: Where Deserts Meet Rainforests
Join Zoom Meeting: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82822075187
A day’s drive south of the Texas border, you can discover the place where it all comes together. Deserts, pine forests, cloud forests, and lowland tropical rain forests are found within a few miles of each other; black bears and monkeys are neighbors. The Huasteca, named after the northern Teenek Maya people, contains some of the Americas’ most spectacular landscapes and bird concentrations, yet few outsiders are familiar with its wonders. Imagine the world’s deepest limestone sinkholes tucked among jagged peaks swathed in rain forest, inhabited by swirling clouds of 2.4 million White-collared Swifts, thousands of Green Parakeets, and even a small population of the endangered Military Macaw. Within this Sierra Madre transition zone between plateau and Gulf Coast, Indigenous and mestizo communities welcome visitors to locally- run parks featuring rich biodiversity as well as natural features such as sacred caves and waterfalls. Join the speaker for a glimpse of this hidden world, and for an extra bonus, a side trip to the Mariposa Monarca Biosphere Reserve several hours to the west, where millions of monarch butterflies winter.
Mark was raised on a Pennsylvania mountaintop and went on to explore the remote corners of the planet through service to the Peace Corps and academic research at several small colleges. He has traversed 40 countries and six continents in his pursuit of global citizenship and has been involved in environmental conservation efforts in the Philippines, Australia, Honduras, Mexico, and the US. His many passions include all things related to birds, including the wisdom traditions of avifauna among local and Indigenous peoples. Mark is also a leading expert on cycads, “living fossils” that are the most threatened group of plants in the world. You can access his publications at https://markbonta.academia.edu/ and his eBird profile at https://ebird.org/pa/profile/NDE4MTI5/world
November 15 at 6:30pm
Sara Street
Topic: What’s Happening at Rider Park?
Join Zoom Meeting: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82822075187
This program will discuss the stewardship opportunities and challenges of maintaining a nearly 900 acre nature preserve and public outdoor recreational property for the benefit of birds and other wildlife.
Sara is the Rider Park Manager and a Lycoming Audubon member and volunteer. With degrees in landscape architecture, ecological restoration, and park management she is the Park's forest ecologist, wildlife biologist, environmental educator, and more.