WOS Monthly Meetings

See also Past meetings.

Monday, December 3rd—Patrick Sullivan Tribute and Members' Photo Night

The meeting will begin with a short tribute to Patrick Sullivan.

Bring your photos to share! There will be a digital projector available for your use. Photos may be brought on CD or USB flash.

January 7, 2008:  Desperate (bird) Housewives — with Michael Donahue

Eviction, untimely death, disappearing offspring -- who needs Desperate Housewives when you’ve got nesting birds in your yard? Mike Donahue will share what he’s learned about nesting behavior from watching the birds nesting in his yard, through slides and video.  He’ll also share his experiences participating in several “citizen science” programs that collect information on nesting birds.

February 4, 2008: Birds of Washington and Southern Africa — with Dennis Paulson

March 3, 2008: The Great Gull Debate! — with Gene Hunn et al

April 7, 2008: Osprey Recovery Program — with Larry Rymon

Mr. Rymon will discuss a successful osprey reintroduction program in Pennsylvania, a project that took 30 years. He will also incorporate a 27-minute film, "Return from Forever." This film has been shown widely, including on ESPN.

May 5, 2008: Pterodroma Petrals - Juan Fernandez Islands, Chile — with Jo Smith

The Juan Fernandez Islands are a remote, oceanic archipelago, 670 km offshore from Valparaiso, Chile.  The Juan Fernandez Petrel (Pterodroma externa) is one of two endemic seabirds on the archipelago, with the entire global population of  one million pairs breeding on Alejandro Selkirk.  In this talk, Ms. Smith will describe the foraging ecology of this species and present a photographic essay to highlight this beautiful archipelago and discuss some of the past and present conservation concerns facing the endemic fauna. Ms. Smith is a PhD candidate at the University of Washington, studying the foraging ecology and patterns of habitat use in breeding birds.  She has studied seabirds and island ecosystems since 1997, with research spanning from the breeding biology of nesting seabirds to rare or unusual plant communities and the role of introduced species on islands.  She currently serves on a recovery team in Canada to conserve seabird populations in the North Pacific.

Monthly Membership Meetings are held the first Monday of the month (except July, August, & September). They are held at the Center for Urban Horticulture on the University of Washington campus, 3501 NE 41st St., Seattle, and are open to all. The social begins at 7:00 p.m. and the program starts at 7:30 p.m.

Directions: From I-5 take SR520 East.  Take the Montlake Blvd NE exit and turn North towards the University of Washington campus. Stay in right lane and drive North on Montlake Blvd (over the bridge and past the stadium).  The road will curve to the right around the Montlake Fill and merges with NE 45th St.  You will quickly approach a 5 way intersection.  At the intersection turn right onto Mary Gates Memorial Drive.  The Center for Urban Horticulture is 2 long blocks down on the right.  There is plenty of free parking at the facility.  We use the main meeting room, the backside of which faces the road. The following bus routes stop at NE 45th and Mary Gates Memorial Drive: #25, 65, & 75.  A map can be found on http://depts.washington.edu/urbhort/html/info/contact.html.

Past meetings - if you would like to contact a past speaker, please email the WOS Webmaster

November 5th, 2007 - Song sparrows, Discovery Park by Chris Templeton

October 1st, 2007 - Swans with Martha Jordan

June 4th, 2007 - Member slides night

May 7th, 2007 – Ginger Gumm and Daniel Poleschook, Jr.: Loons in Washington State

April 2nd, 2007 – Rob Faucett – Bird song recording.

March 5th, 2007 – David Williams: The Street Smart Naturalist – a naturalist’s overview of City of Seattle natural history. www.seanet.com/~wingate/

February 5th, 2007 – Charlie Wurster: Polar Seabird Adaptations to the Environment – Partial convergent evolution of Arctic and Antarctic seabirds. Why Alcids in the Arctic can fly and penguins in the Antarctic cannot.  cfwurster@yahoo.com

December 4th, 2006 — Member’s slide night.

November 6th, 2006 — Burke Research.  Ongoing work into understanding the hybrid zone dynamics of Hermit and Townsend’s Warblers was discussed, as was the Burke’s participation in the All Birds Barcoding Initiative.

October 2nd, 2006 — Renee Ha, PH.D.  The phylogenetic status of three North American crow species based on mtDNA control region sequences.

