(Note: This meeting and presentation took place online, via Zoom platform technology, due to social-distancing protocols prompted by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.)
At 7:00 pm, President Ken Chaya called the meeting of the Society to order. After introducing himself and thanking the attendees for joining the meeting, he announced that there were currently 69 people in the meeting and that more were joining as he spoke.
Commencing with the business portion of the meeting, President Chaya announced the result of an online vote to approve the minutes of the November members’ meeting: it passed with 165 votes of approval, none of disapproval, and no abstentions.
He then announced the result of an online vote to approve new members. It passed with 161 votes of approval, none of disapproval, and four abstentions. President Chaya welcomed the following 17 individuals as new members:
- Susan Gibson, sponsored by Kevin Sisco
- Sarah Dahl, sponsored by Miriam Rakowski
- Janet Riese, sponsored by Theresa Brown
- Jennifer Kalb, sponsored by Amanda Bielskas
- Karen Becker, sponsored by Mary Beth Kooper
- Hillarie O’Toole, sponsored by Ken Chaya
- Linda Musser, sponsored by Elise Boeger
- Frank Nutella, sponsored by Mary Beth Kooper
- Debbie Becker, sponsored by Ken Chaya
- Kelley Burney, sponsored by Mary Beth Kooper
- Hailey Clancy, sponsored by Mary Beth Kooper
- Irina Rich Langer, sponsored by Mary Beth Kooper
- Mary Hilles, sponsored by Miriam Rakowski
- Matthew Degulis, sponsored by Amanda Bielskas
- Renee Shaw, sponsored by Amanda Bielskas
- Nicholas Susnea, sponsored by Anne Lazarus
- Amy Susnea, sponsored by Anne Lazarus
President Chaya then invited non-members in attendance to join the Society, explaining that they could learn how to do so by visiting the LSNY website, www.linnaeannewyork.org. He also pointed out that he or any of the other LSNY officers listed on the website would be willing to sponsor anyone who would like to join, emphasizing that an organization is only as healthy as its growing and diverse membership. He declared that the LSNY welcomes all to become members regardless of race, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, background, ability, or geographic location.
As the final item of business, President Chaya announced that the Linder Theater will remain closed until at least the fall of 2022. Thus, until further notice, LSNY meetings will continue to take place remotely via the Zoom online platform.
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At 7:10 pm, President Chaya introduced the evening’s speaker, Christian Hagenlocher. Christian’s passion for birds began at an early age when he saw a pair of Peregrine Falcons nesting on a building in downtown Seattle. Since then, he’s read every library book and field guide he could get his hands on, and his passion for birds and education has only grown. Passionate also about the education of people of all ages, he entered the teaching profession after completing a B.S. in biology in 2011. As a high school science teacher and licensed falconer, Christian has integrated birds into school curricula in unique ways, exposing students to the ancient sport of falconry and leading international science-focused trips to Belize, Costa Rica, Israel, Colombia, and Peru. In 2016, Christian became the youngest person to break the 700 mark in an ABA Big Year. His book, Falcon Freeway: A Big Year of Birding on a Budget, describes his adventures and the lessons learned while living on the road and birding in the 21st century. His talk, titled “A Big Year of Birding on a Budget,” was about his all-out quest in 2016 to cover North America.
Christian began by saying that it had been an honor to get a snapshot in a single year of the health and diversity of our continent, as evidenced by birds. Speaking of the origin of his passion for birds, he noted that as a child he moved frequently with his family, since his father was in the military. Birds were everywhere they went and he enjoyed watching them. Books by Roger Tory Peterson and James Fisher, Kenn Kaufman, Mark Obmascik, and David Allen Sibley all influenced him as a young birder.
He titled his big year “The Birding Project,” saying that it was he himself that was actually the “project.” His goal was to become a better birder, meet other birders, and see birds through the lenses of others rather than just from his own viewpoint. In a short video created by his sponsor, Maven optics, he showed how The Birding Project got started and what a “day in the life” looked like during his travels. In a journey that spanned North America from the remote island of Attu, Alaska, to Florida’s Dry Tortugas, he economized by living out of his Subaru Outback and cutting corners wherever possible in his search for birds.
