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How Art Inspired a Young Birder
Birder and artist Isaiah Scott was blown away by a mural called the Wall of Birds.
© Courtesy of Isaiah Scott
Isaiah Scott was in middle school when his family took him to visit the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. He remembers seeing a huge mural showing hundreds of colorful birds spread across a map of the world. That painting, called the Wall of Birds by Jane Kim, got Isaiah curious about how many of those species he might see for himself. In this episode, Isaiah shares how the artwork sparked his love of birding.
There’s more to our conversation with Isaiah Scott in season 4 of Bring Birds Back!
BirdNote®
How Art Inspired a Young Birder
Written by Ariana Remmel
This is BirdNote.
Isaiah Scott was in middle school when his family took him to visit the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. He remembers being blown away by a painting called the Wall of Birds.
Isaiah Scott: It's this beautiful, huge mural with like the map of the world, but it had these colorful birds. And I was like, wow, I didn't know there was this many birds with different colors and different sizes and bill morphologies and it just made me recognize the beautiful diversity of birds all around the world.
He marveled at the Blue-footed Booby in the Galapagos Islands, the Osprey diving above the Florida Peninsula, and hundreds more life-sized birds painted by artist Jane Kim.
[Blue-footed Booby, ML127089]
Isaiah Scott: From that point I was like, I wanna know more about birds. Like, you know, I wanna go out and see what birds that I find and how many of these birds on this wall that I could potentially see one day.
Isaiah bought his first pair of binoculars from the gift shop and started birding. Years later, he returned to Cornell to study ornithology and science communication as an undergrad. And now, Isaiah shares his love of birds on social media, guided hikes, and through his own artwork — thanks to that first spark.
Isaiah Scott: Ever since then, I just been pointing my eyes towards the skies with my binoculars.
You can learn more about Isaiah Scott, and the Wall of Birds when you visit our website, BirdNote.org. I’m Jonese Franklin.
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Senior Producer: Mark Bramhill
Producer: Sam Johnson
Managing Producer: Jazzi Johnson
Managing Producer: Ariana Remmel
Content Director: Jonese Franklin
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Blue-footed Booby ML127089 recorded by Wesley Lee.
BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
© 2025 BirdNote December 2025
Narrator: Jonese Franklin
ID# ScottI-01-2025-12-10 ScottI-01
Jonese Franklin
Narrator