June 5th, 2006 — Member Slides

May 1st, 2006 — Sievert Rohwer—Burke Museum - Molting/Migration - An evening that gave an overview of the Burke’s effort to discover where some Northwest-breeding passerines go to molt before they reach their wintering grounds.

April 3rd, 2006 — Bud Anderson—Hawk Bills - Discussed extensive studies on the long-billed hawk syndrome.

January 2nd, 2006 — Washington and Alaska - the Link - Brian Bell and Michael Hobbs discussed their trip to Kotzebue, AK, in 2004.

December 5^th, 2005 - Member slides night.

November 7^th, 2005 - Tony Angel and John Marzluff made a presentation on corvids.

October 3^rd, 2005 - Becky Hartley - "Little Birds With Big Voices: How Do They Do It?".

June 6^th, 2005 – Members slide night

May 2^nd, 2005 – Matt Klope discussed radar tracking birds and collision avoidance at Whidbey Naval Air Station

April 4^th, 2005 – Dan Varland's presentation on the Coastal Raptor Survey Project

March 7^th, 2005 – Sievert Rohwer – On studying differences in molt timing and location among neotropical migrants

February 7^th, 2005 - Peter Singleton – The Ecology of Barred Owls in Eastern Cascades.

January 3^rd, 2005- Mary Carlson spoke on the natural history and captive husbandry of the Aquarium's alcid collection (Tufted Puffins, Common Murres, Pigeon Guillemots and Rhinoceros Auklets).

December 6^th, 2004 - Members slide night.

November 1^st, 2004 - Julia Parrish presented "Why Common Murres are Uncommon in NW"

October 4^th, 2004 - Chris Thompson gave a talk on molting.

June 7^th, 2004 - Member Slides Night

May 3^rd, 2004 - Ed Schulz and Chuck Henny presented a program on Ospreys

April 5^th, 2004 - Ann Essinger will present "The Secret Life of the Great Blue Heron.”

March 1^st, 2004 - John Withey presented a program on western Washington’s Crows

February 2^nd, 2004 – Sharon Birks and Rob Faucett of the Burke Museum discussed the programs in ornithology at the Burke.

January 5^th, 2004 – Michael Donahue presented "All the Gulls I’ve Loved Before: Adventures in Gull Watching"

December 1^st, 2003 – Member Slide Night.

November 3^rd, 2003 – Scott Downes presented “Reproductive Ecology of the Sage Thrasher in a Disturbed Shrub-steppe Landscape” covering his master’s research on the reproductive ecology of sage thrashers in the Columbia Basin

October 6^th, 2003 – Bob Morse presented a program on the birds of the Puget Sound area.

May 5^th, 2003 – Tim Cullinan, presented "Bird Conservation's Second Revolution," describing the unprecedented efforts of conservationists to protect entire ecosystems for the benefit of birds.

April 7^th, 2003  – Dr. John C. Wingfield, presented "Territorial Behavior in the Song Sparrow: Changing Contexts and Alliances." See his lab's website for more info, http://faculty.washington.edu/jwingfie/reg_index.html, and read the Seattle Times’ May 20, 2002, article about Dr. Wingfield’s research.  Search the Times’ website for “John Wingfield.”

March 3^rd, 2003 – Population and Conservation Genetics of Black-footed Albatrosses by Hollie E. Walsh, Ph.D. candidate, Department of Zoology, University of Washington.

February 3^rd, 2003 – Monitoring Climate Change With an Arctic Seabird: The Response of Black Guillemots to a Warming Climate in Northern Alaska by Dr. George J. Divoky, Research Associate, Institute of Arctic Biology, University of Alaska, Fairbanks.  See http://cooperisland.org/  for more information.

January 6^th, 2003 – Bob Altman presented “Landbird Stories, A Potpourri of Topics"

December 2^nd, 2002 – Member’s slide night.

November 4^th, 2002 -- Tom Bloxton gave a talk entitled "Northern Goshawk Research in Intensively Managed Forests of Western Washington

October 7^th, 2002 Russell Rogers presented data and results of a 1999 Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife nest site selection study of white-headed woodpeckers for the east slope of the Cascade Mountains.

June 3^rd, 2002 Members slide night.

