[Bristol-Birds] BBC Raptor Education & Outreach

Ron Harrington's efforts as the hawk migration education and outreach person 
for the Bristol Bird Club were never more obvious than today at the Town of 
Abingdon's 4th Annual Arbor Day & Earth Day.  Again, Ron was an ambassador for 
BBC that makes us proud.
He also worked on our behalf with the Wynn Wood Wildlife Rehab center from 
Carter County to secure their partnership with BBC in a joint booth as well as 
working out arrangements and details for the event.

I dropped in on the celebration and was glad to see other faces from BBC 
showing up.  We were all set up under probably the largest tent at the 
celebration and our booth took up three large folding tables.  It took two 
vehicles to move in everything that made up our booth.

All afternoon people came to see the exciting live Red-tailed Hawk and red 
morph Eastern Screech Owl.  Geri Wynn carefully talked with young and old 
alike.  Many adults had never seen such a big hawk so close.  Children stood 
and gazed at the mysterious birds.  Geri fed a basket of young American Robins 
and had a baby groundhog and baby 'possum she was caring for.  Several people 
left money in a dontation jar to help pay for the work that Geri and husband 
Keith do to rehab wildlife.  Keith worked overtime in building displays and 
hauling and setting up.  He stayed the afternoon too.

Ron had carefully worked up a really neat factsheet and member benefit about 
the BBC.  He fielded questions all afternoon about membership in BBC and gave 
out the attractive and informative handouts.  It tells you more about BBC than 
most of us know about our own club.  It was really a neat idea.

Two tables were covered with all of our books and field guides and bird 
magazines of all type as well as hawk identification material.  The public  
entering the booth were welcomed by a large poster with our name over a 
dramatic very large photo of a Bald Eagle soaring.   There were beautiful color 
photos and detailed descriptions about Barred Owl, Rose-breasted Grosbeak, 
Red-bellied Woodpecker and Wood Duck.  It was a splash of color for BBC. 

The splash was anchored with two columns written for the Bristol Herald Courier 
by Jack Kestner (1) about the annual Christmas bird count and (2) local 
participation in the Cornell Project Feeder Watch.  You could also see six 
photos of our BBC good-time crowd birding in Burke's Garden for eagles in the 
winter and President Dave Worley and the gang having a great time at our annual 
Christmas party.

There were 16 great photos in series showing scenes from the annual hawk 
watching at Mendota FT in the fall.  You could see great photos provided by 
Roger Mayhorn of the Buchanan County Bird Club.  There were all types of photos 
of various raptors flying past Mendota and view from the mountin into the 
valley.  Visitors to the booth could look at the totals from 2001-2002-2003 of 
the hawk counted in migration at Mendota.

He spoke with knowledge about the hawk migration and had all the details about 
the how, when and where of hawk migrtion.  Ron was promoting the Fall Hawk 
Migration Festival.

Ron had bought four large bulletin boards at Walmart to mount everything.  It 
was all put up with a neat series cords to keep any wind from being a problem.  
The Nature Conservancy came to see us, the Virginia Division of Forestry, the 
Virginia Deaprtment of Transportation, Washington County Public Library, 
Virginia Department of Conservation and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service all 
were there and said hi.

 Amanda Martin, former secretary of the BBC and former editor of our BBC 
newsletter, THE EAGLE, pushed a stroller in with her new baby and the family 
dog.

The Wynn Wood Wildlife Rehab display had a great selection of photos of all the 
different types of reptiles, mammals, birds and other critters they have cared 
for.  Even Chris O'Bryan was in a photo right in the middle of it all showing 
him at the release of a recent rehabed Great Horned Owl.  The educational 
effort they made was neat.  They had brochures on everything from what to do if 
you find and orphaned or injured raptor to what to do it find and injured or 
ill turtle. 

They even had a bottle with a terrible looking parasite worm taken from the 
throat of a Barn Owl which Bert Hale had picked up injured from two Sullivan 
County farmers and BBC members took to the Wynn Wood Wildlife Rehab center.  
The owl has had its leg x-rayed and it is healing.  Good news there.  So far, 
so good.

In the center of their display was a full page in color from the Johnson City 
Press morning editon about the Wynn Wood rehab efforts and program.  It was 
neat and well done.

The rain did not come.  The wind was never a problem.  The crowd was good and 
the kids and grownups came all afternoon.  A biologist from VDOT wanted to ask 
about a Loggerhead Shirke being seen at their district office in Bristol.

Dave Raines, a member of the Buchanan County Bird Club from Breaks, VA, name 
came up when his brother-in-law stopped and talked about Dave and his birding.  
The brother-in-law's wife was at the other end of the tent and had just visited 
with Ron Harrington.

Emily Lachniet, a former nature center staffer with one of the National 
Audubon's centers in the northeast stopped to talk a bit.  She and her husband 
now live at Abingdon and they are birders.  She is a resource person at one of 
the area schools and Ron helped by giving her information on the Project Feeder 
Watch program for schools.  She asked all about the Bristol Bird Club.

Dr. Ramsey White, a dentist from Abingdon and formerly active in BBC, came over 
to say hello.  He wanted back on the Bristol-Birds net e-mail list and I hope 
he is reading this.  He needs to join us again at the ETSU-Bristol Center for 
meetings and again go birding.  That won't happen until his daughter's wedding 
is behind him.  They have a big spring ahead.

After it was all taken down and loaded at the end of the day, I left as Ron 
headed off to talk about the BBC with some new folks who now work for The 
Nature Conservancy's Abingdon office.

The BBC ambassador is probably still there.  It was a good weekend for the BBC 
!  Thanks to Mary Jane Erwin and Ruth Smith who were leaders Saturday for the 
BBC field trip for 11 birders.  And for several of us who did double duty by 
spending Saturday on the Herndon Chapter TOS spring count in five northeast 
counties.  We missed our BBC fieldtrip but we thought about you all.  Larry 
McDaniel and I spent 13 hours afield in Shady Valley and Holston Valley at 
South Holston Lake and Middlebrook Lake helping with that count -- we never 
found an oriole :-(  We drove 111 miles and got just 101 species.  Rick Knight 
and Don Holt had 110 species !  A good show!

Let's go birding......

Wallace Coffey
Bristol, TN





 

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