COMMUNITY JOURNALISM: Bird watchers gather in Iowa City

Editor's note: Rick Hollis, 64, of rural North Liberty, has been watching birds since his childhood. He's past president and newsletter editor for the Iowa City Bird Club.

By Rick Hollis. community contributor

IOWA CITY - What do bird-watchers to when they get together?

We talks about birds, we listen to talks, we share the company of people who share our interests and, above all, we watch birds.

More than 125 bird-watchers from around the state and beyond came to a state meeting of the Iowa Ornithologists Union earlier this month.

The Iowa City Bird Club hosted the event with a significant contribution from Cedar Rapids Audubon. A big tip of the binoculars to ICBC President Karen Disbrow, Bruce Gardner and Chris Edwards. These people were responsible for planning, running countless errands and planning field trips.

We started May 18 by enjoying the chimney swift show over Iowa City and going to Hageboeck (Bird) Hall at to look at the exhibits, kickoff a fund drive to renovate the 100-year-old Laysan Island exhibit and to hear Iowa City's Tom Kent talk about his recent book on References to Iowa Birds Prior to 1900.

On May 19, we moved to the fairgrounds for breakfast and the departure of field trips. After lunch we returned for our afternoon program. We heard a panel discussion on educating beginners about birds. Next Alvaro Jamarillo spoke on An American Journey, the blackbirds, orioles and meadowlarks of the Americas. We learned about the numerous lifestyles of one of my favorite bird families. Next up was Ron Wingdingstad from Minnesota Audubon who spoke on the decline of chimney swifts and how we can turn this around, namely do not cap or cover brick or stone chimneys. Shane Patterson spoke about the final year of the Iowa Breeding Bird Atlas.

That evening Jamarillo gave a keynote talk called “Birding Outside the Box” or “How Our Brain Identifies Birds” or “How to Identify Birds like a Pro.” As you might guess from his talk with three titles, he covered a lot of ground and had us laughing at the way he explained things and at the way birders sometimes behave.

It is a truly rare speaker who can educate and amuse his audience.

On May 20, after field trips, we met for lunch at the Conservation Education Center at Kent Park and compiled the list of birds seen over the weekend.

Field trips included the Amana Colonies and Indiangrass Hills in Iowa County, Brinton Timber in Washington County and Ciha Fen, Hawkeye Wildlife Area, Hickory Hill Park and Lake Macbride State Park (and Sugarbotton Recreation Area) in Johnson County.

Our bird count for the weekend was 147 species. We saw everyday friends like Canada geese, turkey vultures, robins, cardinals and goldfinches and we missed some birds we expected to see. But we also saw many other species that might be less familiar to the reader of this note, like American avocets, Eurasian-collared doves, rose-breasted grosbeaks, dickcissels and orchard orioles.

We saw 22 species of wood warblers, a family of small, colorful and active birds seen only in the Americas. We had northern parula, blackburnian, yellow-throated, cerulean, hooded and Canada warblers, and American redstarts, also a warbler.

n To learn more about the IOU and bird-watching go to www.iowabirds.org. IOU meetings are held around the state in the spring and fall.