
Photo by Sharon Crowell
On Sunday March 17, 30 Bluebird Monitoring Program volunteers met at Ida Lee Park for the third annual hands-on bluebird monitoring training session. Lisa McKew, the Education Coordinator for the volunteer bluebird leadership team, kicked off the event by providing an overview of Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy and how the program fits into the organization’s overall vision of helping people and wildlife thrive together in Loudoun County.
The attendees, from 20 of the program’s 59 trails, then split into three groups for focused hands-on training. In addition to Lisa, Rich Wailes (also a member of the leadership team) and Kiley Chung (a former leadership team member) reviewed and demonstrated monitoring protocols and answered questions from both new and returning trail leaders and monitors. An unanticipated learning activity occurred when one of the demonstration boxes was opened and revealed a partially constructed House Sparrow nest. All attendees had the opportunity to see first hand what these invasive nests look like and how to dispose of them.