Columbus Audubon

Tonight's presenter is Dick Tuttle, retired middle school science teacher, whose conservation projects have fledged more than 40,000 cavity nesting birds since 1968. As a self-described active conservationist, most of Dick's projects are individual efforts, but he teams up with a fellow retired science teacher, Dick Phillips, to perpetuate Delaware County's American Kestrel Nestbox Project. This effort started in 1991 when the Delaware County Bird Club partnered with school children and five other entities to attach ten nestboxes to highway signs. Today, nestboxes hang from 17 electric poles and one free standing mount to help Falco sparverius successfully reproduce. Since the fist "Sparrow Hawk" nest in 1995, more than 700 kestrels have fledged from the project's boxes wearing numbered leg bands. Join us to find out what Dick has learned over the last twenty seasons of effective conservation.

7:00 – 7:15 pm: Our short program will feature a brief, more specialized presentation by Dick Tuttle on the features that make a nestbox safe and effective for kestrels. He will also review important factors for monitors seeking data and for installing boxes for those who seek "nuts and bolts" information for their own nestbox projects.

7:15 – 7:30 pm: Social time, refreshments, and door prizes

7:30 – 9:00 pm: Main program

Columbus Audubon public programs are held at the Grange Insurance Audubon Center (505 West Whittier Street in the Scioto-Audubon Metro Park on the Whittier Peninsula).