Update from New York State Young Birders Club
- By Carena Pooth
The New York State Young Birders Club (NYSYBC)
is coming up on its fourth anniversary this year.
Two of our original members, Hope Batcheller and
Erich Lehner, recently “aged out” (at the ripe old
age of 20) and became Supporting Adult Members.
By next fall seven of the eight Charter Members will
be in college. The kids grow up and leave the nest!
But empty nest syndrome will not be setting in at
NYSYBC because there are still 29 Youth Members
and half of them are under 15.
NYSYBC’s young birders are truly exceptional
kids, and not just because they’re birders. Every one
of them is a delight, and I could tell you great things
about all of them, but there’s not enough space here.
So I’ll limit this article to some of the most notable
achievements.
Hope Batcheller, age 20: Hope is attending Cornell University and has worked in both Canada
and Chile on Hudsonian Godwits. She was
recently elected president of the Birding Club
at Cornell. In March she went on a recording
expedition to the Mojave Desert for the Cornell
Lab of Ornithology. Hope will captain the
Cornell Redheads team at the World Series of
Birding (WSB) this year.
Eamon Corbett, age 16: Eamon was selected last
year to be one of the editors of the American
Birding Association’s blog for young birders
(The Eyrie). Also last year Eamon won one of
three gold medals in the New York State Sci-
ence Olympiad, specifically in the ornithology
event. He is a finalist for the American Museum
of Natural History’s Young Naturalist Award
in the 11th grade division for his essay, “The
Impact of Invasive Tree Species on Bird Populations in a Northeastern Urban Park.”
Jacob Drucker (age 19) and
Lila Fried (age 18):
Jacob and Lila did a study on primary feather
projections in austral migrants, taking measure-
ments of specimens in the American Museum of
Natural History’s vast collection of bird skins.
Jacob presented the study at the New York State
Ornithological Association’s (NYSOA) annual
meeting in September 2011.
Alexander Gottdiener, age 15: Alexander is one
of eight (out of 1000) 9th grade division finalists
for the American Museum of Natural History’s
Young Naturalist Awards for his essay, “A
Study of Predator Avoid-
ance Behavior
in Birds.”
Nathaniel Hernandez, age 17: Although he lives
in New Jersey, Nathaniel is an avid member of
NYSYBC. Last year he spearheaded the effort
to create a similar statewide YBC in NJ. He
is President of NJYBC, maintains its website,
and does much of the work to keep the club
going with field trips and meetings. Nathaniel
is involved in various bird research projects,
including banding, grassland bird surveys, and
tracking radio-tagged Bald Eagles. He is an enthusiastic writer about birds also, contributing
to the Cornell Lab’s Neotropical Birds species
accounts at
neotropical.birds.cornell.edu.
Benjamin Van Doren, age 18: Recently Benjamin took 5th place (winning $30,000) in Intel’s
prestigious national Science Talent Search for
the project he presented at the 2011 NYSOA
annual meeting. Benjamin investigated a poorly
understood behavior of nocturnal migratory
birds, called morning flight, which has potential implications for the growing wind power
industry.
Be sure to check out the NYSYBC website, where
you will find a new “Hall of Fame” page showing
club officers and holders of other luminary positions since 2009, plus the NYSYBC teams that have
competed in the Superbowl of Birding and the
WSB. You’ll also find links to several young birders’
websites/blogs, field trip reports, photography, and
artwork.
The WSB is on May 12, and the NYSYBC will have
two teams in the Youth Division again this year. This
event is the club’s biggest fundraising activity and all
WSB donations go to the Education/Scholarship Fund.
You can donate online at nysyoungbirders.org.
The young birders and their parents are grateful
to the generous Supporting Adult Members and
Partner Clubs, as well as to the adult advisors who
donate their time and work. If you agree that it’s
important to encourage youngsters to become life-long birders and conservationists, please consider
becoming a Supporting Adult member and seize
the opportunity to see our young birders in action
on a field trip
John obtained his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees
in zoology from Colorado State University. He has
worked as a field biologist for various federal, state,
and private entities, including the Colorado Division
of Wildlife and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. In
addition, John has produced independent programs
on wildlife conservation that he has shared at schools
in several western states.
