September 15 • Scott Rashid
MOUNTAIN OWLS

When we picture an owl we often conjure up an image of a large majestic bird like the Great Horned Owl. Did you know that the Rocky Mountains are home to owls so small they could easily use a pencil as a perch? Four species of small owls are found in Colorado's mountains: the Flammulated Owl, Northern Pygmy-Owl, Northern Saw-whet Owl, and Boreal Owl. Spend the evening with Scott Rashid, author of Small Mountain Owls, and learn about the lives of these tiny predators that are at home in our local forests.

October 20 • Bill Maynard
FLYCATCHERS DE-MYSTIFIED

Bill Maynard will entertain and educate us with his program, “Flycatchers Demystified.” Even experienced birders will benefit from his helpful hints on identifying all of Colorado’s flycatchers by both sight and sound.

Bill moved to Colorado in the ‘80s and founded a wildlife art gallery with his sister-in-law, Virginia. A real bird job, an avian analyst variability research project with Dr. Jared Verner, led him to California with its endemic birds; to Mt. Graham, Arizona, surveying for the endangered Mt. Graham red squirrel, and more birds; on to New Mexico, coordinating the statewide search for the endangered Southwest Willow Flycatcher for the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish; back to Colorado, as a biologist on a large military reservation, and then on to the American Birding Association, as Field Programs Manager. Bill is currently editor of “Winging It,” the Association’s publication.

Bill’s main interests involve learning more about bird taxonomy and vocalizations, the finer points of bird identification, digiscoping, and travel anywhere; but especially to The Bird Continent. Knowing next to nothing about seabirds, Bill hopes to one day go on multi-day pelagics, following ocean wanderers across an unexplored frontier.

Bill is a Colorado Field Ornithologists’ Bird Records Committee member, plus he can perform a mean rendition of a Lesser Prairie-Chicken’s lek display; thankfully, failing miserably at the female’s vocal “bubbling, hooting wamp, wodum, wodum” and other wild clucking, with exaggerated jumps and strutting of the male.

November 17 • Jenyva Turner
VULTURE CONSERVATION IN SOUTH AFRICA