May/June 2010 News
JM and JR their Two Swift Backyard Bird Sanctuary now LIVE on the Internet. Check it Out!
A HUGE CONGRATULATIONS TO TEAM SWIFT!!!!
The boys participated in the Junior Statewide Birding Championship and won 2nd place for the Elementary Division (3rd – 5th). The competition started on Friday evening, April 23rd, where they recorded over 50 of the first bird species list. They awoke the morning of the 24th, at 4:30 am, to assure being at West Point Lake at dawn, and birded until moments before the end of the competition at Charlie Elliott Wildlife Center by 5pm, even walking through many rainstorms and puddles to locate their birds. They did a terrific job of spotting, confirming, even photographing, the 94 bird species.
Their team not only won, but JM got to meet his hero, Giff Beaton, who signed his book. Giff or “Bird Dog” as he is lovingly called by the birding community, was so impressed that they spotted and photographed a whimbrel that he ‘stole’ the camera and ran around the banquet hall showing the WMA folks.
“The list included a whimbrel spotted – and photographed – at West Point Lake, only the fourth or fifth known sighting of the shorebird inland in Georgia, Giff Beaton said.”
The boys won three pairs of binoculars, a hat, tote bag, attended their very first dinner banquet, met ALOT of enthusiastic birders like themselves, and discovered some really wonderful places to return to for birding. We are so very proud of them. All had a terrific weekend and are really looking forward to next year’s competition, thanks to a very dedicated wildlife biologist at the DNR, Tim Keyes!
To read the GABO newsletter about the competition and see more photos – click here.
