Boston Flora

Tag: Joan Walsh

  • Friday, November 12, 7:00 pm – A Pocket Guide to Pigeon Watching, Online

    Join Porter Square Books on November 12 at 7 for a virtual event with Rosemary Mosco, author of A Pocket Guide to Pigeon Watching: Getting to Know the World’s Most Misunderstood Bird: Part field guide, part history, part ornithology primer, and altogether fun. Rosemary will be joined in conversation by Joan Walsh of Mass Audubon. This event is free and open to all, hosted on Crowdcast.

    Fact: Pigeons are amazing, and until recently, humans adored them. We’ve kept them as pets, held pigeon beauty contests, raced them, used them to carry messages over battlefields, harvested their poop to fertilize our crops–and cooked them in gourmet dishes. Now, with The Pocket Guide to Pigeon Watching, readers can rediscover the wonder. Equal parts illustrated field guide and quirky history, it covers behavior: Why they coo; how they flock; how they preen, kiss, and mate (monogamously); and how they raise their young (on chunky pigeon milk). Anatomy and identification, from Birmingham Roller to the American Giant Runt to the Scandaroon. Birder issues, like what to do if you find a baby pigeon stranded in the park. And our lively shared story together, including all the things we’ve taught them–Ping-Pong, for example. “Rats with wings?” Think again.

    Pigeons coo, peck and nest all over the world, yet most of us treat them with indifference or disdain. So Rosemary Mosco, a bird-lover, science communicator, writer, and cartoonist (and co-author of The Atlas Obscura Explorer’s Guide for the World’s Most Adventurous Kid) is here to give the pigeon’s image a makeover, and to help every town- and city-dweller get closer to nature by discovering the joys of birding through pigeon-watching.

    Rosemary Mosco is a science communicator, acclaimed cartoonist, and speaker on all things bird. She’s the creator of the webcomic Bird and Moon and has authored many science books for young people, including co-authoring the bestselling Atlas Obscura Explorer’s Guide for the World’s Most Adventurous Kid. She lives in Massachusetts.

    Joan Walsh has been an ornithologist and ecologist since 1979, and is the Bertrand Chair of Ornithology and Natural History for Mass Audubon. She has worked with Common and Roseate Terns in New York, Wood Storks in east-central Georgia, and  seabirds and Elephant Seals on the Farallon Islands off California. Her interests involve large-scale and long-term monitoring of threatened populations, and innovative recovery programs for wildlife. Currently she is working on projects involving offshore wind in New England, Roseate Tern wintering grounds in Brazil, and a long-term forestry project in Belize. Joan loves to travel, and while she hasn’t been everywhere, it is on her list. 

    Register to join the event on Crowdcast here: https://www.crowdcast.io/e/pigeonwatching

  • Wednesday, September 23, 7:00 pm – 8:00 pm – Nature on Tap: A Mighty Wind – Offshore Wind and Birds

    Join Joan Walsh, Mass Audubon Gerard A. Bertrand Chair of Field Ornithology, on September 23 from 7 – 8, online, for a discussion of offshore wind development and birds.

    By 2030 offshore wind turbines could power much of the residential eastern US, as well as a substantial part of our transportation. What will this great experiment mean to birds and bats? What can we do now to be sure we are protecting wildlife as we develop this game-changing industry? Working with our Advocacy team, Joan Walsh has been leading Mass Audubon’s efforts with other nonprofit partners in the US to protect birds while supporting a decarbonized electricity future. Join us as we share what we know, and what we need to know, to be the leaders in responsible development of this greener future.

    Instructions on how to join and the link to this virtual session will be sent within 24 hours before the event. Registration is required. Register now. For your own security, DO NOT send credit card information via email.

    For more information contact Conservation Science 208 S. Great Rd Lincoln, MA 01773 birdconservation@massaudubon.org

    Image from Save the Eagles International

  • Saturday, March 3, 8:00 am – 4:00 pm – Mass Audubon Birders Meeting – Birds, Baleen, and 20 Years of Marine Conservation

    The Massachusetts Audubon Society will hold its 20th Annual Birders Meeting on Saturday, March 3, from 8 – 4 at The LaCava Center, Bentley University in Waltham. Registration fee, which includes lunch, is $63 for Mass Audubon members, $70 for non-members, and you may register online at www.massaudubon.org.  Sessions will include talks by Stephen Kress on Restoring Endangered Seabirds: Lessons from Puffins and Terns, Dave Wiley on Foraging Behavior of Humpback Whales in the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary, Debi Shearwater on 35 Years of California Seabirding, and Shawn Carey and Jim Grady on Epic Journeys: Tracking the Migrations of Shorebirds in the Western Hemisphere. Additional breakout presentations will be given by Anne-Marie Runfola, Julie C. Ellis, Brian Harrington, and Joan Walsh.

  • Thursday, April 28, 6:30 pm – Ghost Bird

    To kick-off the 6th annual Birds and Bards Festival, The Arnold Arboretum, the Boston Nature Center, the Emerald Necklace Conservancy, and the Franklin Park Coalition will screen the movie Ghost Bird —a fascinating look at the controversial “rediscovery” of the extinct (or is it?) Ivory-billed woodpecker.

    The screening will take place at 6:30pm on Thursday, April 28th at the Boston Nature Center, 500 Walk Hill Street, Mattapan, Massachusetts 02126.

    In 2005, scientists announced that the Ivory-billed woodpecker, a species thought to be extinct for 60 years, had been found in the swamps of Eastern Arkansas. Other creatures have wrongly been presumed extinct, but the reappearance of the Ivory-bill was celebrated around the world as the rediscovery of a lifetime, prompting the largest recovery effort ever undertaken for a lost species. Millions of dollars poured in from the government while ornithologists and birders flooded the swamps to find the rare bird.

    Down the road, the town of Brinkley, Arkansas – itself on the brink of extinction – was transformed by the hope, commerce and controversy surrounding their feathered friend. But continued sightings by expert birders only highlighted the mysterious absence of credible evidence. Now six years later, the woodpecker remains as elusive as ever. Ghost Bird brings the Ivory-bill’s blurry rediscovery into focus revealing our uneasy relationship with nature and the increasing uncertainty of our place within it.

    Following the film, there will be a panel discussion about the state of conservation and endangered species in Massachusetts and around the world. Experts from three of the leading conservation organizations in MA will be available to answer questions:

    Pearl Yusuf, Asst. Curator of the Hooves and Horns, Franklin Park Zoo

    Joan Walsh, Director of Bird Monitoring, Mass Audubon

    Wayne Klockner, Director of the Massachusetts Program of The Nature Conservancy

    For more info visit

    http://ghostbirdmovie.com/

    http://arboretum.harvard.edu/news-events/birds-and-bards/

    http://www.massaudubon.org/Nature_Connection/Sanctuaries/Boston/news.php?id=1430&event=no

    Contact: Marc Devokaitis 617.384.5209 marc_devokaitis@harvard.edu