Seven ‘O’ Two

We arrived before first-light so as to set-up undetected. In my left hand I carried a small pet-kennel. Inside, a young black bird peered out ahead with curious, shining blue eyes. He utters a small, worried sound.

The tropical forest took on a different appearance in the electric blue beam of my headlamp.  Our boots scuffed and scraped against sharp limestone projections as we made our way through tangled Guamia and Hibiscus.  We ducked and crawled and braced ourselves, trying not to agitate the young birds.  Seventy meters further and we arrived at our destination.  We placed our feathered passengers in a large, waiting cage, and unravelled two mist nets.  We were ready to begin.  I squeezed myself into a blind garnished with large coconut palm fronds, and waited. My field partner was twenty meters away, in another blind, playing pre-recorded crow calls...

We are attempting to lure a pair of unbanded, adult Mariana Crows (Corvus kubaryi) into a pair of perpendicular mist-nets. If we are successful, they will make 10 radio-tagged birds that we can track using telemetry in order to monitor daily dispersal habits and behaviour. These corvids are found nowhere else in the world - only here, on the small island of Rota, in the Northern Mariana chain.  The Mariana Crow at one time also inhabited the larger southern island of Guam, but their numbers plummeted upon the accidental arrival of Boiga irregularis, the Brown Tree Snake.  Luckily, this voracious predator has not made an appearance here, but it may just be a matter of time.

Two hours later, and it is quiet. I press the small indiglo button on my watch: 7:02.  Our “lure birds” - captive crows that have volunteered their time to help us out - are busy playing in their large cage in front of the nets. One examines a small stick while the other pulls dry leaves through the metal wire mesh. Then they sit close together on a perch to allopreen and make small noises to one another. Their presence is meant to attract the attention of our target birds. 

In the distance the ocean can be heard rushing and frothing through the dimpled limestone shore, the wind lashing through Pandanus leaves. Fat raindrops fall from leaves of the Pisonia and Morinda trees above, blotting the coconut fronds of my blind.  A few drongos and starlings dart about in the canopy making irritated shrieks and caws.  The small fantails flash the orange undersides of their long tails.  A dove lunges into the air in a whooping flutter of feathers.

All the while, hungry mosquitoes whine about my face.

Three hours later and the sun has climbed up into a blue sky.  Scattered beams squeeze through the slats of palm fronds and thin, golden flecks of of light play upon the limestone karst beneath me.  The air has become thick and heavy.  A combination of the sun's warmth and the early morning rain create a blanket of humidity.  The lure birds have found and eaten all of the geckos hidden in the leaf litter, and they make quiet begging noises in anticipation of their next meal.  It is enough to force us from our cover, but our rogue pair is still at large. 

It is time to go. 

We place the young crows back in their carry-kennels, furl our nets, and begin our descent through the limestone forest.  We have to give up on this pair for the time being and focus our attentions elsewhere.  In the meantime, there is still plenty to do.  This last remaining population of Mariana Crows needs all the help it can get if it stands any chance at a future...

The Who, What, Where, When, and Why.

We all ask the same question:  What are we doing here? 

Pondering the meaning of life is what makes us human.  We rationalize everything, so the very fact that we exist must mean something.  I think, therefore, I am.  We know we're here, that's easy.  But now that we've figured that out, we feel the need to understand why.  The majority of the world attributes our immaculate existence to the hand of a higher power. The rest of the world quietly believes otherwise.  The problem with the former belief is that an "afterlife" makes it easy to put the important things off another day.  The latter belief makes it easy not to care at all.  Nonetheless, we are here and we should make the most of the time we have. 

As I sit in my beige tin trailer at the edge of Chesapeake Bay, I sometimes wonder what I'm doing here.  Not on Earth, but in Virginia.  I have to remind myself that I came here to get experience banding birds and teaching people about avian migration, and conservation.  Another stepping stone.  But to what?  What am I reaching for?  Ultimately I'd like to coordinate my own conservation project somewhere in the world, and in the meantime I'm slowly accumulating the skills required to achieve this goal.  The more books and journal articles I read on the subject of conservation increases the prominence of the idea that accelerated species extinctions are inevitable in this world gone to the humans. 

