December-January 2000            Volume 31            Number 4

December Program

Slide and Dessert Fest
Each December, Fort Collins Audubon invites YOU to be our program! Come to the Fourth Annual Slide and Dessert Fest on December 14th. Bring 10 to 15 of your favorite slides of birds or other wild animals and a holiday dessert to serve six to eight people. Please bring serving utensils for your dessert—plates, cups, utensils, napkins, and beverages will be provided. You may even want to bring your recipe to share. Empty slide carousels will be available at 6:30 pm. and the show will begin at 7 pm.

Please bring your old or extra field guides for the FCAS to send to northern Chihuahua, Mexico for their Christmas Bird Count.

WHEN: Thursday, December 14, 6:30 pm

WHERE: Ludlow Room, Fort Collins Lincoln Center 417 West Magnolia Street

Fort Collins Audubon Society programs and field trips are free and open to the public

FCAS Elections in January

Our nominating committee has presented the slate of candidates to be voted on at our program meeting in January.

President—Rick Harness
Rick has been serving as President-Elect in 2000 and is eager to take up the reins as President in 2001. This is a two-year position. Rick has been working on preventing birds from being electrocuted on power poles all over the world.

Vice President—Sue Kenney
As vice president, Sue will assist the president.

Secretary—Kris Cafaro
Kris’ duties will involve taking notes at approximately six to eight board meetings per year, typing them up, and distributing them to board members. Kris is currently Colorado’s state coordinator for the Important Bird Areas program.

Treasurer—John Waddell

Directors at Large— Bob Blinderman, Dave Dubois, Cynthia Melcher

Serving as a director is an excellent opportunity to become familiar with our organization plus give input and direction to the board throughout the year.

Annual elections will be held on January 11, at our regular program meeting. If you are interested in serving in an elected position, please contact any of our nominating committee: Cynthia Melcher, Bob Blinderman, or Bill Miller.

President's Message
Sue Kenney

We need your Help!
My tenure as president is coming to an end, and I want to thank all of you for your efforts working with Fort Collins Audubon. Serving in Audubon is fun and rewarding because of the wonderful people who share like interests and care about conservation in our community.

There are many ways to be involved with Audubon. Please consider volunteering as much time as you have available with any of the following.

Publicity Committee—The publicity committee is crucial in getting the word out about our programs, field trips, and special activities. Volunteers on this committee may develop flyers of our programs and field trips for distribution to the media and for posting at selected locations.

Education and Outreach Committee—Consider donating a few hours each month on our education committee. We have lots of great ideas for getting others interested in birds and conservation issues; we just need more people to help us get them off the ground. Duties could range from coordinating the staffing of a table at an event (Bird Appreciation Days, Earth Day, etc.), helping to develop presentations to get children interested in birds, or organizing a beginning bird watch. Serving on this committee lets you get really creative.

Birdathon—Rick Schroeder continues to do an excellent job as Birdathon Coordinator, but he would like to implement some new ideas to make it even better. This is an annual event and is our chapter’s major fundraiser.

Publications—This newsletter is going smoothly, but we always need ideas and help on developing brochures and other publications.

Membership—An effective Audubon Society requires a strong membership. Our chapter needs to actively recruit new members. If you have ideas about this please serve on the membership committee.

Contact me or any board member if you want to discuss any of these opportunities. Your ideas and input are very welcome. Volunteerism is the heart and soul of Audubon. I hope you will consider volunteering with us. You will find it will enrich your life.

Conservation Corner
Bill Miller

Looming Legislative Session
The Legislative Committee of Audubon of Colorado (AOC) has already scheduled two meetings in preparation for the 2001 Legislative Session.  Preliminary priority setting will take place on December 1, 2000, and specific bills will be discussed on January 10, 2001. Your chapter will be represented at those meetings by Ron Harden, AOC Board member, and Bill Miller, FCAS Conservation Chair. 

