Welcome to the Black Canyon Audubon Society
Black Canyon Audubon Society was formed in 1990 and is one of 11 National Audubon Society chapters in Colorado. The BCAS is committed to the conservation of natural resources through our birding, conservation, and educational activities. The region covered by the Black Canyon Audubon society encompasses nearly 8,300 square miles and includes Delta, Gunnison, Hinsdale, Montrose, San Miguel and Ouray counties. Within this region, elevations vary from 4,695 to 14,309 feet above sea level. Rainfall ranges from less than 8 inches per year in the lower valleys to more than 50 on the higher peaks. Vegetation varies from desert scrub to boreal forest and alpine tundra.
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Christmas Bird Counts
It is Christmas Bird Count Season, and we have four counts in the BCAS are for you to take part in! Bring: warm clothes (dress for expected weather), boots, snack and/or lunch, water, sunscreen, binoculars, spotting scope (if you have), bird books. Clip boards are very helpful. Provided: Map of birding areas, checklist of birds that might be seen, and instructions. All are welcome regardless of birding experience. You will be teamed with experienced birders, so it is a great way to meet new people and to learn great places to bird.
Montrose. Saturday, December 14. Meet at 8:30 AM at the N. 2nd Public Parking lot (N. Cascade Ave. and N. 2nd St.) Downtown Montrose. We will break into teams and you will be given maps and data sheets to complete the field count. Everyone is encouraged to dress appropriately for the weather and bring lunch, water, and sunscreen. All experience levels are welcome and encouraged. We will meet post count at 4:00 PM at Silver Basin Brewery to compare notes from the day. Please contact Missy Siders at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. if you have any questions.
Gunnison, Sunday, December 22. This group will meet at 7:30 AM at Hurst Hall, Room 130 on the Western Colorado University campus to get organized. Everyone is encouraged to dress appropriately for the weather (which can be a little chilly in Gunnison) and bring lunch, water, and sunscreen. Afterward we will have a chili potluck to compile results. Please contact organizer Arden Anderson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. for additional information and to let him know you are planning to attend. Folks at all levels of birding experience are welcome.
Delta, Saturday, December 28. Meet at the Delta City Market parking lot at 8:30 AM. We will break into teams and you will be given maps and data sheets to complete the field count. Please contact Amy Seglund by email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. if you have any questions.
Hotchkiss. Saturday, January 4. Meet at the Hotchkiss City Market parking lot at 8:00 AM. All experience levels are welcome and encouraged. A catered lunch get together will be held at Andrea Robinsong's. Please contact Adam Petry at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. with questions or to RSVP. All levels of birding experience are welcome. We’ll be birding most of the day.
Field Trips
**See the Field Trips page for participation guidelines**
First Tuesday Field Trips - Montrose Area
First Tuesday Field Trips are January 7, and February 4 at 9:00 AM at the public parking lot at the intersection of N. 2nd St. and N. Cascade Ave. in Montrose. A leader will accompany the group to a nearby birding hotspot. Return should be by about noon. Bring a snack, water, binoculars, and field guides. Please RSVP for all field trips and included your name, field trip date and contact information in case weather or illness forces a cancellation. RSVP for all fieldtrips at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Please let us know if you are coming, so we don’t leave you behind. This is especially in case of sudden weather changes.
Third Tuesday Field Trips - Delta County
We are proud to announce that we will now be doing another set of field trips - these oriented around Delta County! Third Tuesday Field Trips are November 19, December 17, January 21, and February 18 at 9:00 AM. They will meet at various locations, depending on the date.
The November 19 field trip will meet at the large parking area on the eastern side of Confluence Lake west of and behind the Bill Heddles Recreation Center. After scouting the lake for winter water birds, we will carpool to Sweitzer Lake State Park (or you can meet the group at Sweitzer Lake about 9:45 AM).
The January 21 field trip will meet at Orchard City Park towards the southern end of the parking area (11245 2100 Road, Orchard City). We will walk the loop trail. Bluebirds are typically abundant and it is a good place for other songbirds and raptors.
All trips will last about 2 hours. Bring a snack, water, binoculars, spotting scopes (if you have one), and field guides. Please RSVP for all field trips and include your name, field trip date, and contact information in case weather or illness forces a cancellation. RSVP for all fieldtrips at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Please let us know if you are coming, so we don’t leave you behind. This is especially in case of sudden weather changes. For more information, please call Dian Torphy at (970) 200-6294.
Ridgway Rosy-finch Trip #1
Saturday, January 18. Join us as we visit the home of a Ridgway BCAS member who regularly gets all three species of Rosy Finch at her home feeders. We’ll meet in Ridgway at the Cimarron Coffee parking lot at 8:30 AM and carpool up to the Elk Meadows home. Because it is a private residence, the trip is limited to 10 participants. Please RSVP to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. early to reserve your spot.