Christian said he wanted an “E.P.I.C.” big year: his objectives were to Engage, Preserve, Inspire, and Connect. To “Engage,” he taught others along the way, even working briefly at a school in Colorado. To “Preserve,” he helped re-seed native prairie in the Chicago suburbs and assisted with controlled burns in Georgia’s coastal savannah scrub. He said he hoped to “Inspire” people to get outside and explore nature and to “Connect” them to nature, using technology responsibly.
What IS a Big Year? It’s a year in which one attempts to see as many species of birds as possible in a calendar year. It could cover territory as local as one’s yard or county, or as widespread as the entire American Birding Association (ABA) designated area, or across the entire planet.
Christian explained that his strategy was to first find as many rare birds as he could, stopping to work whenever he ran out of money near areas with a greater likelihood of vagrants (e.g.,in Florida). Later in the year, he fundraised to get to Alaska and directed his travel toward specific groups of birds. He also tried to cut costs whenever and wherever he was able: driving when possible, rather than flying; sleeping in his car; and eating cheap food.
During the year, he conducted over 365 interviews of birders ranging in age from five to 90+, asking questions about birds, birding, and community and photographing each one’s hands as they held their binoculars. He added that compared to this collection of snapshots from 2016, he sees much more diversity among birders today than in those of just five years ago.
He shared some of the statistics from his big year:
- 1,162 walking miles
- 738 birds seen (98% of them photographed)
- 56 days spent in Alaska
- 49 states birded
- 16 oil changes
- 5 trips to Alaska
- 2 times pulled over (no tickets!)
- 0 flat tires, speeding tickets, car accidents—or regrets
- 1 month birding at sea
- 20 nights on boats
One of his more efficient birding trips during the year was what is known in the cruise industry as a “repositioning cruise,” when a ship needs to move from one port to another but isn’t carrying its typical paying passengers. Christian and other birders purchased inexpensive tickets for a repositioning cruise on the Ruby Princess from Los Angeles to Vancouver. It was a three-night, four-day cruise and the tickets came out to $63.50 per day. Since he saw 25 species, the cost was $2.54 per bird. And after weeks of sleeping in cars and eating fast food, he was pleased to experience an all-you-can-eat buffet, room service, and a cabin so large that he could have parked his car in it. Black-footed Albatross, Short-tailed Albatross, Hawaiian Petrel, Cook’s Petrel, and South Polar Skua were among the species he saw during the cruise.
Christian added that he went 129 days without flying (from January 1 to May 9), and showed some information about the flights he took during the rest of the year and how he saved money on them:
- 48 total flight legs
- 2,857 miles: longest single flight (Anchorage to Chicago)
- 184 miles: shortest flight (Nome, AK, to Kotzebue, AK)
- 3 nights: slept on planes
- Preferred airline: Alaska Airlines
- Payment method: included using air miles from gas and food purchases, standby tickets from employees, and miles donated by friends and family.
Among his tips for flying: buy refundable flights to Florida during spring break, when flights are often overbooked and airlines will buy back tickets; always bring your own food and reusable water bottle; travel with friends (Alaska Airlines offers companion passes for $99 for some flights; by working with other birders, he was able to maximize the value of this benefit).
Christian then shared bird totals from the year:
- 343: highest species count in a single state (TX)
- 3: lowest species count in a single state (KY)
- 4: heard-only birds (all of which he saw in the following 4 years):
- Black Rail
- Boreal Owl
- Flammulated Owl
- Northern Beardless-Tyrannulet
- 752: species counted (+ 12 he wasn’t 100% sure of)
Christian paused his work on a master’s degree in global sustainability to continue his big year. As part of his program, however, he did a carbon audit of his travels and then decided to purchase more carbon offsets than his calculated carbon footprint. He said he hoped to inspire other birders to be more aware of the carbon footprint of our hobby. We want to be certain that we’re protecting birds and not amplifying climate change.