So why bother trying to save a population of Pink Pigeons?  Of Maui Parrotbills?  Of assessing the invasion rate of an exotic species of beetle?  Why spend thousands of my hard-earned dollars on a flight to Australia to volunteer my time chasing birds through a forest?  For the same reason humans do anything at all. Because it makes me happy.  We're all going to die some day.  Everything dies.  But why not preserve what we can, while we can?  If I can improve my quality of life by improving the quality of life of my avian neighbours, then I'm just going to keep doing it and stop asking why I'm doing it. 

Despite the fact that my life is an exercise in futility, I'll continue to travel the world discovering new species, working with people of diverse culutral backgrounds, enjoying new food, and delaying the extinction of a population of endangered birds for one more day.  This is life.  The why is not important.  The how, the when, the where - that's what truly counts. 

"Fee" - Pink Pigeon (Columba mayeri), Mauritius

Dreamworld

I lay there in the dark, not quite asleep and not quite dreaming.  I lay there in the same bed I imagined months ago.  The same, but different.  What I had imagined was in fact a mirror image of this place.  The Virginia of my mind was an entirely different world from the Virginia in which I spent my waking, and working, hours.  I listened to the rain splattering across my window.  The wind threatened to lift the tin roof, revealing me like a sardine.  It was difficult to find sleep in this swirling Atlantic weather.  I wondered whether I would have to work in the morning.  It always seemed to be the way the weather worked here.  The clouds spat rain and the wind tossed it loudly against the tin of the trailer, keeping me awake for most of the night.  Yet as the new day approached the clouds always retreated to the north, leaving me to take-on the morning, weary. 

A few months back I imagined a sandy soiled forest, rich with the scent of a salty ocean.  I imagined a quaint trailer, tucked away amongst the pines.  I saw the ocean from my window.  I suppose my daydream was not so far off.  The trailer did back onto a stand of Loblolly Pines, and the beach was less than a half mile down the road.  But there was no magic here.  I was surrounded by noisy campers, and offensively large motorhomes crowded in a sterile and treeless campground. 

But still this did not bother me so much.  I was generally unhappy in this place I had built up in my mind and it had nothing to do with the position of the trailer, or the distance to the beach, or even the fact that I could look out my window and see into the windows of a Bounder.  Instead, there was a flavour in the mouths of many of the locals that I would never grow to tolerate, or even appreciate. 

Virginia, I came to learn, is a very conservative state.  There are activities that are celebrated (or at least tolerated) in the rest of North America, that are discouraged here.  This includes sharing your home with a significant other out of wedlock. 

I learned how serious an offense this was a few nights ago when one of the local park police officers came banging on my front door in the middle of the night.  My boyfriend had just arrived not five minutes earlier, and the tent we were told he had to sleep in, was not yet errected.  I was threatened with a fine and his prohibition from the park.  But in addition to the poisonous words that flew from the mouth of the officer was a look of intense judgement.  It was a look I had never seen before.  Not even from my mother when I was caught skipping school in the eleventh grade.  I was being made to feel shame. 

He left abrubtly after stating an official warning, and all I could do was stare blankly at the floor.  I tried to process the information and tried to make sense of his words in my head.  Law.  Illegal.  Fine.  Prohibited.  But still I could not understand how this 18th century rule could be pressed upon a 27 year-old woman.  Not now, not in this day and age, where gay couples were allowed to express their love through legal marriage in Canada (as well as six of the United States), and America was being led by a black president. 

