Birdchick

August 1, 2010 Outdoor Talk, KTLK, 4pm – 6pm

Call in with your bird questions and I’ll answer them live on air!

August 30, 2010 Showcase Minnesota, KARE 11, 10am – 11am

This will be a live appearance at the Minnesota State Fair. If you are at the fair you can be in the audience and I’ll answer your bird questions–live!

September 11, 2010 Birds to Beers on The Mississippi River

This is an event for the park I work for Mississippi National River and Recreation Area at Merlin’s Rest.  It will include a history of beer on the Mississippi River presented by my friend Ranger Dan, a showing of our park’s movie and even a special Mississippi River Pub Quiz.

September 18, 2010 Bun Fest!

Bun Fest is a fundraiser for the Minnesota Companion Rabbit Society.  Since our rabbit Cinnamon was a rescue for the St Paul Humane Society, Non Birding Bill and I both feel strongly about rabbit rescue organizations.  I’ll be on hand doing a presentation on Life with Disapproving Rabbits.

September 23, 2010 MRVAC Panama Talk

I’ll be speaking for the Minnesota River Valley Audubon Chapter on my travel to Panama this past February.  It will include photos and videos of birds and other wildlife…incidentally, if YOU would like to go to Panama, I’m leading a trip there in February of 2011.

February 11 – 21, 2011  Canopy Tower & Canopy Lodge in Panama

I’m going back to Panama in 2011…want to come?  We’ll watch birds, we’ll toast good friends, we’ll take a zip line through the canopy, we’ll take a train and learn the history of the Panama Canal, we’ll live a life of adventure for 10 days–don’t worry, we’ll work in a few siestas as well.  Read the itinerary and rates here.

Would you like to book me for an appearance at your bird festival or convention?

I offer a variety of programs and workshops that are great for any festival for birders of all levels.  I’ve been booked all over the country and even gave one of my techno birding programs in Guatemala.  Having organized and led field trips for several years, I am also available as a field trip leader and especially enjoys taking beginning birders out to see new birds.  The added bonus is that your festival will be covered in my blog for other people to learn about and encourage them to attend in the future.

Some festivals I have blogged about include:

Detroit Lakes Festival of Birds, Detroit Lakes, MN

Leks, Treks, and More in Woodward, OK

Potholes and Prairie Bird Festival, Jamestown, ND

Rio Grande Valley Bird Festival in Harlingen, TX

San Diego Bird Festival, San Diego, CA

Space Coast Birding and Wildlife Festival, Titusville, FL

My list of offerings are below.  Fees vary according to location and program desired.  You can email me for more info.

Adventures in Bird Banding – Ever wonder what it’s like to hold a pelican or cormorant (that’s a cormorant chick above) and then have it vomit on you? Or what it’s like to watch a red-tailed hawk drop from the sky right in front of you? Or held an indigo bunting in your hands?  I’ve participated in banding birds as big as bald eagles to as tiny as ruby-crowned kinglets and have had some humorous encounters. Learn about how birds are banded, exciting information obtained from banding records, and the adventure of visiting a heron rookery. This program can be species specific, for example, if you want only raptor banding, it can be all raptor banding, if you want only songbirds, I can do just songbirds. This is a PowerPoint Presentation, I bring the computer and wires, and you provide the projector and screen.  I’ll also bring some bands for people to view.

Birding in Kazakhstan – A report on the birding trip of a lifetime to other side of the globe with Swarovski Optik to see the work they funded with the endangered Sociable Lapwing. Includes photos of incredible birds, remote landscapes, and humorous adventures in outdoor female urination as we birded the Kazak Steppes and the Tien Shan Mountains. Here are some of my blog entries about Kazakhstan to wet your whistle. This is a PowerPoint Presentation (strictly as a slide show), I bring the computer and wires, and you provide the projector and screen.

Horned Guan Death March – Have you ever been on the hunt for a bird and stopped to take serious assessment of your sanity? I did. This is humorous account on seeing one of the rarest birds in the Americas during a fabulous trip to Guatemala.  Also includes information on the birds (like the above berylline hummingbird) that you can see along the Pacific slope of Guatemala.  Here are some of my blog entries on Guatemala.  This is a PowerPoint Presentation (strictly as a slide show), I bring the computer and wires, and you provide the projector and screen.

Digiscoping – How to take a point and shoot digital camera or digital SLR and use your binoculars or spotting scope to get photos of birds and mammals. Almost all of the photos on this website are digiscoped.  I also cover creating videos with your scope and you can view a digiscoping video I made with editor Amy Hooper of WildBird Magazine in Las Vegas.  This is a PowerPoint Presentation, I bring the computer and wires, and you provide the projector and screen. This can also be combined with a field trip to go out and actually practice digiscoping.

Techno Birding – The latest in technology to enjoy the outdoors from digiscoping, to field guides on iPhones, to digital recorders, to  eBird, to bird blogs, to a guide to websites and some interesting birding stories found via the World Wide Web. This program is rarely the same, it changes as technology changes.  This is a PowerPoint Presentation, I bring the computer and wires, and you provide the projector and screen.

Bird Feeding – How to attract birds no matter where you live from out in the middle the country to an apartment in an urban area. Birds are tailored to the state or region the presentation is given. Based on the book City Birds/Country Birds that I wrote for Adventure Publications. This is a PowerPoint Presentation, I bring the computer and wires, and you provide the projector and screen.

Bird Real Estate – How to attract birds no matter where you live from out in the middle of the country to an apartment in an urban area using nesting boxes, platforms and unusual places like this house finch who nested in a bird feeder.  This also includes information on anti predator tactics. Birds are tailored to the state or region the presentation is given. Based on the book City Birds/Country Birds that I wrote for Adventure Publications.  This is a PowerPoint Presentation, I bring the computer and wires, and you provide the projector and screen.

The Woman Who Could Talk To Birds – This is a humorous story based on my experiences of managing a wild bird store for eight years. The main theme is a funny and true story about a woman who would call and could psychically communicate with birds. This is more entertaining than informative–great for lunches or following a banquet.  There are no photos to go with this.

Play On Birds – A sketch comedy show that pokes fun at birds, bird watching and bird feeding written and performed by Sharon and Bill Stiteler has been performed at nature festivals and the Minnesota Fringe Festival to rave reviews. Sketches include What Birders Think They Look Like, What Birders Actually Look Like, Birds With Dirty Names, The Brown Bird Sketch, and The 4 Stages of Squirrel. This runs about 45 minutes and is priced differently from the other birding presentations. Please call for rates.

Beginning Beekeeping – Bees are in the news, especially with Colony Collapse Disorder being of concern. This photographic program walks you through the fascinating world of the honeybee life cycle and things you need to know if you want to start beekeeping. This is a PowerPoint Presentation, I bring the computer and wires, and you provide the projector and screen.

These are just a few of the workshops offered, if you are looking for something specific, please email me and chances are it’s available.