He then talked about how he ate on a budget. He shopped at discount groceries that sold imperfect food, such as damaged cans; foraged and ate native plants; ate salmon caught by others; purchased fruit at roadside stands; used coupons; and ate a lot of inexpensive items such as cereal, oatmeal, and ramen noodles.
His rule for sleeping on a budget was “ABC: Always Be Comfortable.” A = A friend’s guest room; B = a Budget motel; C = Camp. He slept in his Subaru quite often, in the parking lots of Walmarts, state parks, hotels, and McDonald’s; and in friends’ driveways, rest areas, mountain passes, national forests, and country roads, among other places; but he realizes it’s easier to sleep in a car at age 26 than when one is older.
He said that living this way enabled him to develop an attitude of gratitude. He made choices by asking himself, “do I want this or do I need this,” and whether any given choice brought him joy.
Christian then focused on a few particular birding locations. He first described birding on the remote island of Attu in Alaska. Since planes no longer fly there, one must fly to the island of Adak and then take a boat to Attu, a bumpy journey of 437 miles that takes several days. On arrival at Attu, he and other birders slept on the boat each night and then hiked/biked on the island. He recounted some of Attu’s rich history. It was invaded by the Japanese during World War II; 549 Americans and 2,400 Japanese died there. Much debris from the war remains, including airplane wrecks and tanks. The United States Coast Guard had a base there until about 25 years ago, when it was abandoned and the island was allowed to grow wild. He mentioned that a subspecies (Evermann’s) of Rock Ptarmigan is endemic to Attu.
Attu also has a rich birding history and is known among birders for its relative abundance of rarities, including Siberian Rubythroat, Common Sandpiper, Common Cuckoo, Great Knot, and Lesser Sand-Plover. He noted that on the wall of an abandoned barracks where previous birding visitors stayed, there are written records from such well-known birders as Benton Basham and Sandy Komito. Before leaving the island, Christian and his fellow birders added their own names to the wall.
He also visited Nome and Utqiagyik (formerly Barrow), Alaska. Nome, sitting just below the Arctic Circle, features a variety of near-arctic habitats, with species that don’t occur elsewhere on the continent, like Arctic Warbler and Yellow Wagtail. While in Nome, he was pleased to find a rare Common Ringed Plover; nesting Gyrfalcons; Long-tailed Duck in summer plumage; Sabine’s Gull; and Long-tailed Jaeger. In Utqiagvik (which means “The Place where Snowy Owls are hunted”) he was pleased to see healthy-looking polar bears.
While Utqiagvik is the northernmost city in the United States, the Dry Tortugas, off Florida, is the southernmost location in the U.S. Located there is Fort Jefferson, a Civil War-era structure that is now a historic monument. It is remembered as the place where Dr. Samuel Mudd was held following his arrest for treating the ankle of presidential assassin John Wilkes Booth. The Dry Tortugas are known as a major migrant stopover for birds on their way to Florida from South America. In addition to migrants, Christian went there to see birds that couldn’t be seen elsewhere in the U.S., such as Sooty Tern, Brown Noddy, Black Noddy, Bridled Tern, and Masked Booby, all of which nest there.
Christian noted that a major takeaway from his big year is that there are many different ways to enjoy birds. None is better than the others—they are simply different. He also realized that birding is better when done with others. While it can be nice to bird alone, after a year he came to see how much one draws from others. Birding together also helps us develop social skills, such as tolerance.
He concluded his talk by referencing his book, Falcon Freeway: A Big Year of Birding on a Budget. He chose the name in tribute to Kingbird Highway, by Kenn Kaufman, which inspired him as a young birder. Included in the book are illustrations drawn from his photographs by his friend Andrew Guttenberg.
At 8:09 pm, Vice President Gabriel Willow thanked Christian for his talk and facilitated the Q&A portion of the program.
At 8:40 pm, Vice President Willow passed the floor back to President Chaya, who also thanked the speaker, as well as the audience, and invited viewers to return for the next speaker program on January 11, “The Importance of Photography in Conservation,” featuring Michiel Oversteegen.
8:41 pm—The meeting was adjourned.
Respectfully submitted by Amy Simmons, Recording Secretary