The Naturalists' Club of Broome County, NY

Americans spend billions of dollars each year feeding birds and provide an enormous food  subsidy. But little research has been conducted to understand how birds use the food we provide, and how that food influences the survival and behavior of birds. Using passive integrated transponders (PIT tags) and "smart" bird feeders, we're tracking the feeding behavior of individual birds and gaining an unprecedented view of their activity. This presentation will reveal how we use technology to study feeding behavior, and…

Humpback whales are the maestros of the marine world. Their “songs” actually develop and change over time - an example of cultural evolution in a non-human species. Katy Payne and Ann Warde of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Bioacoustics Research Program have teamed up for this audio-visual presentation during which they will introduce the audience to whales, the sounds they make, and the concept of deep listening. Our September Meeting will feature an Open House.  Barb Cole, club member and  licensed wildlife rehabilitator, will bring a rescued animal to the September…

Marie Read, professional nature photographer, will discuss the Birds of Mono Lake California and show photos from her collection.  Widely published, Marie specializes in images of birds and bird behavior. Meetings are open to the public.  The talk will include a question & answer session and light refreshments.

Our December Member Meeting is cancelled due to the current Winter Storm Warning. If you are a member who was planning on showing photos tonight, please email us at bcnatclub@gmail.com with one or two photos and we'll post them here on our Facebook page and credit you so we can all still share in the fun. Please include a short caption and where the photo was taken.

Whitebark pine and Clark’s Nutcrackers have a fascinating relationship: the trees provide rich, fatty seeds, and the birds “plant” the trees’ seeds —a single bird may hide up to 98,000 seeds in a year. The food caches help the birds get through the winter, and the leftovers grow into new trees. In fact, whitebark pine trees sprout almost exclusively from nutcracker seed caches. This dependency has led to considerable concern for both species because whitebark pine ecosystems are rapidly disappearing…

Dylan Horvath will discuss the Caspian Terns of Oregon. He will share stories about his experience in Caspian Tern research in the Columbia River Estuary in the Northwest (Oregon/Washington).  Dylan lived on East Sand Island for 4 months monitoring and guarding the largest Caspian Tern colony on the west coast.  Other wildlife antics on the island were often just as interesting as the terns themselves! Dylan Horvath is the Steward of Natural Areas of Binghamton University and a Wildlife Biologist.  He not…

Gardening for butterflies and moths (i.e., leps) is more than planting nectar sources for adults. Learn how you can assist them in all stages of their lifecycle as well as distinguish them from pests, so that all of us can enjoy these beautiful creatures in the future. Colleen Wolpert is a butterfly and moth enthusiast and long-time member of the Naturalists’ Club. She started with butterflies at an early age, received her Master’s in social work, and then even started…

In 2005 Dolores Elliott traveled to Kenya with an Iroquois beadworker to help him revive beadwork among several groups in Kenya. While there she made friends with a Maasai man whose dream it was to start a safari company. In 2014 Dolores invited four friends to join her on safari with David, whose dream had been realized. David took them to several game reserves, villages, museums, schools, and to visit his family. Of course, they saw tens of thousands of…