Dear Friend of Audubon!

At Audubon Rockies, we are celebrating spring with a statewide Birdathon! This spring will represent the FIRST annual Birdathon held by the Casper Community Naturalist, Zach Hutchinson. This will incorporate the Birdathon previously held by Audubon Rockies Board Member, Bart Rea. We hope to count on your support for our Community Naturalist Program this year.

We will count birds to support our programmatic efforts – bringing STEM education, teacher trainings, citizen science projects, and MAPS Bird Banding to people of all ages across Wyoming. By providing opportunities for students, teachers, and families to get outdoors and experience our local landscapes, we are helping them develop a deeper understanding of our natural world and empowering them to make a positive difference in their communities.

With the help of people like you – our Birdathon sponsors – our Big Day will allow us to expand and improve our education efforts.

Here’s how it works: between May 9th & May 22nd, Zach’s volunteer team will race against the clock to tally as many bird species as possible in one 24-hour day. Zach’s count will run from the Wind River Range to the Thunder Basin. When Zach is finished, he will calculate his Total Species Count. That is where you come in! Just fill out and return the form below to pledge a certain amount per bird species seen (the gambler’s option) or to contribute a fixed amount of your choice. Once the Birdathon is complete, Zach will send you a report of all the birds observed.

We are very grateful for whatever you can pledge, whether it’s 50 cents, $2 or even $10 per species. The more you give, the more resources we have to continue our award-winning education programs. It will also ensure we can continue to protect birds, other wildlife, and their habitats across the Rocky Mountain Region!

Thanks for being a friend of Audubon Rockies. We hope we can count on your support!

AUDUBON ROCKIES – 2017 BIRDATHON COUNT ME IN!

I pledge $____________ Per Species for the Name Total Species Count.

Please bill me for my donation. _____

__  I’d prefer to make the enclosed gift of $________

__I’m enclosing a check payable to Audubon Rockies.

__I will pay electronically at Audubon Rockies secure website: rockies.audubon.org/donate.

Street:_______________________________________

City/State/Zip:________________________________

Email:_______________________________________

Phone:_______________________________________

This year Audubon Rockies is planning a region-wide birding fund raiser to support the Community Naturalist program which includes our own Zach Hutchinson. This event will be held during the week of May 8-15 with teams all the way from Devils Tower south to Pagosa Springs. I am hoping to enlist more birding teams in Wyoming to join with Audubon Rockies staff, board and other volunteers to solicit pledges from friends, neighbors, relatives, and anyone who owes you a favor, to support this event and help expand the Community Naturalist program into more schools and more outdoor activities for kids and adults.

The way this works is that if you are willing to help, you put together a small team to contact prospective donors to make a pledge to Audubon Rockies of an amount per-species that your team identifies on any 24-hour period during that second week of May; anything from $.10 to $10 per bird that you and your team identify that day, either by sight or sound. Or your donors can make a direct gift to Audubon Rockies, but that takes some of the fun out of it. The real goal here is not how many species you see but rather how many sponsors you can get.  Audubon Rockies can supply you with a sample solicitation letter, pledge form, a spread-sheet form for tracking pledges, gifts and payments. The Fort Collins regional office will keep track of donations as they come in, send acknowledgements and tax receipts to your donors, and keep you informed of donations that go straight to the office so that you can personally thank them. And I will be available with advice from past experience doing this.

So, I encourage you to get involved by letting me know if you are interested by contacting me at: bdrea@tribcsp.com.   I am hoping that region wide, we can raise enough to fund one Community Naturalist staff position.

Bart Rea