Norfolk Spring Meeting

    The 2002 Annual Meeting of the NOU will be held in Norfolk on May17-19.
    Registration will begin Friday afternoon at 5:00 p.m. at the Willetta Lueshen Bird Library, located in the Elkhorn Valley Museum and Research Center, at 515 Queen City Blvd. in Norfolk.  The library contains over 1200 books, including the private collection of John and Willetta Lueshen, covering all areas of nature. The library features a large window overlooking Verges Park, a pond and a bird feeding area and should be a pleasant place to spend the evening.  The Elkhorn Valley Museum will also be open for us to enjoy.  The Lueshen’s Birders group will host our evening  meal in the museum meeting room from 6:00 to 6:30.  If you sign up for this meal, please arrive on time, or the rest of us may have eaten all the food!
    We are offering Wayne Mollhoff’s Nebraska Breeding Bird Atlas for sale on the registration form for this meeting.   You may order it now and pick it up at the meeting, saving the cost of postage.  Wayne plans to be available Friday evening (but probably only at that time) to sign your copies.
    Lodging will be at a motel of your choice.  Most of the motels are along highway 275 in south-central Norfolk.  A list of motels is provided on the map page.  It would be advisable to make your reservation as soon as possible.
    Have you ever considered going back to college?  Well, now’s your chance!  Our meetings on Saturday and Sunday will be held at the Northeast Community College Lifelong Learning Center (901 E. Benjamin Ave.) and are considered educational, so we will all be able to register as temporary students.  By registering as students, about 90% of our cost to use the facility will be reimbursed by the State of Nebraska, making this a VERY affordable meeting place.
    The only downside to this is that to register as students, we need to provide our social security numbers and birth dates to the college.  We realize this is personal information, but the College has assured us that the information will not leave their files or be used for anything except to identify us as temporary students.  You can really help us keep the cost of this meeting down by providing this information, and we would greatly appreciate it if you would fill in your information on your registration form.  (Betty Grenon will be the only one in the NOU to see your registration and she is under oath never to tell anyone how old you are!)
    Of course this means you will not be allowed to skip any of our meetings, you must take notes on each session, and on Sunday there will be a test over everything you’ve learned.  (Just kidding.)
    There will be a continental breakfast offered Saturday morning at 6:30 at the Learning Center, and field trips will leave from there at 7:00 am.  On Saturday, we will have sack lunches, to eat on a field trip or wherever you choose.  A few of the planned field trip destinations are Niobrara State Park  and Gavin’s Point, Ponca State Park, Maskenthine Reservoir, Wood Duck WMA, Black Island WMA, Willow Creek, Grove Lake, Lake Babcock, and Lake North.  There will also be some destinations closer to Norfolk for  our members who prefer shorter trips.
    Considering the length of some of the field trips, we will not be having an indoor program Saturday afternoon.   We will meet back at the Learning Center for our banquet, which will begin at 6 pm, to be followed by door prize drawings, a brief business meeting and election of officers.  Our featured speaker, Neal Ratzlaff, will provide us with a presentation on the Birds of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
    We will meet again at the Learning Center on Sunday morning at 6:30 for a continental breakfast, and field trips will depart from there at 7:00.  We will gather at the Learning Center at 12:00 for lunch and the compilation of our weekend species list.

