Greetings my fellow nature lovers,

 

I am honored to have been elected as the president of the San Joaquin Audubon Society (SJAS) for the next two years. I have always enjoyed casually observing and identifying birds, starting as a student in South Africa and then living in several west coast states (BC, WA, OR and CA). My birding moved to the next level when I discovered eBird in 2020 and started attending SJAS events. I met many amazing people that have been observing and working for the benefit of birds for years and even decades. They taught me so much and I made many friends. 

 

I love seeing birds in my garden, on a casual hike or on a SJAS field trip. A recent highlight for me was my first birding trip with three SJAS friends to SE Arizona. One of the things that draws me to birds is that, as I learn new facts about them every day, I realize the amazing living beings that they are. 

 

However, I often feel guilty about how little I do to give back to the birds. I do provide food, water and shelter for them in my garden; but there is much more that I could do. They face so many challenges and the populations of most species are declining. 

 

My wish is that this position will motivate and enable me to do more for the birds. I have started my conversations and involvement with other organizations in the county and beyond, like the North San Joaquin Chapter – California Native Plant Society. 

 

There is so much that we can do in our own gardens and communities. For example I only recently learned about the importance of native host plants as food for caterpillars since introduced plants are toxic to them. These caterpillars in turn are a crucial food source that birds feed to their young. Therefore, we converted all our lawn to mostly native shrubs last fall. I’m grateful to the people that took the time to share this information with me.  

 

Other opportunities I see are advocating for birds with our legislators, being involved in restoration projects, placing and monitoring nest boxes, etc. A big part of the effort will be to get the word out so that more people can be involved. 

 

I hope that when my two year term is over we can look back at some positive actions and results that benefited our feathered friends. 

 

I’m excited to meeting more of you at our field trips and general meetings! We post these to our website, our Facebook and Instagram pages and to Eventbrite. Please let us know if there are any additional events you would be interested in. 

 

Respectfully,

 

Henry Koertzen