May 6^th, 2002 Andy Stepniewski presented “Okanogan, the Epicenter of Breeding Bird Diversity in Washington”.  Andy’s presentation looked at why the highest breeding bird diversity is found in the Okanogan and surrounding highlands, and focused on the birds of the Okanogan and what is known about their habitat, distribution and status.

April 1^st, 2002 Dave Nysewander presented Puget Sound seabird data collected during ten years of monitoring. The suite of data included trends, distribution, and abundance for species included in the Puget Sound Ambient Monitoring Program (PSAMP).  See: http://www.wa.gov/wdfw/fish/psamp/

March 4^th, 2002 Dr. Thomas Good presented "Love/Hate Relationships on the Colony: How Hybridization and Competition Influence Coastal Gull Populations.” Dr. Good's PhD dissertation topic involved the Glaucous-winged/Western Gull hybrid zone.

February 4^th, 2002 Bob Morse, author of A Birder's Guide to Coastal Washington and intrepid birder, shared his knowledge of the birds and birding hot spots of coastal Washington. See the book review in WOSNews 75, and http://www.birdingcoastalwa.com/

January 7^th, 2002 Michael Hobbs shared his reflections on almost 8 years of weekly bird surveys at Marymoor Park in Redmond, King.  Bird and plant lists for the park can be found at http://www.marymoor.org.

December 3^rd, 2001 Members' Slides Night.

November 5^th, 2001 Russell Rogers gave a talk named “Birds of South Puget Sound Grasslands”. Russell recently completed his Master's degree at The Evergreen State College and presented some interesting insights into the prairie birds of the South Puget Sound region, with a focus on Horned Lark, Vespers Sparrow, Western Meadowlark, and Western Bluebird.

October 1^st, 2001 Michael Donahue spoke on "Identification of Iceland and Thayer's Gulls: Shades of Gray or a Red Herring?".  Iceland Gulls are being reported with increasing frequency on the west coast, with 7 currently accepted records for Washington. Identification of birds in the Iceland Gull/Thayer's Gull complex can be difficult, and out-of-range birds often generate much discussion and controversy. Michael Donahue spent 5 days in January 2001 in Newfoundland, the premier place in North America for studying large numbers of Iceland Gulls. He will share some of his slides of Iceland and Thayer's Gulls, and review what is known about identifying these two gulls in the field.

June 4^th, 2001 Three members brought slides from Washington and Florida for Member Slides Night.

May 7^th, 2001 Martin Muller, renown expert on Pied-billed Grebe, gave a fascinating account of their behavior, based on his countless hours of observations at Seattle's Green Lake and his extensive review of the literature that he carried out while co-authoring the Birds of North America account on the species.

April 2^nd, 2001 WOS President Scott Morrison gave a talk on Northern Goshawks in Washington.

March 5^th, 2001 Matt VanderHaegen spoke on "Changes in Washington shrub-steppe habitat and their effect on obligate birds." Matt is with the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife in Olympia.

February 5^th, 2001 Pelagic Birding Off the West Coast was the featured topic at the February WOS meeting. Mike Donahue gave an overview of seabirds and marine mammals you can see offshore. Tracee Geernaert gave a history of the Short-tailed Albatross, their recovery and the potential potential for ticking one off on your Washington life list.

November 6^th, 2000 Dr. Todd Hass, Program and Science Coordinator, COASST Research Associate and Lecturer, Department of Zoology, gave a talk: “Putting Our Best Feet Forward (or Dead Birds 101)”. The Coastal Observation and Seabird Survey Team (COASST) is a citizen science project dedicated to involving volunteers in the collection of high quality data on the status and trends of coastal resources--mainly seabirds--for the tripartite purposes of science, informed management and conservation, and proactive citizen involvement and action. And how do we do it?? We sytematically identify dead birds along Washington's beaches!  See the COASST website at http://depts.washington.edu/coasst/ for more information.

October 2^nd, 2000 Lee Barnes, avid photographer and long time WOS member, shared a slide display of his trip to Kenya.  He also gave a presentation describing the work of Lee Barnes, avid photographer and long time WOS member, shared a slide display of his trip to Kenya.  He also gave a presentation describing the work of Operation Smile which performs free operations on children to correct cleft palate and related problems.