    NOU member, supporter and friend, George Brown, passed away on February 9 at the age of 80 following a 10 year battle with leukemia.
    His many contributions to this organization include service as President on two occasions, 1974-5 and 1992-4.  Some of us remember smaller but equally memorable contributions, including the flower arrangements, gifts from George’s garden, that appeared on the tables at our Halsey Fall Field Days; his wonderful stories and good humor; his personal thriftiness which he applied with equal vigor to the NOU budget and his love of only the most brief and concise presentations.  The latter was not lost on George’s pastor, whose comments at his memorial service included: “There is another visual that I guess I missed... when the preacher was preaching too long, his arm and his wristwatch went higher and higher.”
    George spent his youth in Minden and graduated from Minden High School in 1939.  He began college but World War II intervened and George entered the United States Army Air Force, serving as a C-47 cargo plane pilot in Africa and India.  Following the war he returned to Kearney State College where he received his degree.
    The delightful George and Marian team so evident at many NOU meetings was formed on June 1, 1947, when he and Marian Wardrop were married.  To this union four children were born:  Gary, Randy, Linda and Laurie.  He is also survived by 10 grandchildren and a great-granddaughter.
    George was an educator.  After short terms at Silver Creek, Oxford and Gibbon, he came to Kearney High School in 1950.  Here he taught biology and served as a coach for some 33 years before retiring in 1983.  George and Marian must have been good role models.  The Brown family was recently featured in the Nebraska State Education Association magazine “The Voice”  in a feature titled ‘Family of Teachers’ relating that all family members are teachers or former teachers.  George was also honored as outstanding retired teacher for Kearney Public Schools.
    The Kearney First Methodist Church, where he was a member for over 50 years, was an important part of his life.  He served in many roles, including church boards, the building committee, Sunday School teacher, Methodist Youth Fellowship sponsor, Boy Scout leader and Elderhostel teacher. The Brown family also was honored as Methodist family of the year.
     His interest in nature and conservation was not limited to birds or the NOU.  He was a charter member of the Big Bend Audubon Society and also served as its president.  Woodcarving was another way in which he expressed his love of nature and some NOU members likely still possess a Sandhill Crane carving which he produced.  He loved gardening and was a recipient of the Kearney Sertoma Yard of the Month Award, and his contributions to church and community were recognized by the Kearney Hub’s Freedom Award for Volunteer Service.
    George especially loved eagles.  In fact, the headstone which he chose is graced by the figures of two Bald Eagles.  When Marian observed that the eagles did not appear to look very happy, he replied in true George Brown fashion:  “Have you ever seen a smiling eagle?”  Perhaps not, but George’s spirit, which now surely soars with and among them, must have them all smiling.

Field Research Opportunity

    Birds in Forested Landscapes is a citizen-science project of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the US Forest Service which needs volunteer birders to help examine the effects of disturbance from recreational development as well as forest fragmentation on North American forest birds.   Findings from this study will be used to develop management recommendations, with descriptions about the kinds and amounts of habitat required to sustain healthy bird populations.  Volunteers will receive a research kit of instructions and data forms as well as a CD with songs, calls and other sounds of the BFL study species for field use.  Participants choose their own study sites in a forest or forest fragment of any size. They make 2 visits to their sites during the breeding season to conduct the BFL protocol as well as to record habitat data and landscape variables. For information contact Sara Baker at forest_birds@cornell.edu or write:  C/O Cornell Lab of Ornithology, 159 Sapsucker Woods RD., Ithaca, NY 14850.

County Bird Lists for Nebraska

     Mark Brogie has just finished compiling the 2001 county bird lists, which birders with individual totals of 125 or more per county have sent to him.  These are listed at ../CountyLists/countylists01.html
     Additional categories of Top 10 Counties Over 125, Top 10 Species Per County and Total Species in all 93 Counties, including the average number of species per county, are listed.
     If you have any questions concerning these lists, contact Mark.  His addresses and phone number are listed on the last page of this newsletter under Directors.
     If you would like to be added to this list of counties for 2002, now is the time to start putting those lists together.  Keeping county lists adds a whole new dimension to your Nebraska birding, although sometimes the most difficult aspect, when you’re on some gravel road somewhere in the boondocks, is figuring out what county you’re in.
    Sometime towards the end of the year there will be a reminder in the newsletter to send your 2002 information to Mark.

Breeding Bird Survey Routes Available

     The United States Geological Survey sponsors the Breeding Bird Survey (BBS), an annual event that surveys breeding bird populations throughout North America.  Nebraska has 46 BBS routes of which several are available and in need of an observer.  The survey route takes only about four hours to complete and is run once, any day in the month of June, beginning 30 minutes before sunrise.  The route is 24.5 miles long with a stop every half-mile.
     It works better when two people can do the route, one to be the observer and the other to be the time keeper and record the birds seen at each stop.  Observers should be able to identify birds by sight and recognize common birds by song.  Expenses associated with running the routes are tax deductible.  If you are interested or know someone who may be interested, please contact Loren Padelford, whose addresses and phone number are listed on the last page of this newsletter.
     BBS routes are fun to do and you can feel confident that you are contributing to our knowledge about birds.  Many researchers use the information gathered by observers on BBS routes.