But Virginia was no dreamworld.  I could scoff at this ridiculous law all I wanted but I couldn't deny the fact that it is written, and there are people who seriously go about punishing those who break it.  I felt oppressed.  I have a new appreciation for the silent (and not so silent) wars fought (and still being fought) by every non-white minority, by women, by homosexuals.  We all want to be accepted, and we do not want to made to feel shame.  I feel silly saying all of this. I'm a fortunate white female, brought up in a middle-class family.  I have a good education, and I was encouraged to voice my opinions, and to believe in what I wanted to believe. 

But not here. 

I'm sure it will all be different one day.  But for the next two months I will be forced to follow a Christian-inspired law... or else.

To the Cape!

I sat in silence listening to the gentle hum of the air conditioner, a splendid luxury in this small trailer I now called home.  It was 90 degrees outside, a temperature I could usually handle after spending so much time in the deserts of Arizona and California.  But this heat was worse than any desert-heat.  The eastern heat is laced with sticky humidity, something that doesn't exist in the southwest.  I heaved a sigh and made a weird noise, just to fill the new space with another sound besides the mechanical chattering of the A/C unit.  I was in Virginia, adjusting once again.

I arrived here the previous afternoon after 14 hours on the road.  I had left my home in Kingston with palpable excitement which soon gave way to nervous anxiety as I rumbled along the congested Pennsylvania Turnpike in my black Oldsmobile Alero.  It rained and rained, and traffic piled up at each on-ramp.  My wipers swished furiously and I wondered if I'd ever make it to my final destination.  Another bird-job awaited me five hundred miles down the road.  As I drove, my overactive imagination spun story after story and whipped-up every possible scenario of what life would be like along the shores of the Atlantic Ocean, and I made myself nervous. 

I took advantage of my position in the slow-moving lanes and peered into the other cars.  People picked their teeth, scratched their necks, talked to their passengers, passengers had their feet up on the dashboard, and everyone looked annoyed.  I wondered where they were all going.  Most of the vehicles had Pennsylvnia plates, a few New Yorkers, and the odd Delawarian.  I was the only Ontario plate among the sea of metal.  I saw one man point-out my car to his daughter and I imagined their conversation, "Look honey, a Canadian!"  "Wow, dad!" I felt so exposed, so exotic.  But in some strange way, I also felt normal again being back in the United States.  Canada is my home, yet I have gained a great deal of my birding experience in the USA partly because my own country is lacking in the bird-job department, and partly because several states boast attractive ecozones that Canada doesn't have.  So, here I was again, on my way to a new state to work with another wildlife observatory generous enough to give this Cana-alien a job.

The road stretched on and my heart was nostaligic as I made my way through the rest of Pennsylvania.  I had worked in an old coal-mining town the previous fall and I was pleasantly haunted by memories of singing katydids and the taste of cigarettes and Suntory.  I passed a band of motorcyclists and wondered how they were dealing with the soaking wet weather.  Their gear was covered in garbage bags and they rode with stone-cold faces into the sheets of falling water.  At least they had each other.  At least I had a roof. 

I eventually left the 476 behind me but the memories and rain continued to splatter across my mind and my windshield, respectively.  The freeway grew more and more complicated as I approached Philadelphia.  Large overhanging signs with peeling arrows (somewhat resembling bananas) and numbers and letters told motorists where to go.  I was told to follow 95 to 4A to DE-7 to 1 South.  Phew.  WELCOME TO DELAWARE, the state sign read.  A new state for me!  I continued on my peeling banana path around Wilmington, through Bear and Odessa, and then onto the Beaches.  I was now the only Ontarian among blue and yellow plates but I didn't notice anyone pointing.  I crossed the toll bridge near St. Georges into the Delmarva Peninsula.  The sun was falling toward the busy earth and the rain tapered off.  I began looking for a place to spend the night.  Sign after sign promised comfortable hotels and motels with reasonable rates, wi-fi, flat-screen TVs, swimming pools and free hot breakfasts.  I briefly entertained the thought of camping out in the parking lot of an abanoned grain elevator, but my busy, creative brain imagined zombies escaping the dark, empty building at nightfall to paw at my windows.  I coaxed myelf to search for an overpriced hotel room instead where I could shower and sleep soundly. 

