Our next meeting will be Monday, September 17 7PM at the Caspar Community Center 15051 Caspar Rd, Caspar, CA 95420.Our speaker will be Dr. Roger Lederer on Beaks, Bones, and Birdsongs.
Birds may seem not to have a care in the world, but they face arduous challenges every moment of every day. Using senses and instincts and their physical and physiological adaptations honed by evolution, birds have to find food, migrate long distances, withstand the vagaries of the weather, and avoid predators, all the while competing with each other and countless other species for survival. Today, after surviving for more than 200 million years, birds are challenged by a new set of obstacles brought about by humans. How do they make their way in the face of these trials? Avoiding collisions with cars, changing their songs in noisy cities and using street lights to increase their foraging times are just a few of the remarkable ways birds cope with a changing planet. We marvel at their resilience while we bemoan the increasing challenges we pose to birds.
Dr. Roger Lederer is Professor Emeritus of Biological Sciences at California State University, Chico, whose expertise is ecology, science education, and ornithology. He has published over thirty scientific research papers and seven books, including Ecology and Field Biology, Amazing Birds (in seven languages), Birds of Bidwell Park, Latin for Bird Lovers, and Beaks, Bones, and Birdsongs.
