6 successful bird outings to: Irvine Regional Park (2), Craig Regional Park, Riley Regional Park (Owl Banding with Pete Bloom), Huntington Central East, and a Private Event – Birding by Ear for the Blind with OC Guide.
Archives and Records Committee
2022-23 was once again a stable year for Archives and Records, with both the Dropbox Archives and Dropbox View accounts being maintained regularly and functioning well in general. However, Dropbox changes in login procedures has had the result that Board members can no longer “generically” log in to the View account for access to the Board Resource Notebook.
With the support of the secretary and membership chair, we continue to add monthly board documents and Wandering Tattler copies to the Archives, as well as other documents that are pertinent to major events or the history of the chapter.
Several committees use folders in the Archives account actively for their record keeping and for ongoing chapter and committee work, including Membership, Conservation, the Conservation subcommittees for Legislation and Advocacy and Tackling Climate and Trash, Field Trips, and the treasurer.
Contents of the Board Resource Notebook were updated several times during the year and are available to board members through a link to the Archives account.
Audubon House Committee
Successfully recruited volunteers to cover most weekends.
Volunteers worked 2800 hours.
Hosted 4778 visitors
Bird Information Committee
Raptor Identification-taught by Bill Clark Introductory workshop – 25 students
Intermediate/Advanced – 16 students
Birds of Southern California- Oct-Dec 2023 – 56 students in 3 sessions for 10 weeks
Shorebirds of North America-Pt 2 March-August – 48 students in 3 sessions over 19 weeks
Conservation Committee
With the guidance of the Conservation Committee and its Tackling Climate and Trash Subcommittee, Sea and Sage made great progress at 6 in-person events in drastically reducing food waste, trash to the landfill, and single-use plastic/other items used. This was accomplished by using reusable rather than disposable place settings. We invited guests to bring their own place settings and entered those who did in free drawing of eco-friendly prizes. Volunteers manned ‘scrape and rinse’ and ‘wash and dry’ stations. Cold drinks were served in reusable, or recyclable aluminum containers, only. We were careful in the amount of food that was ordered. All organic waste was composted or recycled to a city or county organic-green waste service. At our two major events, over 200 disposable plates, napkins, cups, mugs, and plastic cutlery were not used and did not end up in the landfill! At the Summer BBQ, 29 pounds of organic waste were recycled. At the Fall Pancake Breakfast there was very little organic waste.
The Conservation Committee completed another successful year of offering Sea and Sage’s well-received and informative ‘4th Tuesday’ Conservation Virtual Lecture series. The most recent season had nine lectures on a variety of topics relating to bird or wildlife research and conservation issues. We featured several local programs on climate change and tackling trash. Publicity reaches over 4,000 via the chapter newsletter. Reminders are sent electronically to a growing list of “interested persons” that currently numbers over 1,000. Programs are well received by members and the public, occasionally generating a new membership.
Tackling Climate and Trash Sub-Committee The Tackling Climate and Trash subcommittee completed its second successful year investigating climate change and trash and pollution; concentrating on what we as individuals can do; and sharing what we learned with our members and the public, through our newsletter and chapter website. We contributed significantly to the chapter’s success in reducing trash and waste at chapter events. We initiated a project to learn what happens in Orange County to what goes into the trash, the recycles, and the green/organics waste buckets.
Legislation and Advocacy Sub-Committee The Legislation and Advocacy subcommittee of the Conservation Committee successfully completed its second year of operation. We tracked 13 bills through the 2023 session of the California Legislature and during the Legislative process, submitted comment letters (all in support) in about ten instances. We met with one state senator, one assembly member, and one county supervisor.
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee
The year was marked by a transition from Devin Bradley, who retired as Chairperson mid-year amongst some anxiety within the chapter over the Audubon name change issue, resulting in leadership reverting to Scott Thomas taking back the role as Chairperson in September 2023. The committee is proud of the accomplishment of introducing diversity, equity, and inclusion awareness into the chapter’s major events (Summer BBQ, Art Meets Nature, Fall Pancake Breakfast, and December Holiday Boutique), where we witnessed tangible results verified by new members that praised our small efforts as being successful, welcoming actions.
Members of the Events Committee worked with other members of Sea & Sage and with people outside of the Chapter to sponsor and organize a morning of Plein Air painting, which was followed by judging of the paintings and the awarding of prizes. They worked in coordination with The Southern California Plein Air Painters Association. The event brought people into the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary who otherwise might never have experienced the marsh.
Pancake Breakfast: There are 37 volunteers who have managed the same Pancake Breakfast duties for many years. Last year we had at least 48 volunteers, some of them volunteering for more than one job during the Pancake Breakfast.
Exhibits Committee
We staffed 16 tables at 9 locations. We spoke to 2085 people. Due to the generosity of a local nursery, we received donations of $7,204. Some of the funds came from “round-up” donations given by customers at the nursery and the rest was donated by Roger’s Gardens.
Field Trip Committee
A field trip committee was formed to meet once a month to review our field trip processes and procedures, including: the expansion of field trip offerings; improve publicity; and the development of Field Trip Leader Guidelines.
Online registration has been added through Eventbrite. for all field trips. This facilitates communication and provides trip leaders with a list of participants and their emails for distribution of eBird checklists.
A rating system has been added to describe the Birding Skills required for a particular trip (Advanced, Intermediate, Introductory or All Levels) and the Walking Difficulty (Easy, Moderate, Strenuous). These were developed to allow registrants to pick a trip that is right for them.
Finance Committee
Prepare 2024 budgets for the Chapter and the Marsh Education Project
Review and monitor investment portfolios
Membership and Data Operations Committee
Added 274 people to our mailing list.
Sent 187,445 emails, in support of the chapter.
Launched 63 campaigns.
Maintained 4000 membership records
Designed, monitored, managed over 40 field trips and Chapter Activities on Eventbrite.
Raptor Research Committee
The Raptor Research Committee recruited over 40 volunteers to conduct nesting raptor surveys and monitoring in parks and open spaces across Orange County. Scott and Mina conducted training courses by Zoom and in the field, and by late February 2023, volunteers began searching for, identifying, and logging active raptor nests. They conducted follow-up monitoring on the status of the nest all the way through the end of the breeding season, producing a huge database on raptor nesting activity in Orange County for the 2023 breeding season.
San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary Liaison Committee
The major event was the Plein Air Art Event at the Marsh.
Social Media Committee
Facebook page followers: 5433; we have followers in more than 20 countries.
Instagram supports Sea & Sage reaching a broader audience through content posted to our grid, temporary “stories” that are shared for 24 hours, engagement with followers, and interactions with other accounts. In the last year: posts reached between 145 – 929 accounts per post (average 552). Increased followers by 3% since November 28, 2023. Currently at 1637 followers.