I decided to drive another hundred miles before stopping.  I meandered along 13 South until I came to the small town of Salisbury, MD.  The first hotel I saw was a Comfort Inn.  I parked in the half-full lot and went inside to see how much they wanted for a single room.  $79.99 for a single?  I knew there was cheaper places but I was dog-tired and decided to pay the ridiculous fee.  I took my overnight bag into my expensive room and made the most of my stay.  After all these years I still felt a stupid sense of excitement when I stayed in a hotel room.  As a child I relished the rare night my family stayed in a hotel while on vacation.  The emotion stuck with me to this day.  I poked about the room and made note of all the amenities: coffee maker, tv, microwave, mini-refrigerator.  I jumped from bed to bed and decided on the left as my sleeping place.  After a thorough inspection of my room I decided to venture out to find some food.  I drove down the Ocean Highway (aka Business 13 South) through town scanning for a grocery store.  Nothing was open at 10 PM except for one store.  One giant store.  And I really, really didn't want to go inside.  I slinked into the jam-packed Walmart parking lot, it's enormous glowing sign burning my retinas.  Who the hell was shopping this late at night?  Was everyone completing a 600 mile day and looking for a frozen meal to warm in their hotel microwave?

I entered and rather than being greeted by the wonderfully depressing old woman at the front door, I was met with the sound of screaming children and squabling couples.  I plucked up a basket and scooted through the aisles with as much haste as possible.  Large, flabby people floated about in lycra and spandex pants and long t-shirts, pushing carts filled with items they probably didn't need (not at this time of night anyway).    I collected some fruit and a frozen chinese entree then waited behind six people at the checkout before dashing toward the exit.  The same sad wrinkled old lady at the entrance ignored me and stared straight ahead.  I swallowed the smile I had stored in case she acknowledged me, and exited.

Once back in my room I successfully filled the stale air with the smell of wonton soup and vegetable pot-stickers.  I put on an old movie and ate to my heart's content.  I scraped the bottom of my chinese entree boxes then retired for the night.  The next morning I hit snooze on my alarm nearly six times before eventually climbing out of bed.  I still had time to eat a free hot breakfast which included Belgian waffles, toast, coffee, and boiled eggs.  I wrapped a few pieces of toast with a napkin and grabbed a handful of jam to take with me as I completed my journey south.  I didn't have far to go, only another 100 miles to Kiptopeke State Park.

It was an uneventuful drive.  Highway 13 frequently plunges through bustling box-store-infested beach-towns, and is lined with pine trees, dotted with abandoned houses and the odd boarded-up gas station.  Occassionally it is intersected by a county road leading to a small, uneventful town.  I noted all of these relics with mild curiosity.  I arrived in Cape Charles, VA at noon and made my way into the small state park situated on Chesapeake Bay. 

I pulled up to the main office to announce my arrival. Once an old farmhouse, the quaint building was now painted white with a red tin roof.  Inside I found two members of the park staff, both of whom greeted me with warm Virginian hospitality (and warm southern accents).  The park manager showed me a map of the park and directed me to the trailer I would be living in with a few quick lines made by his pen.  I heeded the blue vectors and made my way over to my new home.

The beige and brown trailer, circa 1992, sat at the eastern edge of the campground.  It was framed by two Japonese Maples and a sprawling Prickly Pear, home to two large Argiope aurantias (Black and Yellow Garden Spiders).  The assistant park manager soon met me in the driveway and guided me inside to show me around.  He pointed out the two bathrooms, bedroom (complete with two dressers and a bunkbed, cool!), kitchen and laundry room.  Any maintenance issues I had I was to go to him about.  He dropped a few names of people I would eventually meet, gave me the park number in case of emergency, and left me to unpack.