BIRDING Magazine Index Available

     If you’ve ever spent time looking for a particular article in the American Birding Association’s magazine BIRDING, you will be interested to know that a cumulative index for the full 34 years of the magazine’s publication is now available at: http://americanbirding.org/publications/ bdgindex.htm

    The index is currently three downloadable PDFs: authors, subjects, and reviews, which are all very searchable and will be updated with every issue of the magazine.  The ABA plans to have an on-line searchable feature available soon to look up any article, review, or author.   To see an example of a nice searchable on-line index, take a look at the one from BIRD WATCHER'S DIGEST at: http://www.birdwatchersdigest.com/bwd_index_search.htm

NOU Youth Scholarship

     Do you know of a young person who is interested in birding, or nature in general?  The NOU Scholarship Fund, an idea originating with Rusty and Margaret Cortelyou, provides a stipend for a student and a parent or teacher to attend an NOU meeting.
     Preference is given to 9th through 12th grade students, although students of any age  will be considered.  The scholarship pays the cost of registration, meals and lodging for the student and his or her sponsor.  Transportation costs are not included.  To apply, a student must submit a short statement (one page or less) indicating why he or she wishes to attend.  These should be sent to Mark Brogie, whose address is on the last page of this newsletter.
    We would like to make this available to as many students as possible.   If you know someone who might be interested, please let them know of this opportunity.
    We haven’t actually done the math, but it seems likely that the average age of our membership is increasing, through no fault of our own, of course!  One way to reverse this trend would be to encourage younger people to join.  It would enrich their lives as well as ours.

Sky Dance

    I owned my farm for two years before learning that the sky dance is to be seen over my woods every evening in April and May.  Since we discovered it, my family and I have been reluctant to miss even a single performance.
    The show begins on the first warm evening in April at exactly 6:50 p.m.  The curtain goes up one minute later each day until 1 June, when the time is 7:50.  This sliding scale is dictated by vanity, the dancer demanding a romantic light intensity of exactly 0.05 foot-candles.  Do not be late, and sit quietly, lest he fly away in a huff.
    The stage props, like the opening hour, reflect the temperamental demands of the performer.  The stage must be an open amphitheater in woods or brush, and in its center there must be a mossy spot, a streak of sterile sand, a bare outcrop of rock, or a bare roadway.  Why the male woodcock should be such a stickler for a bare dance floor puzzled me at first, but I now think it is a matter of legs.  The woodcock’s legs are short, and his struttings cannot be executed to advantage in dense grass or weeds, nor could his lady see them there.  I have more woodcocks than most farmers because I have more mossy sand, too poor to support grass.
    Knowing the place and the hour, you seat yourself under a bush to the east of the dance floor and wait, watching against the sunset for the woodcock’s arrival.  He flies in low from some neighboring thicket, alights on the bare moss, and at once begins the overture: a series of queer throaty peents  spaced about two seconds apart, and sounding much like the summer call of the nighthawk.
    Suddenly the peenting ceases and the bird flutters skyward in a series of wide spirals, emitting a musical twitter.  Up and up he goes, the spirals steeper and smaller, the twittering louder and louder, until the performer is only a speck in the sky.  Then, without warning, he tumbles like a crippled plane, giving voice in a soft liquid warble that a March bluebird might envy.  At a few feet from the ground he levels off and returns to his peenting ground, usually to the exact spot where the performance began, and there resumes his peenting.
    It is soon too dark to see the bird on the ground, but you can see his flights against the sky for an hour, which is the usual duration of the show.  On moonlight nights, however, it may continue, at intervals, as long as the moon continues to shine.

     The drama of the sky dance is enacted nightly on hundreds of farms, the owners of which sigh for entertainment, but harbor the illusion that it is to be sought in theaters.  They live on the land, but not by the land.

