State College Bird Club ZOOM Meeting
November 15, 2023


Presiding: Doug Wentzel

Recording: Peggy Wagoner Saporito

Attendance:37

Meeting Format: Zoom

Treasurer’s report:(Karen Kottlowski):

SCBC balance in the checking account is $4283.00 and savings account is $5575.85. Earlier this month the audit committee of Ron Crandall, Kathy Bechdel and Julia Plummer reviewed and approved the treasurer’s accounting records kept during the past year.
 
Announcements/Other Activities:

The Committee to develop endowment fund distribution (Susan Braun, Deb Escalet and Peggy Wagoner) is working on plans to be presented to the Board for approval. SCBC will receive the first distribution of $1100 -$1200 from Centre Foundation in March 2024. When we initially set up the fund last Dec (2022), we considered that the funds would be used for bird conservation which could include research, education and projects. Each year different activities could be funded. (For example: we could fund the establishment of bird boxes somewhere one year, send teachers to a nature/bird training the next, fund a bird research project another...etc). And if dollar amounts requested are fairly small (like Nick Kerlin’s request for $350 for next boxes last year from SCBC), we could potentially fund a couple of different activities. The committee will determine ways to let potential recipients of these funds know that we have money available and a means of deciding which project/research/education activity(ies) to potentially fund which would ultimately be put to a vote for final approval by the membership.

Doug provided an update on the Millbrook Marsh construction projects. The new welcome pavilion is 98% complete and their education building should be completed by early next year.

The Whitehall Community Park (below Musser Gap) will open in the spring with trails connecting to Musser Gap.

The listserv continues to be a wonderful source of information. For example, this month, listserv participants helped identify an ideal location for the release of a rehabilitated turkey vulture that had recovered from lead poisoning.

Joe Gyekis will be sending via the listserv, information to donate and show community support for an initiative to make PSU campus more wildlife friendly, especially addressing bird window collisions. Donations will be done through Centre Foundation’s Giving Tuesday on November 28. Joe is hoping that 300 or more people will make at least small dollar amount ($5) donations to show that there is interest among the community for this effort.

Christmas Bird Counts are being scheduled. Doug encouraged anyone interested to contact the local organizers to join if they haven’t participated in the past and for those who are “old hands” at this, to encourage new birders to join them. Among the five CBC locations within the region, Raystown is scheduled for December 28 and Bald Eagle State Park, December 30. To see a complete list and more information check the Audubon website: https://www.audubon.org/conservation/science/christmas-bird-count

Bird Club Field Trips: (Susan Smith VP of Field Trips)

A successful last field trip of the season on November 12 was led by Bob Snyder at Bald Eagle State Park with a dozen hardy birders braving the cold morning.

Susan welcomes ideas for spring field trips as she will begin developing plans in January.

Bird walks scheduled by other groups and supported with volunteers from SCBC will be occurring in the spring such as Millbrook Marsh on Tuesday mornings and Shaver’s Creek on Wednesday mornings.

Notable Bird Sightings: (Oct. 25 – Nov 15, 2023; Centre and its contiguous counties)

This month Joe Gyekis gave us a quick overview of some of the unusual bird visitors seen within a 25-mile radius of PSU’s Old Main. Late migrants included mostly the expected species. On Lake Perez there was an impressive fallout of brant. Migrant surf scoters were seen at some of the area’s lakes. An especially early short-eared owl was seen in two locations, Stone Mountain hawk watch and within Stone valley. And early crossbills were seen at Bear Meadows.

Speaker: Alan MacEachren: “Geo-Birding, Citizen Science and a PA Geo-Big Year ”

(This entire presentation can be viewed at:)
https://psu.zoom.us/rec/share/fIdOuo3e8NtlpPc5nXMf54h4QfSMww7QaNm3Km2P32OUK3en7u_WNKqvVLoLm3QT.zqXN25ZaP12dMoFM?
startTime=1700093724000

Alan, a PSU Professor Emeritus of Geography, discussed geo-birding and his recent experience doing a geo-big year. He defines geo-birding as maximizing locations birded rather than maximizing number of species seen.

eBird, the quintessential citizen science success story, has a spatial bias. Looking at PA, or anywhere in the country for that matter, areas around population centers are well covered by birders and many eBird lists are generated in these areas. Areas with few people are generally poorly represented in the eBird data, impacting its quality.  There are several potential strategies to improve this data including: spatial-temporal modeling to fill data gaps, systematic sampling plans (in which birders are directed to specific locations such as in the Breeding Bird Surveys) or gaming applications (in which birders are motivated by gaming strategies to go to under-represented areas).

As a challenge to himself and to help address the under-birded status of many areas of PA, Alan, along with his wife, embarked on a “big year” in 2021 which focused on birding every county in PA. In this case, he deemphasized species chasing, but he did make an effort to bird comprehensively. He chose to find at least 67 species in every county during his big year since this number reflects the number of counties in the state. The common target of 100 species per county would be an almost impossible task in some counties with his time constraint.

Equipment for this adventure included binoculars, spotting scope, camera and paper maps since some areas were out of cell service range. Alan divided the state into 11 regions with several counties in each region. He discussed some of his favorite spots within each region and shared his beautiful photos of some of the birds he encountered. Nearly 30 species were seen in only one county and only 3 species, Canada goose, American robin and blue jay were seen in all 67 counties.

To reach his target of 67 species/county, he birded for an average of 4 days per county and generated 9-30 eBird lists depending upon the county. In 30 counties he was among the top 20 birders on eBird for 2021, reflecting the fact that these counties are under-represented in eBird. 

He birded throughout the year, beginning in central Pa during the first 3 months of the year, then branching out into the further reaches of the state as the year progressed. Since he birded throughout the year, he visited some locations at the time of year when fewer species are present. Some birding was done during day trips from home, but others were during more extended camping trips.

To document this adventure, sharing his experiences and photographs, Alan wrote a book, ”A Geo-Big Year: Pandemic Retirement is for the Birds” which can be purchased through Bookshop.org where you can order from the Webster’s Bookstore Cafe.