“The Birds of Railroad Bridge Park: 20 years of Weekly Bird Walks on the Olympic Discovery Trail”
Presented by Bob Boekelheide
March 23, 2022 at 7:00pm
Location: Rainshadow Hall at the Dungeness River Nature Center, 2099 W Hendrickson Rd, Sequim
FREE
Song Sparrow - Photo by Bob Boekelheide
When the Dungeness River Audubon Center opened in 2001, Bob Boekelheide began its first citizen science program — Wednesday morning bird walks in Railroad Bridge Park. Twenty years and over 1100 bird walks later, the data provide one of the longest time series of weekly bird surveys in the Pacific Northwest. Bob will show how the walks have documented the waxing, waning, and resilience of a variety of bird populations on the north Olympic Peninsula, from Anna’s Hummingbirds to Bald Eagles.
Bob Boekelheide
Bob Boekelheide's lifelong interest has been the ecology of marine vertebrates, particularly birds and mammals. With an M.S. in Ecology from UC Davis, Bob participated in several marine research projects to the Arctic, Antarctic, across the Pacific, in Washington and California, including seven years as biologist at the Farallon Islands off the coast of California. While in California, he coauthored the book Seabirds of the Farallon Islands and several papers about the marine ecology of nesting seabirds and marine mammals. A certificated teacher, Bob taught science and math in Wapato, Sequim and Port Angeles public schools. He is the former director of the Dungeness River Nature Center in Sequim, WA. As Bird Count chair for Olympic Peninsula Audubon Society, he has compiled the annual Sequim-Dungeness Christmas Bird Count and the Clallam County Spring Migration Count for over 26 years, along with helping to organize several other citizen science projects on the north Olympic Peninsula, including weekly Wednesday morning bird walks in Railroad Bridge Park.
We are absolutely thrilled to present the Olympic Peninsula Audubon Society’s first in-person meeting since early 2020, and the first OPAS meeting in the new Nature Center. Even though the masking mandate will have been lifted, mask wearing is encouraged.