September 2018 Keystone Volunteers: Levi Wood and Peter Fissel

SEPT 2018 - Keystone Volunteer.png

This dynamic duo has been responsible for organizing Madison Audubon’s expansive list of public, diverse, and fascinating field trips for years. Each fall, Levi and Peter sit down with a calendar, a grin, and a bag full of ideas for what types of trips we should host the following year, and who we might ask to lead them. Their large network of birding, butterflying, botanically minded cronies are persuaded into service, thanks to Levi and Peter!

In addition to planning out the types, locations, and dates of the 20-40 field trips we host each year, Peter and Levi often lead them too! They bring people to nature, and make birding, butterflies, and natural history things to explore openly and thoroughly.

Thank you to both Levi and Peter for the many hours you dedicate to Madison Audubon each year, in particular for this work, as well as all the other ways you contribute to our mission!

Interested in volunteering with Madison Audubon? Fill out our interest form here.

Written by Brenna Marsicek, communications director

Into the Nest: Badgers gotta eat too!

Into the Nest: Badgers gotta eat too!

While adult birds and eggs are vulnerable during incubation, they are at even greater risk after chicks hatch. Most of our grassland birds are altricial as chicks, and need to stay in the nest long enough to be reasonably mobile when they fledge. However, chicks are also very vulnerable in the nest: they stay in one place, and the noise and activity surrounding the nest can attract predators. These birds need to balance the benefits of staying in the nest until they are able to fly to forage and escape predators with the potential risks of being found by predators while still in the nest.

Photo by James Perdue

Madison Audubon earns national land trust accreditation!

Madison Audubon is a non-profit that works to acquire, steward, and conserve land – in other words, a land trust organization. Back in 2012, we made a bold decision to seek national land trust accreditation, a mark of distinction awarded to organizations meeting the highest national standards for excellence and land conservation permanence. This was no easy undertaking. Indeed, of roughly 500 Audubon chapters in the U.S., there is only one other chapter that has received this distinction. We're proud to say that Madison Audubon is now the second nationally-accredited Audubon chapter and among an elite group of other land trust organizations around the country that have received this recognition!

Into the Nest: Cowbirds, everybody’s favorite villain

Into the Nest: Cowbirds, everybody’s favorite villain

A lot of people really dislike - even hate - cowbirds. I get it. It can be hard to watch a small warbler trying to keep a huge cowbird chick fed, and it’s sad when host species eggs get destroyed. But objectively and unemotionally, cowbirds are amazing, smart, resilient, and cool. Their reproductive strategy allows them to produce many more offspring than the average bird. Hopefully by the end of this post, you’ll be thinking about cowbird behavior in a new light too.

Photo by Carolyn Byers

Into the Nest: What goes in must come out

Into the Nest: What goes in must come out

Keeping the nest clean is a pretty big deal. Some large raptors are able to defend their nest from nearly anything, so it doesn’t matter how messy they are. Not so for our grassland birds. They are ill-equipped to fight back against most predators, and fare much better when they’re able to go unnoticed. Dirty nests could smell strongly, and attract curious - and hungry! - mammalian predators.

Photo by Carolyn Byers

 
 
 
 
 
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