Thursday, February 6, 2025 at 7 p.m.
Elise Ferree - Wintering White-crowned Sparrows at the Bernard Field Station and Beyond

Elise Ferree is currently investigating the behavior of migratory white-crowned sparrows that migrate from Alaska to overwinter in southern
California. Her talk will highlight findings based on the past seven years of observations that examine how these sparrows return to and utilize the
Bernard Field Station as an overwintering site. She will also share some preliminary data comparing the return rates and behavior of white-crowned
sparrows overwintering in Claremont suburban neighborhoods. 

Dr. Elise Ferree teaches biology at the Department of Natural Sciences of Scripps and Pitzer Colleges. Her research focuses on behavioral ecology,
with wild populations of birds and spiders as study organisms. Elise is also interested in nutrition and public health, as well as sustainability and
urban ecology of plants and animals. She attended The College of William and Mary, Wake Forest University for her MS, received her PhD at UC Santa Cruz and was a postdoctoral associate at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Thursday, March 6, 2025 at 7 pm

Dr. Allison Schultz – “Flashy Feathers to Microscopic Mechanisms: How and Why Birds are Colorful”

Join Associate Curator of Ornithology at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County as she delves into the world of feathers and their colors. During her talk, she will discuss how different forces have shaped the multitude of colors and patterns that we observe today (including some that humans can’t see!) and describe some of her current work on the mechanisms underlying the great diversity of colors in birds. She will end her talk with an example of how environmental pollution is impacting bird feathers.

Dr. Allison Shultz is Associate Curator of the Ornithology Department at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. With her research, she seeks to understand the evolution of bird diversity, focusing on two major areas: how birds are responding to human-caused environmental changes, and how and why bird colors evolve.

Dr. Shultz received her PhD from Harvard University, MS from San Diego State University, and BA from the University of California, Berkeley. In addition to her research, Dr. Shultz is passionate about increasing diversity, inclusion, access and equity in the sciences, and inspiring a love of nature in everyone. She grew up in Southern California and has done fieldwork in various places in the US, Mongolia, and Colombia. Website: http://allisonshultz.com

Thursday, April 3, 2025 at 7 pm
Jennifer Chebahtah, CalBG “Building a California Native Garden for Birds”

Join horticulturist Jen Chebatah, from the California Botanic Garden as she introduces us to the basics of gardening with California native plants. Then dive deeper as together we will use a blank slate “yard” via slideshow and build a landscape plan from scratch with specially selected California native plants that support birds throughout the year. The audience will be provided with blank paper to design their own garden using dimensions from their own home garden space. (Bring a clipboard and measurements from your yard to the meeting with you.)

In her role as a horticulturist at Cal BG, Jennifer Chebatah, takes care of about 6 acres of native plants. She attended community college at San Bernardino Valley College and received her bachelor’s degree in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from UC Santa Cruz where she was fortunate to do fieldwork on the campus’ Forest Ecology Research Plot among the redwood forest. Her love of nature came from her grandpa who always had a bird field guide with him. The Coast live oak, Quercus agrifolia, is her favorite plant.

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Thursday, May 1, 2025 at 7 p.m.

Dr. Suzanne Thompson “Protecting Burrowing Owls in the Pomona Valley: The Story and Fate of the Ontario Airport Owls”

The PVAS Burrowing Owl (BUOW) Project, led by Suzanne Thompson, the BUOW Committee, and PVAS members have fought for years to protect 200 acres of prime owl habitat east of the Ontario Airport. The Airport and the city of Ontario chose big warehouse dollars over small owls and the fields were destroyed. Pitzer Professor Anne Kaneko will introduce and screen her fascinating short documentary, Operation Owl, showing dramatic footage of the owls before their homes were lost. But what happened to the owls after that? Dr. Thompson has reviewed hundreds of pages of public records that detail the fate of the owls after being removed from their home. She will tell the story of the relocated Ontario owls and the current status of the owls in the Pomona Valley, including both the promising and the less encouraging prospects.

Suzanne Thompson received a PhD in Psychology from UCLA and is Emerita Professor of Psychology at Pomona College where she taught and conducted research on the intersection of psychology, health, and medical care, as well as environmental psychology.

Thursday June 5 at

6:00 pm  Annual End of Year Meeting
We start an hour early at 6:00 with a light dinner, elections, the fun and excitement of the silent auction and a twin bill of a photo showcase and a photo challenge