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Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival May 6-9

2010 Festival Speakers/Guide Bios

The Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival Committee would like to thank each and every one of our presenters for their energy and enthusiasm, and for sharing their passionate wealth of knowledge during this year's Festival.

Aurora Firth has been drawing since she can remember and has been teaching art for four and a half years. She was born in Pennsylvania, but moved to Alaska with her family in 1996 and has been in Anchor Point since 2001. She is the oldest of eight siblings and she, her siblings, and her art students have placed in the Federal Junior Duck Stamp Competition. Her hobbies include ice carving, reading, playing the violin, and studying and collecting baby names. Her work is available at her family's studio, Ben Firth Studio, at Mile 161 Sterling Highway.

Ben Lizdas is currently the sales manager for Eagle Optics and an avid birdwatcher as well. His interest in birds and optics dates back to his college years when he was conducting bird surveys on the prairies and oak savannahs of Wisconsin.

Beth Trowbridge is the Wynn Nature Center director for the Center for Alaskan Coastal Studies and has been leading natural history and science education programs for youth and adults in Homer for over nine years.

Betty Siegel is a seven year volunteer with Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge and the Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival, and is Volunteer Coordinator for the Friends of Alaska National Wildlife Refuges.

Bob Gill is a biologist with the USGS Alaska Science Center who has been investigating Alaska shorebirds since the mid 1970s. Throughout four decades of study, his team has addressed the basic ecology of several poorly know species, including Bristle-thighed Curlew, Surfbird, Wandering Tattle, and Rock Sandpiper, and more recently has used satellite telemetry to reveal some of the most extraordinary migrations among birds. He is no stranger to the Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival, this being his sixth appearance before the group.

Buzz Scher has been passionately watching birds for well over 40 years, having now birded on all the continents except Africa. He's a professional civil engineer in Anchorage, as well as the Audubon regional editor for all of the Alaska Christmas Bird Counts.

Carla Stanley is a retired teacher. This is her 40th year in Alaska, and she had a garden every year ... some big, some small, but always shared with whatever wildlife wants to come and visit.

Carmen Field is a coastal science educator and naturalist with the Kachemak Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, providing educational programs for Alaska students and visitors to the Alaska Islands & Ocean Visitor Center.

Daisy Lee Bitter has lived in Alaska for 55 years, having taught science in Anchorage for 29 years, produced an award-winning TV series, administered educational programs for Alaska Native students, and served as a school principal. By 1986 Daisy Lee had become a regular on public radio's Kachemak Currents. She set up an award-winning program for Homer's Center for Alaskan Coastal Studies, helped organize the Kachemak Heritage Land Trust, and she still volunteers for many non-profit organizations.

Dale Chorman is a lifelong birder who lives in Homer and has worked as a naturalist in Alaska for over 25 years.

Dan Thorington is the Alaska Islands and Ocean custodian, and a lifelong birder.

Dave Erikson is a professional biologist with over 37 years of experience of birding in Homer. He complies data for the annual Christmas Bird Count in Homer, and has volunteered with the Shorebird Festival since its beginning at the viewing stations, leading bird walks, and giving presentations.

Gary Ivey has worked for International Crane Foundation (www.savingcranes.org) since 2007 as their Western Crane Conservation Manager and is currently a PhD candidate at Oregon State University. His undergraduate degree is from Humboldt State and his Masters is from Oregon State. He has over 30 years of experience working with wetlands, waterfowl and waterbird management and conservation planning with particular emphasis on sandhill cranes in the Pacific Flyway. Gary served as a biologist at several western National Wildlife Refuges for 18 years (15 at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge) and has more recently been involved in waterbird conservation planning for the Intermountain West Joint Venture. His PhD project is a study of wintering ecology of sandhill cranes in California, which includes a sample of cranes that were captured and radio-marked in Homer.

George Matz is an avid birder and conservationist who has been a resident of Alaska since 1976 and Homer since 2004. Before moving to Homer, he was active with the Anchorage Audubon for many years. In Homer, he serves as the Kachemak Bay Research Reserve Community Council, Kachemak Bay Conservation Society board, Homer Fish & Game Advisory Committee, Kachemak Bay Birders, and teaches a course in birding at the Kenai Peninsula College. Last spring he organized the Kachemak Bay Shorebird Monitoring Project which seeks to get a better understanding of Kachemak Bay shorebird populations during spring migration.

