October 2018 Keystone Volunteers: Bob and Gerry Bennicoff

Bob and Gerry Bennicoff are the October 2018 Keystone Volunteers

Bob and Gerry Bennicoff do it all. For years, the dynamic duo have volunteered at Goose Pond Sanctuary doing whatever needs to be done: seed collecting, counting frogs, cleaning out the barn, and more. When Bob and Gerry were looking for an organization to volunteer with, we were sure glad they chose Madison Audubon!

Bob and Gerry are a major volunteers for the American kestrel nest box program where they monitor nest boxes, assist with erecting/retroffing nesting boxes, and banding adults and young; they help survey for the Columbia County Breeding Bird Atlas and have assisted with whip-poor-will counts and canoe routes — extra difficult and time-consuming activities; they provide assistance when large groups come out to tag monarchs and they also tag monarch on their own; they are key volunteers with our prescribed burn program and with prairie seed collecting and planting. They also help with the annual butterfly count, frog counts, and other projects at Goose Pond Sanctuary.   

Bob and his granddaughter releasing a newly tagged monarch at Goose Pond in 2016. Photo by Arlene Koziol

Bob and his granddaughter releasing a newly tagged monarch at Goose Pond in 2016. Photo by Arlene Koziol

“Gerry and I first became aware of Goose Pond in the late summer of 2015 at Madison Audubon's Monarch Tagging Event,” Bob recalls. “We fell in love! Oh my — the variety of flowers! Since then we have had the unique opportunity to help in many other ways. The prairie soothes our souls!”

Fortunately for Madison Audubon, the land they help, and the people they interact with, Bob and Gerry don’t plan to stop volunteering any time soon. “Gerry and I plan to volunteer for many years to come,” added Bob. “We feel the Madison Audubon organization and all the volunteers we have worked with are truly remarkable people.”

We are tremendously grateful for this power couple and all they do for the natural world and the people who tend it. If you’re interested in volunteering with Madison Audubon, we’d love your help — click here to find out ways you can best connect.

Written by Brenna Marsicek, communications director, and Mark Martin and Susan Foote-Marin, Goose Pond Sanctuary resident managers

Our Amazing Birds: Crow

Our Amazing Birds: Crow

Of all our native American birds, the crow has most thoroughly mastered the problem of how to thrive in the face of heavy odds. Tough, resourceful, amazingly intelligent, it prospers despite the handicaps of large size and a jet-black uniform which make it almost startlingly prominent. Man’s hand is ever against it, yet it caws derisively and flaps away in safety almost every time. It is incredible the way crows make crime pay. And yet, if it’s not your corn that has been stolen or your nestling robin that has been gobbled, you can’t help admiring their skill and daring.

Photo by Arlene Koziol

Into the Nest: Time to fledge!

Into the Nest: Time to fledge!

We know that human kids grow, mature, and gradually move towards a life that is independent of their parents’ home. The same is true for baby birds: they also have to decide when the time is right to leave the nest and start on their journey to independence. This seems to involve a balancing act between making sure they are big and healthy enough to survive independently, while leaving the nest quickly to avoid predators.

Photo: Kelly Colgan Azar

Our Amazing Birds: White-Breasted Nuthatch

Our Amazing Birds: White-Breasted Nuthatch

A young farmer neighbor of mine, untrained in the niceties of ornithology but, like many countrymen, keenly observant of its facts, calls the white-breasted nuthatch “that upside-down bird.” No name could be more appropriate, for this nuthatch, at least during waking hours, spends fully as much time with its head lower than its tail as it does in a more conventional position. Why the bird seems to think no more about running headfirst down a vertical tree trunk than of climbing straight up it is doubtless its own affair. To us it looks fool-hardy and provocative of cerebral hemorrhages. But nobody has ever seen a nuthatch come to grief that way!

Photo by Monica Hall

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Rebuilding a Wetland

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On September 10, 2018, after many months of planning and countless meetings and discussions, something big began happening at Goose Pond. Two bulldozers, a large backhoe, and an excavator rolled in Monday evening ready to start moving thousands of cubic yards of soil out of the canary grass dominated wetland. For the next four days, LMS construction worked long hours creating seven wetland scrapes for Goose Pond Sanctuary.

Photo by Arlene Koziol

 
 
 
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