Share, Learn, Listen, Lead

Backyard Birdwatching

I'm new here & happy to have found so many folks working to connect kids & nature!

I'm relatively new to blogging, but here's my latest post. I write mainly about my nature play adventures with my two young sons (5 yo & 20 months).

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http://bit.ly/a8kaBw

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Comment by Debi Huang on February 9, 2010 at 4:50pm: Thanks for reading, Chris! I'm never happy with the photos I take, so I appreciate your saying you enjoy them! I recently discovered the Cornell site you mentioned and your right, it is great! We're excited to be out discovering a new facet of nature and identifying what we see is half the fun! Love your blog, by the way! :)

Comment by Chris Hettwer on February 9, 2010 at 10:10am: Great post! I always enjoy the pictures in your posts. I wish something was still green in our neck of the woods. But today is calling for about 10 inches of snow (we're in SE Wisconsin). We love to bird-watch in our backyard too. We have a little semi-protected area right outside of our biggest window. We keep it simple and just have mixed seed, thistle and sunflower seeds, and we love to see birds of all sizes flock there at different times of the day. We like to try to ID them too, and we have a pocket guide book, but we also go onto the Cornell Lab of Ornithology site (http://www.birds.cornell.edu/). They have an online Guide to Birds to help ID them, and it includes pictures and sound bites of their calls. Some species even have a short video clip too! My son can identify a few birds now just by their call...the Chickadee and Cardinal etc. It's a lot of fun. Nothing beats seeing living nature up-close and using it as a teachable moment for our kids!

Comment by Carmen Field on January 31, 2010 at 1:34pm: Thank you, Debi, for supporting backyard birdwatching as a great way to get kids outside. A great outdoor family opportunity, which you may already be involved in but might be of interest to all here, is coming up in 2 weeks for bird enthusiasts across the country - the annual Great Backyard Bird Count Feb. 12 - 15, 2010. Find out how to participate in this awesome citizen science event at http://www.birdcount.org.

Cheers,

Carmen

Comment by Mike Barlow on January 31, 2010 at 1:21pm: Good stuff!

Comment by Debi Huang on January 30, 2010 at 8:13pm: Thanks for reading, Suz! My 5 year old is really enjoying having a bird feeder in our backyard & I've got plans for more/different feeders in the hopes of attracting some different birds. It's a lot of fun! :)

Comment by Suz Lipman on January 30, 2010 at 4:49pm: Hi Debi! Great to see you. I'm so glad you're enjoying the C&NN community. I agree, it's great to find so many people who share the passion for connecting kids to nature. Thank you for directing us to your blog post. I have been enjoying your outings and projects, especially because they are relatively simple and do-able with very young children. They're also imbued with the wonder of the natural world -- a world that may be right outside our doors. The Backyard Birdwatching project is great and I'm glad we got to see it through your son's eyes.