     A Sand County Almanac ,   Aldo Leopold,  Oxford University Press, 1949

NORFOLK MEETING SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

Friday, May 17
     5:00 pm Registration begins at the Lueshen Bird Library, located in the Elkhorn Valley Museum and
    Research Center (515 Queen City Blvd.)
     6:00 pm  Supper at the Library/Museum
     7:00 pm  Evening program:  Bub Blake’s Nature Photography
     8:00 pm  Executive Board Meeting in the Lueshen Library

Saturday, May 18
     6:30 am Continental Breakfast at the Northeast Community College Lifelong Learning Center
    (901 E. Benjamin Ave.)  Pick up your sack lunch at this time.
     7:00 am  Field Trips leave from the Learning Center
     6:00 pm  Banquet
     7:00 pm  Door Prize drawings
     7:15 pm  Annual NOU Business Meeting and Election of Officers (all members should be present)
     7:30 pm  Evening program:  Neal Ratzlaff on the Birds of the Lewis and Clark Expedition

Sunday, May 19
     6:30 am  Continental Breakfast at the Learning Center
     7:00 am  Field Trips leave from the Learning Center
     12: 00 noon  Lunch at the Learning Center
     12:45  pm  Weekend Species Tally
     1:00 pm  Adjourn

NOU Officers Nominated

     A nominating committee consisting of Sharon Draper, Nelli Falzgraf and
    Jim Kovanda was appointed in late January.  They have submitted the
    following slate of candidates, to be voted on at the business meeting at
    our spring meeting in Norfolk:

    President:  Janis Paseka
    Vice-President:  Alice Kenitz
    Secretary:  Mitzi Fox
    Treasurer:  Betty Grenon
    Librarian:  Mary Lou Pritchard
    Director:  Loren Padelford

    Welcome to the Following New Members!

          Loren and Teri Dolezal, Hubbard, NE
          Mary Doud and Jeff Nichols, Boone, IA
          Justin Stolen, Omaha, NE
          Darrell Shambaugh, Somonauk, IL

     A reminder:  Fall Field Days will be held at Halsey on Sept. 6-8

    Are Your Dues Overdue?

         Please check the label on this newsletter, which will indicate the
    status of your NOU dues.  Some of you have paid ahead, either
    intentionally or  because you accidentally sent in dues twice in one
    year.   Please check the date on your label for accuracy.
         There are also some folks out there (no names need be mentioned, but
    you know who you are, or you will when you look at your label) who are
    actually behind on paying their dues, difficult as that is to believe.
    If you find yourself in this category, please take a moment today to
    write out a check and send it to our Treasurer, Betty Grenon.

     Conversation enriches the understanding, but solitude is the school of genius.

         -Edward Gibbon, English historian, 1737-1794

    The Lueshen Library is located in the Elkhorn Valley Museum
    and Research Center, 515 Queen City Blvd.  The Friday evening meal and
    program will be held there.

    The Lifelong Learning Center is part of the
    Northeast Community College,  901 E. Benjamin Ave.  Our Saturday and
    Sunday meals and program will be held here.

    The following are some of the local motels, with indications of their price ranges.

    $ = single room rate up to $35
    $$ = single room rate $35 to $55
    $$$ = single room rate over $55

    Budget Inn, 721 E. Norfolk Ave., 402-371-2750   $
    Capri Motel, 211 E. Norfolk Ave., 402-371-4550   $
    Days Inn, 1001 Omaha Ave., 402-379-3035 or 800-DAYS INN   $$
    Eco-Lux Inn, 1909 Krenzien Drive, 402-371-7157   $$
    Holiday Inn Express, 920 S. 20th St., 402-379-1524 or 800-HOLIDAY   $$$
    Leisure Lodge, 407 N. 13th St., 402-379-2056   $
    Norfolk Country Inn, 1201 S. 13th St., 402-371-4430 or 800-233-0733   $$
    Norfolk Super 8 Motel, 1223 Omaha Ave., 402-379-2220 or 800-800-8000 $$
    Ramada Inn, 1227 Omaha Ave., 402-371-7000 or 800-272-6232   $$$
    Skyline Motel, 509 N. 13th St., 402-371-5610  $
    White House Inn, 2206 Market Lane, 402-371-3133 or 888-802-5000   $$

 NOU ANNUAL SPRING MEETING REGISTRATION

     May 17,18,19                Norfolk                      Registration Deadline:  May 10

     LODGING :  at a motel of your choice... see list in this newsletter
 
 

MEALS	Number of Persons	Cost
Friday Dinner  $4.00 each
Saturday Continental Breakfast  $2.25
Saturday Sack Lunch  $4.00 each
Saturday Evening Banquet   $9.00
Sunday Continental Breakfast   $2.25
Sunday Lunch   $4.25 each
Registration Fee    $5.00 each
Meeting total
Nebraska Breeding Bird Atlas copies $26.63 each

      Copies of the Nebraska Breeding Bird Atlas by Wayne Mollhoff
      will be available at the meeting for $25 plus state and local tax.
      By ordering and paying for your copies now and picking them up at
      the meeting, you save the cost of postage.

