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Some Crossbill Natural History and the Cassia Crossbill

Join Boulder County Audubon Society and University of Wyoming ornithologist and evolutionary ecologist Craig Benkman to learn about crossbill natural history, including the Cassia Crossbill. This meeting will be held online.

Craig will begin by discussing some of the more striking features of crossbills, a group of birds he started studying in 1982. This includes how crossbills use their crossed mandibles to feed, why there is such great size variation among crossbills, and why crossbills are usually nomadic and breed at unusual times. Then the focus will shift to the sedentary Cassia Crossbill, a species Craig found on his way to a conference in Boise, Idaho. He will discuss some of its evolutionary history and ecology, and end by discussing its future prospects in the face of climate change including a fire in the fall of 2020 that burned around a quarter of the Cassia Crossbill’s habitat.

Craig Benkman is an evolutionary ecologist and ornithologist, and a Professor and Robert B. Berry Distinguished Chair in Ecology at the University of Wyoming. Before moving to Wyoming in 2004, Craig was on the faculty in the Department of Biology at New Mexico State University. He received a B.A. from UC Berkeley, an M.S. from Northern Arizona University, and a Ph.D. from State University of New York at Albany, and conducted postdoctoral research at Princeton University and the University of British Columbia. Craig is a Fellow of the American Association of the Advancement of Science, and received the E. O. Wilson Naturalist Award from the American Society of Naturalists and the William Brewster Memorial Award from the American Ornithological Society.

When: Tuesday, November 23, 2021.   The presentation starts at 7:15 PM. Everyone is encouraged to join early to work through any connection issues (the meeting room will be open at ~7:00 PM).

Where: This meeting will be held online. All participants will be muted upon entry to the meeting room. The chat feature will be on so you can write questions for the speaker.

Zoom link - click or copy and paste: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87510587146?pwd=MUxWUUVRNDBnbFBzQytjTHV1UlVJdz09

Meeting ID: 875 1058 7146

Passcode: 944188

If you wish to join audio by telephone, you can also call one of the numbers below or find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kvybiFzQY. We highly recommend you also join the meeting by video (but don't connect audio) due to the visual nature of this presentation.

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November 19

Stearns Lake and Carolyn Holmberg Preserve

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December 5

Lafayette Birds! First Sunday Bird Watching