Appalachian Highlands Birding Trail

14/02/2023

Good afternoon birding friends! We're hoping you'll take a moment to give our Alabama Birding Trails page a like. We're consolidating pages to make sure we share the best information possible, so give us a look! (and a like!)

28/02/2022

Participants must complete the mandatory online waiver. Please do not request registration for others when submitting your request.

01/10/2021

Only 30 days left until the end of this year's photo contest! Send your entries to [email protected]!

22/09/2021

Lights Out Alert!!!!

Tonight, September 22, will be a night of high intensity for bird migration across the state, with an estimated 31.6 MILLION birds migrating over Georgia this evening alone.

Thanks to a collaborative venture between Georgia Audubon and Kyle Horton of Colorado State University, we can now see nightly predictions for bird migration over Georgia and can alert the public to reduce outdoor lighting on nights of elevated migration intensity.

Learn more, sign our Lights Out Georgia pledge, or view the collision resources at http://ow.ly/bfHB50G3mFv.

14/05/2021

Heron monitoring and digiscoping today at East Lake Park in . Want to help? We need volunteers throughout to monitor green herons and yellow-crowned night-herons and help us get a better understanding of how development and disturbance pressures influence habitat use and reproductive success. Learn more and log your sightings at alaudubon.org/herons!

Photos: 1) Adult green heron; 2) juvenile night-heron

09/04/2021

08/03/2021

SITE of the WEEK: James D. Martin Wildlife Park, Etowah County
PHOTO: Paul H. Franklin

The James D. Martin Wildlife Park offers exceptional facilities for exploring an extensive backwater of Neely Henry Lake, on the Coosa River in the City of Gadsden. In addition to a walking trail along the shoreline, a network of boardwalks allows visitors to walk out into the 300-acre lake, and even to visit a series of wooded islands situated along the mouth of Black Creek, providing superb views of the birdlife of this rich and varied ecosystem. In winter, Bald Eagles are semi-regulars. Watch for them soaring and fishing here, and look for Osprey from March to November. In spring and summer, a nearby nesting colony of Great Blue Herons, Great Egrets, and Black-crowned Night-Herons provides extra interest. Numbers of Green Herons also nest along the shore line. The boardwalks provide the best birding opportunities for waterfowl such as American Coots, Pied-billed Grebes, Double-crested Cormorants, Gadwalls, Hooded Mergansers, Ring-necked Ducks, Lesser Scaup, Mallards, and Canada Geese.

Additional Information: https://alabamabirdingtrails.com/sites/james-d-martin-wildlife-park/

23/02/2021

BIRD of the WEEK: Blue-winged Teal
PHOTO: C. Goss

Pairs and small groups of this tiny dabbling duck inhabit shallow ponds and wetlands across much of North America. Blue-winged Teal are long distance migrants, with some birds heading all the way to South America for the winter. Therefore, they take off early on spring and fall migration, leaving their breeding grounds in the United States and Canada well before other species in the fall.
Additional Information: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Blue-winged_Teal/overview