-----Original Message----- From: linda_zie...@fws.gov [mailto:linda_zie...@fws.gov] Sent: Fri 10/7/2011 3:44 PM To: bigbo...@friendsofmontezuma.org Cc: tpbi...@mac.com; tom_jasik...@fws.gov; bill_stew...@fws.gov; nancy_es...@fws.gov; louise_da...@fws.gov; andrea_vanbeusic...@fws.gov; jeff_r_gra...@fws.gov; scott_stipet...@fws.gov; tasha_dani...@fws.gov; fmmor...@gw.dec.state.ny.us; jteck...@gw.dec.state.ny.us; michaelobrie...@gmail.com; fmmor...@gw.dec.state.ny.us Subject: Birding Volunteer Opportunities! We have four exciting volunteer opportunities coming up in October and November. As you may be aware, volunteers (Larue St. Clair and Jackie Bakker) and regional US Fish and Wildlife Service staff (Michael O'Brien) do weekly waterbird surveys in refuge emergent marshes. They do an excellent job, however, in many marshes, the vegetation is so thick that it is impossible for them to get an accurate count. This not only makes it seem as though there are less birds here than there really are. It also makes it seem as though this thick vegetation is not providing good habitat. To mitigate this detectability issue, we will be conducting flush counts in refuge impoundments with thick vegetation. Larue, Jackie, and Mike will do their regular survey and immediately following their survey, we will flush the birds out of the impoundment and count them. This way, we can compare the number initially counted to the number that is flushed to get some sense of the percent of birds present that are actually counted. We need a lot of volunteers to assist with the counting, and we hope you can help! We will need you to be here for about three hours total. Please let me know if you can make it for any of these surveys. If I don't get enough volunteers for any of these days I will reschedule so please let me know if you plan to be here - thanks! Friday, October 14 - Meet at the refuge office at 12:00 to survey Tschache Pool. Wednesday, October 19 - Meet at the refuge office at 8:00 to survey the Sandhill Crane Unit. Friday, October 21 - Meet at the refuge office at 12:00 to survey Knox-Marsellus Marsh. Wednesday, November 9 - Meet at the refuge office at 10:30 to survey the Main Pool. (This date is tentative.) Thank you! Linda Chorba Ziemba Wildlife Biologist Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge 3395 Routes 5/20 East Seneca Falls, NY 13148 Phone: 315-568-5987 ext. 225 Fax: 315-568-8835 Georgena - please forward this request to the Friends membership. Thanks! -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
