Hi everyone!

I wanted to give you all plenty of notice for next
week's meeting of the Prince George's Audubon Society
and the Patuxent Bird Club.  We're having it at a
special location this time, the National Wildlife
Visitor Center on Powder Mill Road (see our website
for directions).  The program will start at 7:30, but
doors open at 7 if you want to get there early to
compare storm birds and such!  

I'm really excited about this month's program.  Greg
Kearns, naturalist at Patuxent Rive Park, will be
presenting a talk titled "Of Rails & Rice: The
Delicate Ecology of Wild Rice Marshes on the Patuxent
River."  

From the PG Audubon web page: 
"A renowned expert on the Sora Rail and the wetland
ecology of Jug Bay, accomplished photographer, expert
birder, and a popular speaker who has presented more
than a dozen programs to us over the years, Greg's
interest in the secret life of the Sora Rail began in
1987.  Questions about their migration led to
groundbreaking research that found answers to those
questions through improved trapping techniques,
digital sound and radio telemetry. He and USGS
biologist Mike Haramis linked the drastic decline in
Sora numbers in the late 1990s to the 95% decrease in
stands of wild rice they observed during the same
period, and they realized that something had to be
done.
 
Greg will share his slides and stories about nature's
delicate balancing act, as well as the answer to the
mystery of what was causing the disappearance of the
wild rice to begin with – and what efforts he
spearheaded to reverse it.  Wild rice at Jug Bay has
rebounded and today is close to where it was 20 years
ago.  Will Sora numbers increase as well?  Were other
waterfowl affected?  Come September 12th and help us
kick off another exciting and informative program
year.

Everybody bring a friend, and join us next Tuesday
night!  See our website for details, or feel free to
contact me if you have any questions!

Lynette Fullerton, President
Prince George's Audubon Society
http://www.pgaudubon.org




"The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware--joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware."        --Henry Miller

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com