I wandered back into the bedroom.  In lieu of a flag to stake my territory, I threw my backpack onto the bottom bunk.  My heart yearned for the top bunk, but I had learned that life was much easier on the bottom (and less wobbly).  I was to meet my superiors at the banding station in an hour, so in the meantime I attempted to find places for all of my books, clothes, and toiletries.  I was still making myself at home when my boss called to let me know it was time to start setting up the mist nets.  I left my bags strewn on the floor and headed out the door.  I shielded my eyes from the hot, Virginian sun as I closed the half-mile distance between my trailer and the banding station.  This was it.  Another field season had officially commenced and I couldn't help but wonder what I was in for...

If We're Lucky

I had been in Tofino for a few days now and was still feeling a little unsettled.  My best friend, whom I was visiting (the sole reason I was in Tofino to begin with), worked most days so I attempted to keep myself busy by applying to jobs, entering data freelance-style for my previous employer, and writing here and there.  In the evenings we went out for dinner or visited her boyfriend at work, watched movies, drank tea, and just hung out and caught up on life. 

I wasn't sure how much longer I'd stay out here, though.  Yasmin and Ryan had some housing issues that would soon leave them looking for alternate lodging  until their new place was finished and move-in ready.  This left me in an awkward position since I would also be along for the ride.  I felt like a huge imposition now and it was one more thing that I had to worry about.  My to-do list already included having to replace my driver's license and health card that were stolen a few months earlier (before setting off on my desert journey), as well as replace my "lost" passport.  I really did need to get back home to Ontario to take care of these things, but I did my best to stay on the west coast, and thus extend my adventure, for as long as possible. 

One morning, before Yasmin had to be at work, she and I headed into town to run a few errands.  Our first stop was the Co-op grocery store, a link in a prominent chain here in Tofino (there was also a Co-op hardware store and the Co-op gas station).  We travelled up and down the aisles, plucking random items from the shelves.  While in the dairy section we ran into a man that Yasmin knew through her work.  He was a local ornithologist and owned a bird-watching adventure company in town.  Yasmin said a polite hello and introduced me.  She was ready to leave it at that and stroll away, but I took the opportunity to pick this man's brain about the local bird life.  I told him that I had just come from Arizona, surveying breeding birds along the Colorado River and immediately we were engaged in conversation.  Soon I was booked to join him on one of his guided walks.  I left the grocery store exultant.  So far, I had spent a little time roaming around town and some of the local beaches familiarizing myself with Tofino's avifauna, but now I had the chance to get a little more hardcore about it.  Also, I had started keeping a life list (like any good bird nerd) and was eager to add a few new species to my on-going tally (and hang out with someone who understood why that was so exciting). 

The next morning Mr. B met me at the corner of Fourth St. and Campbell.  Binoculars draped around my neck and a Kaufman field guide in hand, I climbed into his beat-up black Jeep Grand Cherokee and we set off for the Pacific Rim National Park.  He said we would try to see as many birds as possible so I could really appreciate the whole experience, but there was really only one species I secretly wished to see.  A colourful robin of the west with a beautiful, clear whistle of a song - the Varied Thrush would make for an excellent addition to my list.  Mr. B said these fellows were more common in the fall and that we'd be very lucky to see one.  I put the bird at the back of my mind and looked forward to seeing everything else, novel or not.

On the way we picked-up one other person and it became blatantly obvious to me that the people of Tofino didn't care too much about birds.  Her name was Mary and she ran a small bed and breakfast.  She wanted to learn more about the natural heritage of Tofino and took Mr. B up on his offer of a free guided bird walk.  She and I would be his only bird-loving companions in weeks.  Mr. B expanded greatly on this point several times throughout the day and revealed the hardships of owning a business that thrived specifically on a virtually non-existent human interest (at least out here anyway).  Needless to say, profits had decreased over the years since people had better things to do during the recession than watch birds poke around Vancouver Island.