If you wish to be active during the legislative session you may sign up with Bill Miller (970-493-7693 or 5mcorp@verinet.com) to be placed on the Legislative Alert list. People on this list receive background information on pending legislation, alerts when bills that, in AOC's opinion, need to be either supported or defeated, and legislator contact information. Response to alerts is generally best when done by telephone to the appropriate legislator's Capital Hill office, and usually lasts 30-45 seconds, to a secretary or answering machine. Your telephone bill will NOT be astronomical! For each call a legislator receives they figure there are another nine or ten people out there with the same opinion.  Thus, your calls can represent a lot of public sentiment, and are taken very seriously by most legislators. 

The most efficient way to receive legislative information is by signing on to CO-GENERAL, a listserv for connecting the chapters of AOC together. There is very little communication on this list serve except during the legislative session when legislative updates and alerts are posted. Alerts usually number around 12 per session.  To subscribe to CO-GENERAL, follow these instructions:
1) Send a message to: LISTSERV@LIST.AUDUBON.ORG 
2) Leave the SUBJECT LINE blank
3) In the body of the message, type: SUBSCRIBE CO-GENERAL

If this does not work, sign on to the following web site, and follow the instructions: 

http://list.audubon.org/archives/co-general.html

You can also visit our FCAS web site for more information on CO-GENERAL

ANWR AND OIL
This is being written before the outcome of the Presidential Election has been determined. However, popular public sentiment is in favor of NO oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), home to the largest caribou herd in the world and many other species for whom that portion of Alaska is critical for their survival. If you believe this part of the world deserves some addition protection, call President Clinton and urge him to extend wilderness status to this National Wildlife Refuge. There is a comment line that you can call at: 1-202-456-1111

HELP AUDUBON CLEAN UP AGAIN!

Saturday, January 13, 2001, 1-4 pm

The November cleanup at Fossil Creek Wetlands was cancelled due to bad weather. We will try again in January.  I hope to see you there!—Sue Kenney

Since Fort Collins Audubon adopted Fossil Creek Wetlands Natural Area last year, we have done some major trash removal, but more is needed. This 230-acre natural area in south Fort Collins has long been a birding hot spot. The wetlands support a wide variety of migrant and nesting shorebirds. The upland portion has a prairie dog colony, and several species of raptors are seen throughout the year. Coyotes, rabbits, and foxes also use the site. This area, along with Fossil Creek Reservoir to the east and Duck Lake to the southeast, has been designated an “important bird area.”

We will meet and park on Trilby Road, just west of Timberline. Come for all or any part of the afternoon.  Please bring water and work gloves (leather preferred). Wear sturdy work boots, and dress for the weather. Metal rakes and shovels will be useful.  Children accompanied by an adult are welcome. Volunteers must sign a waiver at the clean-up. For information, please call Sue Kenney, at 482-4425 or 224-6118.

101st Annual Christmas Bird Count
Cynthia Melcher

Attention all birdwatchers and nature enthusiasts!

The Fort Collins Chapter of the National Audubon Society invites you to participate in one of its oldest and greatest traditions, the annual Christmas Bird Count. This holiday season there will be 6 Christmas Bird Counts (CBCs) in Larimer, Weld, and Jackson counties alone. These counts will take place on December 16, 17, 27, 28, and 31.

The continent-wide institution of Christmas Bird counting began in 1900. It was a time when citizens and ornithologists alike were becoming concerned about precipitous declines in many bird species due to market hunting, collecting, and even sport. When ornithologist Frank Chapman acted out against a popular tradition that entailed teams of people competing on Christmas day to see which group could shoot the greatest number of wild birds. As an alternative, Chapman gathered together 27 like-minded souls in 25 localities on Christmas day to count as many birds as they could. Soon, Chapman’s idea spread across North America and replaced the old tradition entirely.

