VOLUNTEER HIGHLIGHTS

Harvest Hoedown 

This year's Harvest Hoedown was a rousing success due in great measure to those of you who so generously assisted with preparations, set up, and cleanup. Approximately 1,500 people enjoyed a beautiful fall day at Pickering Creek Audubon Center.  Fifty people volunteered on Harvest Hoedown, many of those taking on additional shifts to fill in gaps were help was needed.   Pickering Creek Staff wholeheartedly appreciated the enthusiasm and flexibility of everyone who so generously gave of their time and energy.   A special thanks goes Erney Maher, John Bayliss, and Bill Reybold who also worked tirelessly planning and preparing for this event long before the Hoedown workdays began.

Together Green Volunteer Days

Two school-based groups participated in Together Green workdays in October.  A group of special needs students from Easton High School and their teachers came out on October 7 to mulch and prepare the educational areas around the office for Harvest Hoedown. All 11 individuals worked hard and enjoyed a great day outside in fresh air with a picnic lunch. This group will be returning to Pickering Creek for another volunteer day sometime in the spring.  Two groups of middle school students from the Country School came out with their teacher advisors Cathleen Steg and James Hoopes on October 20 for a volunteer field day.  The 19 students learned about the importance of water quality and how to do basic water quality testing. They also completed a survey to determine thesurvivorship of native plant installed this summer behind the children's garden. Thesetwoadvisory groups will be returning to Pickering Creek throughout theschool year to continue water quality monitoring, habitat enhancement and invasive removal work, and bird monitoring.

Pickering Creek's Volunteer Celebration

Thirty guests joined Pickering Creek staff for the Volunteer Celebration, a catered party on Wednesday, October 27. Lively conversation, delicious food and drink, and a great atmosphere marked the event. All volunteers in attendance received a gift of appreciation in addition to special recognition to several volunteers for their outstanding efforts over the past year.

New Volunteers of the Year awards went out to the Businsky and McDonald families.  Vanessa Businsky and her two daughters Ella and Brooke take care of program animals one day a week as well as participate in volunteer events like planting native meadow plants over this past summer and help with Children's activities at Harvest Hoedown. Julie McDonald, her husband Jason, and their two son's Jason Jr. and Jack also participated heavily in planting projects this summer and assisted with animal care. 

Volunteer of Distinction Awards went to Bill Reybold, Herman and Nancy Espenhorst, and Albert Moschetto.  On almost any given week throughout the year at least one of them could be found at the Center, assisting with tasks great and small like painting, stuffing envelopes, power washing buildings, clearing trails, working in gardens, building bird boxes, removing invasive plants, and so much more.

Erney Maher, Gwen Siegmann, and Tom Lane received the Volunteer Leadership Award for their commitment to important projects throughout the year.  Erney again organized our wood duck nest box monitoring at Pickering Creek and spent an incredible amount of time recruiting and working with vendors for Harvest Hoedown. Gwen Siegmann again busily organized volunteer activities in both the children's and Chesapeake Herb Society gardens as well as participated in major Pickering events including Tour Toast and Taste and Harvest Hoedown. Tom Lane has worked extensively behind the scenes as the Pickering Creek Board President, introducing the Center to new supporters, providing significant support for building projects and guiding our Trustees overall efforts

John Bayliss was honored as Pickering Creek's Volunteer of the Year.  John has worked tirelessly to support Pickering programs throughout the year. You can often find him at the Center several times a week working on grounds and building maintenance projects.  He organized over a dozen other volunteers as part of the office painting and repair project that begun this July. This project gave the office exterior a fresh coat of paint and tune up of the trim, with volunteers logging over 600 hours. John can be counted on whenever help is needed here.  He represents the volunteer program as a member of the Pickering Creek board and acts as an informal Pickering Creek ambassador and advocate.

VOLUNTEER SPOTLIGHT - Value of Citizen Science

Citizen Science is participation in data collection or other scientific research by non-scientists in collaboration with conservationist and professional scientists. The National Audubon Society has long recognized the value community support through citizen science to our conservation goals.  Audubon's Christmas Bird Count, an annual census of birds taken by citizen scientists across North America, has been conducted for the past 110 years. This census has been instrumental in the study of long-term health and status of bird populations across the continent. The National Audubon Society and its partners also engage supporters and volunteers in other valuable citizen science projects like Project FeederWatch and the Great Backyard Bird Count. These projects allow individuals to connect with the nature through fun activities that generate vital information for the conservation of birds.  Learn more about these and other citizen science projects at the following websites:

Audubon and Citizen Science          http://web4.audubon.org/bird/citizen

Christmas Bird Count                          http://birds.audubon.org/christmas-bird-count 

Project FeederWatch                          http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw  

Great Backyard Bird Count                http://www.birdsource.org/gbbc
Reporting Bird Sightings anytime  http://www.ebird.org  

Locally, here at Pickering Creek Audubon Center, we have a tradition of volunteers participating in citizen science.  Bluebird monitoring was started by an intern in 1993 with about 45 nest boxes.  Bob Mason, a long-time Pickering volunteer and former trustee, coordinated the bluebird program from 1994 until 2004. Les Roslund-local MOS member, Pickering Creek volunteer, and bluebird aficionado- has coordinated bluebird nest box monitoring since 2004. Pickering Creek currently boasts a 65-box bluebird trail. The all time high for bluebirds fledged was in 2008 with 232 bluebirds. This year 154 bluebirds, and 101 tree swallows were fledged from our boxes despite the heat of an especially oppressive summer.  Erney Maher, another longtime Pickering Creek volunteer and former Pickering trustee, coordinates our wood duck nest box program. The wood duck trail currently includes 27 nest boxes. This year wood ducks laid 151 eggs and hatched 111 chicks in nest boxes. Our previous record, in 2009, was 94 eggs and 75 chicks.

COMING UP IN NOVEMBER