Dennis was a friend to many of us and a great aid to the Matagorda County Mad
Island Marsh Christmas Bird Count. We were blessed to use his art work since
2012 to recognize the Best Bird of the count each year.
He will be missed in many ways.
Brent Ortego
TXMM Compiler
Sent from my iPhone
On Feb 18, 2021, at 3:32 PM, Keith Arnold <kbarnold2@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Thanks, Fred , for an eloquent tribute to Dennis. He was everything you wrote
and much more. Vic’s comment rings true.
May Gods bestow his blessings on Jenni and the family.
Keith Arnold
On Thu, Feb 18, 2021
Dennis Shepler passed away this morning after a long bout with PFD. His partner
of the last 12 years, Jenni, was with him. He had fallen asleep and after some
erratic breathing passed away quietly. He was 73.
I met Dennis in 1968 when I joined Dr Arnold’s infamous Snipe Crew. Dennis was
one of the veteran leaders. He and I immediately clicked because both of us
would rather be birding or talking about birding than almost anything. We
became fast friends and remained so until today. Ted Eubanks always says: show
a person a lifer and you have a friend for life; that certainly applied to
Dennis and me as well as Vic Emanuel. Vic, Dennis and I drove down through
eastern Mexico to Palenque in August of 1969 and showed one another lifers for
about 10 days straight. We have remained close, “Musketeers”, ever since. We
made our last trip as a threesome in 2017 to Nebraska where we watched leks of
Greater Prairie Chicken and Sharp-tailed Grouse as well as the Sandhill Crane
spectacle on the Platt River.
Dennis used to irritate me by stopping to talk to every birder he encountered
because it would slow us down on our birding trips. However, once we were at an
open weekend in Texas Nature Conservancy’s Davis Mountain Reserve with only
four hours of birding time remaining. True to form Dennis talked to every
birder headed out of the canyon. But in one of his conversations with a passing
birder he learned about a Slate-throated Redstart discovered that morning at
Tobe Canyon. It was noon on Sunday and we had to be out of the reserve by 4:00
pm. Although Dennis’s lung condition prevented him from making the quick hike
up, I was able to go up and see the bird before we had to leave. Thank you
again Dennis. No doubt many of you talked to Dennis in the field and I’ll bet
benefitted from the experience. His enthusiasm was infectious. Texas birding
will miss his friendliness, enthusiasm and his generosity of birding knowledge.
Dennis’s first love and wife of 35 years, Laurie was an artist. He worked hard
helping her and promoting her artwork until she died. Turns out, he was an
equally talented artist that only surfaced in the last dozen years. I wrote
about him more in depth and as a bird artist in the TOS Texas Birds Annual
Vol.10 pp 53-56.(2014).
My condolences to Jenni and his kids and grandkids. As Vic Emanuel said of
learning of his death: “When a very close friend dies it leaves a hole in your
life that can never be filled and causes you to value the close friend you have
even more.”
May God bless his soul. I know that my heaven will see me birding with him
again.
Fred Collins
Sent from my iPhone
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