Jason Sodergren is an electrical engineer, birder, and bird bander living in Homer. He has recently initiated an owl banding project in Homer focusing on the Northern Saw-whet and Boreal owls and in the past has worked with raptor, passerine and owl banding and migration monitoring projects in Ontario, Canada and in Michigan. He has served on the Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival committee for four years and also serves as a board member of Friends of Alaska National Wildlife Refuges. Jason is also involved with the Hawk Migration Association of North America, managing a continent-wide raptor migration database and website.

Jeff Bouton has worked as a seasonal field biologist, professional bird tour guide for over 20 years. He lived and worked in Fairbanks, Alaska and actively birded throughout the state. Jeff is a contributing author to the current ABA Bird-finding Guides to Alaska and Florida, writes a regular column in WildBird magazine and hosts a blog on the Birdwatcher's Digest website. Currently he works for Leica Sports Optics as the product specialist to the birder and naturalists markets in the United States.

Jimmy Fox explored the swamps of Mingo National Wildlife Refuge in southeast Missouri as a child. Over the past 19 years he's worked as a volunteer, park ranger, law enforcement officer, and assistant, deputy and refuge manager across the United States from the northwest corner of Alaska to the Headquarters of the National Wildlife Refuge System in Washington, DC. Since 2007 he has served as the deputy manager of Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He has devoted his life to passing on our nation's wild inheritance, and shares his passion with his wife, Joanna, deputy manager of Kanuti National Wildlife Refuge, and young children Logan and Audrey.

John Wenger is a wildlife biologist/naturalist with an M.S. in Nature Interpretation, and has held positions with ADF&G, USFWS, and the Alaska Division of Parks. While off-duty from field operations, he taught natural history classes for the University of Alaska Anchorage. Now, after a marvelous 35-year career, he is retired but active with a 3,000 acre nature preserve he established in Bolivia. As his business card says: "Now retired - just sniffs flowers and gawks at birds all day".

Laurie Daniel is a wildlife restoration biologist with the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge and a Board member of the Kachemak Bay Conservation Society (KBCS) After many years of field work in coastal and interior Alaska, she presently works on impact assessment and restoration for wildlife and wildlife habitat from oil spills and invasive species. Through KBCS, Laurie was very involved in the local effort to establish Overlook Park and has led the springtime hikes during Shorebird Festival for too many years to count now.

Lisa Matlock is the Education Specialist for the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge. She harbors a deep love for coastal Alaska and its awe-inspiring wildlife. Lisa has educated children of all ages as well as the general public for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service, the USDA Forest Service, the University of Alaska Anchorage, and for private nature centers and eco-tourism companies for over eighteen years, most of that time in Alaska.

Marianne Aplin is the visitor Center Manager for Islands & Ocean, the headquarters of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge.

Marie-Helene Burle is this year's Tim Schantz Memorial Scholarship recipient. Marie is a student at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, Canada, working towards her M.Sc. in Biology. The Tim Schantz Memorial Scholarship was established to encourage the passionate study of Ornithology by young people.

Matt Kirchoff joined Audubon Alaska as their Director of Bird Conservation in 2007. Prior to that, he worked for 25 years as a Research Wildlife Biologist for the State of Alaska. He has studied waterfowl and shorebirds on the Yukon Delta, seabirds in the Bering Seas, and is currently studying the ecology of Marbled and Kittlitz's Murrelets in Glacier Bay. He is an active member of the Pacific Seabird Group, the Alaska Shorebird Group, the Pacific Coast Joint Venture, and Boreal Partners in Flight. Matt lives in Anchorage.

Mossy Kilcher has lived in Homer her entire life, and is an artist, photographer and an avid, lifelong birder. Mossy is a member of several bird organizations and participates in many local bird activities, including feeder watch, bird counts, and bird walks. She also contributes material to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Mossy's main passion is filming and photographing birds, especially songbirds, documenting their habits, and collecting their songs.

