January, 2012 Gene Howard, Editor, eugenefhoward@bellsouth.net
Volume 41, No. 1
JANUARY MEETING: The Augusta-Aiken Audubon Society will meet on Thursday, January 12, 2012 at 7:00 PM. The meeting location is the North Augusta Community Center, located at 495 Brookside Ave. in North Augusta, SC. The public is invited to all meetings, programs, and field trips sponsored by Augusta-Aiken Audubon.
PROGRAM: The program for the January 12, 2012 Chapter meeting is a "Show and Tell" by you, our members. Each member is invited to show up to twelve digital photographs during the meeting with a nature theme. Dust off all those National Park, bird, wild animal, and wild flower photographs that you have and send them to: augustaaikenaudubon@yahoo.com to the attention of John Demko. The deadline for receipt of images is January 5.
You must be present at the January meeting for your photos to be shown as you will be responsible for narrating them. Please be sure to indicate the order in which you wish your photos to be projected and make sure that each image is in the correct portrait or landscape orientation. We look forward to seeing what you've got! To date there have been only a few submissions so please send John some photos!
The 15th annual Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC) will be held February 17-20, 2012. The GBBC is an annual four-day event that engages bird watchers of all ages in counting birds to create a real-time snapshot of where birds are across the U.S. and Canada. Please visit the official website at http://www.birdcount.org for more information.
Each checklist submitted by these citizen scientists helps researchers at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society learn more about how birds are doing – and how to protect them and the environment we share. Last year, participants turned in more than 92,000 checklists online, creating the continent's largest instantaneous snapshot of bird populations ever recorded.
Taking part in the Great Backyard Bird Count is a great way to get outside with family and friends, have fun, and help birds—all at the same time. Anyone who can identify even a few species can provide important information that enables scientists to learn more about how the environment is changing and how that affects our conservation priorities.
Augusta-Aiken Audubon's field trips are open at no charge to all chapter members and the public. We encourage everyone to come out and join us! Some tips to make the trips more comfortable: bring a hat, sunscreen, insect repellent, and drinking water. Sturdy walking shoes are recommended as is having raingear nearby. Morning trips during the winter usually begin at 9 a.m. and end around noon; warmer weather trips generally begin at 8 a.m. and end around 11 a.m. If you have questions about a field trip, please contact the listed field trip leader.
January 14, Saturday. Savannah NWR, SC and Tybee Is. beach, Ga. Meet at the beginning of Laurel Hill WL Dr. at 9am at Savannah NWR on the SC side of the Savannah River. We will bird the drive there looking for water birds and then eat lunch at a fast food place (Wendy’s?) and bird the beach in front of the lighthouse in the afternoon. The tide will be going out so we hope to see Purple Sandpipers on the rocks there. After that we will drive home. Anne Waters and Lois Stacey lead.
January 28, Saturday. 9-12.Merry Brick Ponds. We will be looking for waterfowl. Meet at Popeyes at 9am to carpool to the ponds. Anne Waters and Lois Stacey lead.
February 11, Saturday. 9-12. Phinizy Swamp Nature Park, Ga. We will be looking for waterfowl. Meet at the parking area in front of the park at 9am. Anne Waters and Lois Stacey lead.
February 18, Saturday. 9-12. Silver Bluff Audubon Sanctuary, SC. We will meet at Kathwood Ponds near the entrance to the area at 9am and bird the ponds then other areas. This is also the Great Backyard Bird Count so birds seen today will be reported to that for our group. You will be able to see the results on the internet. Anne Waters and Lois Stacey lead.
March 3, Saturday. 9-12. North Augusta Brick Ponds Park, SC. Park at the lowest level behind the municipal building. and we will walk into the park from there. Anne Waters and Lois Stacey lead.
Di-Lane Plantation WMA, November 26, 2011 Di-Lane Plantation WMA south of Waynesboro was a good place to visit on our Nov. 26th after Thanksgiving field trip. 7 people met at Phinizy Swamp at 7:30 to car pool to the area. And are you wondering why it’s good for after Thanksgiving? We saw 26 Wild Turkeys! The first group were 10 in a field and the 2nd group of 16 were in the middle of a road.
The many fields were good places to see sparrows. We had 8 different types and most abundant were Chipping Sparrows but we also saw Song, White-throated, Savannah, Field, and 1 White-crowned, as well as Slate-colored Juncos, Eastern towhees and a lot of Goldfinches.
Red-headed Woodpeckers are almost abundant in this state refuge and we saw good flocks of Pine Warblers. We also saw a flock of Cedar Waxwings, the first of this season for most of us. Our current drought in Georgia was evident here in dried up creeks and swamps but in one area we did see White-breasted Nuthatches.
An American Kestrel was hunting one field and we saw a large falcon over another that was probably a Peregrine but was not positively identified. Anne Waters
Merry Ponds, December 10 2011 Eight people came on the December 10th field trip which was looking for wintering waterbirds. We were pleased to find 11 species of ducks. We had Ring-necked, Lesser Scaup, Redhead, Gadwall, American Wigeon, Ruddy, Northerm Shoveler, Canvasback, Green-winged Teal, Bufflehead and Hooded Merganser. There was a big flock of Double-crested Cormorants fishing in one pond with a lot of Great Egrets and Ring-billed Gulls flying over them, swooping down to snag small fish (scared by the cormorants) from the surface. Lois was able to get a nice video of this. We also saw 10 White Ibis, a species not usually wintering here. Also saw 1 Black-crowned Night Heron roosting. Two Common Loons were in the Expressway Pond and a lot of Anhingas were sunning in snags.
We had 5 species of shorebirds: Least Sandpiper, Lesser Yellowlegs, Killdeer, Dunlin and a Snipe. Five Bonaparte Gulls were with a group of gulls in another pond. And finishing up our water birds were Pied-billed Grebes and Coots which were abundant. Although not waterbirds, it was fun to see an American Pipit flying over us calling as well as a Palm Warbler and an Osprey. In all we had 46 species of birds, mostly waterbirds. Also fun and one reason I love the south, we had 2 Gulf Fritillary Butterflies flitting about the Baccharis which had filled MP with white seed fluff that looks like snow and coated our jackets.
Anne Waters
Augusta-Aiken Audubon Society
4542 Silver Bluff Rd.
Jackson, SC 29831
Phone: 803-471-0291
A-AAS Elected Officers 2010-2011
President: Doug Walker, 803-649-5929
President elect: Gene Howard, 706-863-2109
Vice-President: Ken Badke, 706-855-1955
Secretary: Nancy Demko, 803-648-7973
Treasurer: Gerald May, 706-860-3249
A-AAS Web Site: http://augustaaikenaudubon.org/
PHINIZY SNOW GOOSE (Lois Stacey)