     Total Enclosed with this Form:        $___________

      Please list special dietary needs here: ______________________________________

     PLEASE REMEMBER TO INCLUDE THE REGISTRATION FEE!!

      Name(s)  ______________________________________________
      Address  ______________________________________________
      City, State, Zip  ______________________________________________
      Phone number  ______________________________________________
     * Social Security Number (s)   ______________________________________
     * Birthdate (s)  (month, day, year)
    ______________________________________

     * This information is necessary to register our members as temporary
      students at Northeast Community College, which will make state funds
      available for reimbursement.  Neither the NOU nor NECC will
      allow this information to be used for anything except to identify us
      as students for this one meeting.  You can help us keep costs down
      by providing this information.  Thank you!

     Make checks payable to NOU and mail with this form to:
    Betty Grenon, Treasurer
    1409 Childs Road East
    Bellevue, NE  68005

President and Newsletter Editor:
Janis Paseka, 1585 Co. Rd. 14 Blvd., Ames,  NE  68621,  Phone:  402-727-9229
E-mail Address:  paseka@tvsonline.net

Vice-President:
Alice Kenitz, 190648 Co. Rd. 22,  Gering,  NE  69341,    Phone:  308-436-2959
E-mail Address:  akenitz@prairieweb.com

Secretary:
Mitzi Fox, Rt. 2, Box 36, Albion,  NE  68620,    Phone:   402-395-2395
E-mail Address:  mitzi@albion.net

Treasurer:
Betty Grenon, 1409 Childs Road East, Bellevue,  NE  68005,    Phone:   402-731-2383
E-mail Address:  grenon925@aol.com

Editor, Bird Review:
William Clemente, Box 10, Peru State College, Peru,  NE  68421    Phone:   402-872-2233  Work
402-872-3073 Home,    E-mail Address:  clemente@bobcat.peru.edu
 

Librarian:
Mary Lou Pritchard, 6325 O St., Lincoln,  NE  68510    Phone:  402-540-9157 State Museum
402-486-2428   Home

Past Presidents:
Clem Klaphake, 707 Garden Ave., Bellevue,  NE  68005    Phone:  402-292-2276
E-mail Address:  cnk@scholars.bellevue.edu

Betty Allen, 9628 Emmet St., Omaha,  NE  68134    Phone:   402-571-9755
E-mail Address:  lizprints@webtv.net

Directors:
Mark Brogie, Box 316, Creighton,  NE  68729    Phone:  402-358-5675
E-mail Address:  mbrogie@mother.esu1.k12.ne.us

Steve Lamphere, 3101 Washington St., Apt. 98, Bellevue, NE  68005   Phone:  402-291-9149

Jan Uttecht, Box 823, Stanton, NE  68779   Phone: 402-439-2114

Records Committee:
Joel Jorgensen, Chairman, 1218 Jackson, Blair, NE  68008,  Phone:  402-426-5138
E-mail Address:  zrtac@genesisnet.net

Breeding Bird Atlas Project and Nest Records Committee:
Wayne Mollhoff, 1817 Boyd St., Ashland, NE  68003,  Phone:  402-944-2243
E-mail Address:  wmollhoff@netscape.net

Occurrence Reports:
Ross Silcock, P.O. Box 57, Tabor , IA  51653,  Phone:   712-629-5865
E-mail Address:  silcock@rosssilcock.com

Nebraska Birdline:
Loren and Babs Padelford, 1405 Little John Road, Bellevue,  NE  68005,  Phone:  402-292-5325 Birdline
402-292-5556 Home,    E-mail Address: lpdlfrd@juno.com

NOU Website:          http://rip.physics.unk.edu/NOU/