Despite the constant rain and fog, the three of us spent a grand total of six hours scouring the trails and beaches for birdlife.  I managed to pick out a pair of Brown Creepers (rarities on this side of the island) as well as a multitude of Pacific Slope Flycatchers - species Mr. B could no longer hear due to the combination of a high-frequency call and his dimished hearing ability.  We saw Black Oystercatchers scuttling across the sand, Wilson`s and Orange-crowned Warblers darting low in the brambling blackberry bushes, Bald Eagles perched high in the towering spruce trees, and chattering groups of Chestnut-backed Chickadees (the only chickadees on the island).  We heard Townsend's Warblers high up in the canopy but never caught a glimpse, much to Mary's dismay. 

Song and Fox Sparrows were seen foraging in piles of washed-up kelp and driftwood and Mr. B explained how to tell the difference between the similar brown birds based on tail length and their overall posture. He also pointed out similarities between Glaucous-winged and Western Gulls.  Since their wing plumage varied from charcoal grey to light grey they could be very easily confused - especially since they often hybridized.  A Red-throated, and Yellow-billed Loon floated far out on the Pacific and we were able to see them through a powerful spotting scope.  We were also witness to a few Marbled Murrelets flapping erratically across the bay, as well as a lone Pelagic Cormorant. 

Around noon we were all thoroughly soaked and chilled to the bone, but it was an excellent day for birds and I managed to see seven new species.  I was eager to get back home and change into some dry clothes, however, Mr. B wanted to stop at one more location to see if we could detect anything else.  We exited the Pacific Rim National Park while our driver cursed the government's lack of interest in maintaining the few remaining Canadian wild spaces.  Driving further from Tofino down Highway 4, we turned right onto a small road and headed towards a nameless bay.  Large, boradleaved trees created a dim road-hugging tunnel through the temperate rainforest.  Suddenly, Mr. B screeched to a halt as a chunky bird darted out from the understory.  It landed in the middle of the road and we all squinted through our binoculars to see it.  I caught my breath as my heart skipped a beat.  What we thought was an American Robin was in fact a Varied Thrush.  Despite the low visibility I was able to see his bright orange throat and belly, charcoal back, and black breast.  He paused for a mere moment then took off, flying deep into the forest.  We exited the jeep and listened hopefully for a song, but heard nothing.  The bird had vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

We climbed back into the jeep and sat in amazed silence. "Well," excalimed Mr. B, "That was lucky!"

Bam!

The ascending, metallic spiralling voice of a Swainson’s Thrush slowly tugged me into consciousness.  I looked about the strange room, bewildered at my new surroundings.  I had fallen asleep eleven hours earlier and lay in a Greyhound-induced coma until now.  The thrush continued to sing his eager tune, "thiiiis is myyyyy treeeee... Aaanyone waaaaant to maaaate with me?" (Waaaaaake uuup Jeeeennn!)  I pulled the covers up to my face and stared at the ceiling, cursing the optimism of the energetic songster outside my bedroom window.  My head was plagued with random memories of the last two days...  the last three months and two days.  I didn't feel like moving.

I was now in Tofino, British Columbia; a small town on the western shores of Vancouver Island. The trees were tall, the skies were grey, and the air was damp and full of all the anxiety that comes with change. 

Float planes continuously hovered over Clayoquot Sound, either landing or taking off (the constant hum of their sputtering engines had become somewhat of a comforting white-noise).  Wave after wave of locals and tourists flooded the small streets. Both could be seen toting surfboards around, but it was easy to distinguish between those who knew how to use one and those who didn't.  The streets were lined with shops of all kinds - coffee shops, surf shops, outdoor clothing shops, second-hand shops, health food shops, souvenir and gift shops.  Restaurants, like barnacles, clustered in between the myriad stores, and squished between those were the surf schools and whale-watching businesses (all quietly battling for tourist attention).

