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Bonding with Mom Through Birding
A visit home becomes a magical moment with birds!
© Oregon State University
In this episode, environmental educator and nature enthusiast Nicole Jackson tells the story of an unexpected backyard birding experience when she visited her mom in 2021. When she arrived, Nicole saw typical birds such as robins and jays, but then saw something less common: a brightly colored Blackburnian Warbler! Nicole’s mom asked what she was looking at, and Nicole showed her pictures of all the nearby birds on her phone. Nicole helped her mom create an account on Merlin Bird ID and document her first bird sighting.
This week is Black Birders Week. Learn how to participate in Black Birders Week here and by following #BlackBirdersWeek on social media.
BirdNote®
Bonding with Mom Through Birding
Written by Nicole Jackson
This is BirdNote. I’m Nicole Jackson, an environmental educator and nature enthusiast.
[American Robin song, ML 94261, 0:27-0:29]
I visited my mom back in May 2021 and it turned into something so magical! As I arrived to greet her, I noticed a couple of the usual suspect birds hopping around on the pavement: American Robins, Starlings, and Blue Jays.
But then I saw flashes of yellow, bright orange, and black among the conifers and oak trees in the yard. I screamed, “Oh my gosh! That’s a Blackburnian Warbler?!”
[Blackburnian Warbler song, ML 100858, 0:14-0:16]
My mom looked at me with confusion. She asked, “What are you looking at?” I said, “You have warblers everywhere up in the trees!”
I showed her each bird l was seeing on Google images and the All About Birds website. She was amazed that she had such beautiful tiny birds in her backyard. We talked about how I got into birding and how I learned to identify them.
By then she was hooked and asked how she could learn more about birds. I showed her the Merlin Bird ID app on my phone and created an account for her. Her face lit up when she documented her first bird sighting.
I was absolutely beaming seeing her expression after listing a bird. I will never forget this experience, as it was the first time my mom got to witness my joy from birding and created her own.
Black Birders Week concludes today. To learn more, follow the hashtag Black Birders Week on social media and visit BirdNote dot org. I’m Nicole Jackson.
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Senior Producer: John Kessler
Content Director: Allison Wilson
Producer: Mark Bramhill
Managing Producer: Conor Gearin
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. American Robin ML 94261 recorded by W. Hershberger, and Blackburnian Warbler ML 100858 recorded by W. Hershberger.
BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
© 2022 BirdNote June 2022 Narrator: Nicole Jackson
ID# birding-31-2022-06-04 birding-31