Nancy Lord is a long-time Homer resident, is the author of seven books of fiction and nonfiction. She is the Alaska Writer Laureate for 2008-2010.

Patty Lekanoff-Gregory is an Aleut, born and raised in Unalaska, Alaska. She learned the revived art form of making Aleut Bentwood hats and visors that were traditionally worn by the men while paddling their kayak. Patty has been traveling throughout the State and teaching for twelve years. Patty is this year's Special Guest Artist for the Festival.

Peter Harrison is this year's featured Festival Keynote speaker. Widely considered to be the world's foremost authority on seabirds, Peter Harrison has written and illustrated over a dozen books, of which Seabirds: An Identification Guide, is considered the bible of seabird identification. Peter is only one of a handful of authors to both write and illustrate bird books. Peter has led scientific research expeditions throughout the world, from the Arctic to the Antarctic and across the islands of the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. One such expedition resulted in a 22-page profile article in the New Yorker magazine and highlighted the plight of the Short-tailed Albatross, once thought to be extinct and now one of the rarest of all surviving bird species. Co-founder of Eco and Zegrahm Expeditions based in Seattle, Peter still leads expeditions to all seven continents. He is also an ardent conservationist. His latest project is to help raise the US $2.5 million needed to eradicate rats from Henderson Island, an uninhabited makatea in the South Pacific and home to four endemic bird species. In recognition of his outstanding contribution to the world of natural history and his dedication to conservation projects, Peter was recently honored with the title Member of the British Empire by her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II.

Poppy Benson is the Visitor Services Manager for the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge. Poppy was among a handful of individuals who were instrumental in the creation of the very first Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival, and she has been involved in a variety of capacities ever since.

Rich Kleinleder is a wildlife biologist who has lived in Homer for 20 years. He is the author of the Homer Birding Hotspots Guide and website - www.birdinghomeralaska.org.

Robb Kaler is a wildlife biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and has been working in Alaska since 2001. He received a B.S. degree in Wildlife Biology from the Evergreen State College and an M.S. degree in Ecology and Systematics from Kansas State University. His work experience includes four field seasons studying the demography of island bird species in the the Aleutian Islands, including Kittlitz's Murrelet.

Scott Hatch is a wildlife biologist with the U.S. Geological Survey, Alaska Science Center. His research interests are the breeding, feeding and population ecology of North Pacific seabirds. The research questions that most interest him (as a reader, at least, if not a regular contributor to date) are life history adaptation, aging, and senescence in natural populations, and their implications for environmental and species management. Methods-wise, he is particularly turned on by the revolution in electronic data collection - satellite transmitters, GPS receivers, geolocators and time-depth recorders. A native of Bellingham, Washington, Scott has lived for 34 years in Anchorage, Alaska, where the winters are long, dark and cold. More than 20 years ago, he learned to ameliorate this situation by spending several weeks each winter with his family in Hawaii, where the only "birdies" that concern him are scores totaling 1 under par.

Tamara Zellar works as an Outreach Biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Anchorage. She has spent several years working on a number of research projects involving seabirds, shorebirds, loons, grebes, and most recently eiders. She also coordinates the Shorebird Sister School Program and Alaska Jr. Duck Stamp Program

Taz Tally is a professional landscape and wilderness photographer living in Homer. He has authored numerous books and online training courses about Photoshop, digital photography and related digital imaging topics. His latest book 50 Hikes in Alaska's Kenai Peninsula is available at major bookstores. A Nature photographer and outdoor enthusiast, Taz draws on his background as a PhD geologist and former University of North Carolina professor. Taz also offers custom Alaskan photography adventures and training. Visit www.taztallyphotography.com for more information.

Tony DeGange is currently a research manager for the Biology Program of the U.S. Geological Survey's Alaska Science Center. Prior to that, he worked for 29 years in a variety of capacities for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in California and Alaska. He has worked extensively throughout coastal Alaska, including at many seabird colonies that make up the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge. He has been working closely with staff from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey and University of Alaska Fairbanks on the Kasatochi project ever since the catastrophic eruption of August 2008.