Today, between each mid-December and early January, more than 50,000 volunteers from every American state and Canadian province, as well as parts of Mexico, Central and South America, Bermuda, the West Indies, and Pacific islands, partake in nearly 1800 CBCs. Each CBC area consists of a circle 15 miles in diameter (about 177 square miles), over which participants cover as much ground as possible within a 24-hour period. During that time, the participants record every individual bird and bird species they detect. Apart from its attraction as a social, sporting, and competitive event, the annual CBC provides interesting and scientifically useful information on the early-winter distribution patterns and trends of various bird species. As a group, birds respond rapidly to environmental changes (e.g., pollution) and habitat destruction. Furthermore, birds are easy to see and count compared to other animals. Therefore, long-term monitoring of bird populations has become an important tool not only for detecting declines or increases in their populations and distributions, but also for understanding our effects on the environment that sustains all life, including human beings.

The individuals who compile each CBC may now enter their data on-line through BirdSource’s website, www.birdsource.org, a cooperative venture of the National Audubon Society and Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. As of this winter, Bird Studies Canada (BSC) becomes the official Canadian partner to assist with assimilating and compiling CBC data, and compilers may enter their data on-line at BSC’s website, www.bsc-eoc.org. For those without access to the web, the National Audubon Society and BSC will still receive data through the mail and enter those data by hand.

The CBC is now the longest running ornithological database available (1900 to the present), and anyone can access those data through the BirdSource website. As we begin a second century of CBC effort, the count’s importance as a way of monitoring the status of resident and migratory bird populations will continue to grow across the western hemisphere. Interested in joining the effort? All you need is an ability to look through binoculars and write down what you see! Each CBC is open to birdwatchers of all skill levels. In fact, participating in a CBC has often resulted in participants developing a life-long passion for wild birds.

Each CBC participant is strongly urged to donate $5.00 to help fund this international effort, which requires some permanent staff, enormous mailings, database management, and more. It also entails publishing the results each year in the annual Christmas Bird Count issue of American Birds, which is jointly published by the American Birding Association and National Audubon Society. Without everyone’s $5.00 donation, the CBC would cease to exist. To thank those who do support the CBC with a $5.00 donation, Audubon publishes their names in American Birds with the results of the CBC(s) in which they participate.

Locally, there are the Fort Collins, Rawhide, Nunn, North Park, Loveland (new this year!), and Rocky Mountain National Park CBCs; local compilers also run a CBC in Longmont and one in northern Chihuahua, Mexico! For more information about how to participate in any one CBC contact the count compiler (see below). An organizational meeting for he Fort Collins CBC will take place on December 11, 2000 at Jax Mercantile (1200 N. College Ave.) at 6:30 p.m. for new participants and 7:00 p.m. for previous participants. Additional information is also available on our Fort Collins Christmas Bird Count web page.

FCAS Field Trips

December 3 (Sunday). FIELD TRIP. Half day.
Northwest Fort Collins with Beth Dillon and Dave Leatherman.  8:00 a.m. - 12 noon.  Meet at Colorado State Forest Nursery on Laporte Street, 0.7 mile west of Overland Trail.  We will start at the nursery and then move on to other locations in northwest FTC such as College Lake, Watson Lake, and the City Park Cemetery.  For more information, call leader Beth Dillon, 970-490-2610, dillon_b@hotmail.com.

December 9 (Saturday). FIELD TRIP. Half day.
Birding for Beginners. 9 am - 12 noon.  Meet at 9:00 am at the Prospect Ponds parking lot on Sharp Pointe Drive (just west of the Poudre River and just south of Prospect Rd.)  Children accompanied by adults are welcome.  We will focus on identification of common bird species found in Fort Collins, in preparation for the area Christmas Bird Counts.  Dress appropriately for the weather, be prepared for walking, and bring water and a snack.  Contact leader Kevin Cook for more information, 970-223-8392.

All FCAS field trips are free and open to the public.  Children accompanied by an adult are welcome.  To lead a field trip, or if you have field trip ideas or need more information, contact Nick Komar 970-416-7527 (nick.komar@juno.com)

DATES TO REMEMBER

The Fort Collins Audubon Society meets at 7:30 P.M. on the second Thursday of each month, September through May, excluding December, in the Ludlow Room at the Fort Collins Lincoln Center, 417 West Magnolia Street. Members and non-members are welcome at all meetings, field trips and special events.