Volunteering for the birds

The Audubon Society of Portland, U.S. Fish & Wildlife, Friends of Cape Falcon, and others interested in the welfare of birds will begin another season of monitoring seabird nesting colonies adjacent to the Cape Perpetua and Cape Falcon marine reserves. In order to better understand seabird productivity at these sites, Audubon and their partners are looking for volunteers to help count noses - and that could be you!

All you have to do is make contact with Portland Audubon and agree to visit the breeding sites two times a month, early June through August (probably about three hours each visit) and report what you see. The schedule can be worked out to be best for the breeding birds and best for you.

The marine bird species are: Brant's cormorant; pelagic cormorant; rhinoceros auklet; pigeon guillemont.

Even if you've never been on the Oregon Coast before, or never taken part in a breeding bird survey, the opportunity to join in is wide open. All you have to do is be willing take the time to help conduct the survey and agree to do it. You'll receive all the training you'll require, and even if you don't have binoculars, you'll be supplied with a spotting scope for use during the observing.

You'll also have a choice of the areas you'd like to help survey: Cape Perpetua-Heceta Head lighthouse and Sea Lion Cave, Cape Falcon near Devils Cauldron, and at nearby Haystack Rock.

There will be two training sessions, both of which are available on http://audubon

portland.org/about/events/community-science-training-seabird-nest-colony-monitor

ing-at-cape-perpetua and http://audubonportland.org/about/events/community-science-training-seabird-nest-colony-monitoring-at-cape-falcon.

More information can be gathered by contacting Joe Liebezeit, [email protected]

audubonportland.org.

If you'd like to help out with Frank Isaacs' Oregon Eagle Foundation's state-wide Golden Eagle (GOEA) population survey, give Sue Anderson a call at 541-480-0330, or drop her an email, [email protected]

All you have to do is keep track of the GOEA nest(s) you've volunteered to keep watch over by making three visits to the nest site from spring to summer: In spring to see if the breeding territory is occupied and the female is incubating, then to see if the eggs hatched and how many young there are. The last visit in early summer is to see who is about to fledge.

The final task is to send a report to Anderson and come to the OEF volunteer's meeting next winter in Bend and compare notes with other volunteers.