Snow-capped mountains loomed far off in the distance, pushing their noses into the clouds.  Every now and then when the fog lifted I could steal a momentary glance. Tofino was not only plagued by warring businesses, but rain as well - and it was absolutely full of life!  Epiphytic ferns and mosses gobbed in the crooks of trees, even the houses had natural gardens dripping from their cedar-panelled siding. The grey skies provided a constant backdrop and nourished my sad-spot, but they were also the reason for the poisonous green life that covered the rooftops and mountain-sides, and caused the trees to tower at dizzying heights. I was simultaneously grateful to them and enraged at their persistence.  I missed the hot Arizona sun, and I missed my expired desert life. It was tough to grasp the reality of being back in Canada.

 

Have you ever read a really good book?  So good that as you approached the end you read faster and faster until finally you found yourself on the last page, eyes scrolling at warp speed over the final words making up the last paragraph, heart pounding, hands sweating.  The last. Few. Words. Then – BAM!

The end.

Well, Bam. Here I am in Tofino. Now what?  My desert story had come to an end - and with such rude finality. Bam! How could it be over so soon?  It's incredible how quickly life changes.  One minute you're chasing birds through the riparian cottonwood-willow plantations of the lower Colorado River valley and the next you're confronted with the unblinking face of the Canadian Rockies.  The life, the love, the family - all just a distant memory now.

This new place had me at arm’s length. It's exquisite beauty was overshadowed by a peculiar energy that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Perhaps it was a slight case of claustrophobia (induced by too much time on buses), or maybe it was just my inability to keep up with the change I had initiated. The whole purpose of the Greyhound pilgrimage was to exit my desert life slowly, romantically. I wanted to reflect graciously and say goodbye.  But instead I was kicking and screaming (metaphorically, of course), heels dug into the desert scrub.  It was just all-so-sudden. My head was a mess and I felt full and hollow all at once - full of memories and absent of any inclination as to what the future held. It was hard to swallow.

I listened to the Swainson's Thrush a little while longer then decided it was time to face the day.  I teased myself from the tangled sheets and wandered out to join the rest of the world, leaving my gob of memories behind in the gnarled bedding.  I made a small breakfast and ate it outside on the lichen-encrusted concrete steps of my friend's duplex.  I spooned into the humble bowl of oatmeal and watched  as a Bald Eagle circled overhead, vying for an acceptable spot to land.  He eventually decided on a limb in a cluster of large cedar trees growing alongside the parking lot across the street.  After perching triumphantly his head swiveled around and he stared down at me with cynical yellow eyes.  I answered his glare with a whole-grain smile.  I may have been lost out here in the Pacific Northwest, but at least the birds were familiar.

Bird-ucation!

So far every bird-job I've had has been an educational experience. Whether I'm managing the population of an endangered species, combing the forest for their nests, observing their behaviour, or identifying them based on song and field markings - the birds never fail to teach me something new.  And I know my latest endeavour will be no exception. 

I was finally able to make a decision regarding which job to take (and which job not-to-wait-for).  Sure, I'll be living like a pauper for the next four months, but I'll be getting a superb education as the new Songbird Station Intern at the Coastal Virginia Wildlife Observatory (CVWO)! 

As the assistant to the bander-in-charge I'll be busy running net lanes, extracting birds from the mist nets, determining their age and sex, and of course banding them.  I'll also be largely responsible for providing information about migrating passerines (songbirds) to public visitors and school groups - something I've been wanting to get experience with for a long time.   

I'll be living it up in a small trailer situated in Kiptopeke State Park - a stones-throw away from the Atlantic Ocean.  In the afternoons there will be opportunities to help out at the hawk watch station as well as banding raptors (hawks, falcons, etc.).  In September I'll be sharing my humble abode with the Monarch  Butterfly intern - and probably learn a thing or two about scaley-winged migration as well.

All in all, CVWO was the best decision I could have made.  I'll always wonder about the direction my life could have taken were I to have chosen another opportunity, but someone once told me that when you make a decision you need to stick with it - go forward full-force, and never look back.  And that's what I intend to do.  The next four months will come with new opportunities, challenges and unforgetable experiences.  I'll be wrist-deep in feathers (and at times kicking myself for choosing to help run a banding station) but I'm going to give it my all and learn as much as I can.  Cheers to that!