Winter Raptor Trips
Saturday, February 15 and Sunday, February 16. Join Bruce Ackerman and Bill Harris as they search the Montrose area for winter raptors, including eagles, ferruginous hawks, rough-legged hawks, and many other raptors. The trip will conclude in early afternoon. Dress in layers, bring water and a lunch or snacks, binoculars, and a spotting scope (if you have one). These trips are limited to 8 or 9 participants each day (three vehicles). To reserve a space on Saturday’s trip contact Bill at his email. To reserve a space on Sunday’s trip, contact Bruce at (727) 858-5857 or at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
Ridgway Rosy-finch Trip #2
Wednesday, February 12. Join us as we visit the home of a Ridgway BCAS member who regularly gets all three species of Rosy-finches at her home feeders. We’ll meet in Ridgway at the Cimarron Coffee parking lot at 8:30 AM and carpool up to the Elk Meadows home. Because it is a private residence, the trip is limited to 10 participants. Please RSVP to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. early to reserve your spot.
Upcoming Programs
Except where noted, all meetings will begin at 7:00 p.m. at the Montrose Field House Summit Room at the corner of Rio Grande Avenue and Colorado Avenue (South 9th St.), except as noted. All are welcome and there is no charge, though donations are gratefully appreciated. For additional information or to let us know that you would like to do a presentation, please contact Kristal Stridham at (580) 919-5987 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
Cassandra Wolfganger: Conservation of Vermont Priority Species and Local Projects
Thursday, December 12 – 7:00 PM. Cassandra Wolfanger is a wildlife habitat biologist with Bird Conservancy of the Rockies in the Montrose office of the National Resource Conservation Service, newly established in June. For the previous three years, Cassie worked in Audubon’s state of Vermont office. She’ll be speaking about her conservation work with Vermont’s priority species including peregrine falcons, bobolinks, golden- and blue-winged warblers, to name a few. She’ll also give us a sneak peek at the projects she’s starting in our neck of the woods.
Nic Korte: Western Slope and North American Owls
Thursday, January 9--7:00 PM. Nic Korte is a long-time member and Conservation Chairman for the Grand Valley Audubon Society (GVAS). Nic has been working with for more than thirty years and he’s the leader of the GVAS Western Screech-Owl project. In Grand Junction regularly leads the nation in counting Western Screech Owls during the annual Christmas count. They are successfully maintaining a significant population despite increasing urbanization, witnessed by a CBC total of 101 Screech Owls two years ago. In addition, Nic recently completed his quest to see all of North America’s owls in person. He will share stories from that experience and compare and contrast the species. What a hoot!
Renzo del Piccolo: South African Wildlife
Thursday, February 13. 7:00 PM. Retired wildlife expert, Renzo Del Piccolo, formerly with CPW, traveled to South Africa in September 2024. He will share his expertise in wildlife and bird management. Join us as he chronicles his experiences with South African wildlife species. He traveled with the Katie Adamson Conservation Fund, a Denver-based non-profit focused on protection of endangered species around the world. Renzo tells us that his experiences with wildlife in Krueger National Park were unlike any he has ever had. Join this adventure without the 24+ hour flight!
BCAS Book Club Selections for 2025
The Black Canyon Audubon Book Club meets on the third Tuesdays, at 3:00 p.m. Meetings will be virtual (usually in the fall and winter) or in-person in Montrose (usually in Spring and Summer). Contact Bruce Ackerman for more details. Please check back with this website, as times, locations and book choices may change to accommodate the participants. Please join us, even if you haven’t read the book yet! Let Bruce know if you would like to be on the separate email list specifically for the Book Club.
January 21. The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan (2024). “Tan’s observations of her avian guests, recorded in journal form, are both entertaining and informative. And the drawings that illustrate her musings are remarkable . . . Like the early naturalists, Tan learns by watching, bringing no preconceptions, and it’s a pleasure to sit with her as she observes and accumulates knowledge. She takes careful notes, she sketches what she sees and she tries to draw conclusions.” - Los Angeles Times. 2024 Barnes & Noble Gift Book of the Year.
February 18. Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History by Stephen Jay Gould (2014). High in the Canadian Rockies is a small limestone quarry formed 530 million years ago called the Burgess Shale. It holds the remains of an ancient sea where dozens of strange creatures lived. Gould explores what the Burgess Shale tells us about evolution and the nature of history. “Gould is exceptionally well placed to tell these stories, and he tells them with fervor and intelligence.” – New York Times Book Review.
March 18. A Wing and a Prayer: The Race to Save Our Vanishing Birds by Anders Gyllenhaal and Beverly Gyllenhall, (2023). “The Gyllenhaals, birders and distinguished former reporters, journeyed thousands of miles, tracking efforts to protect the Americas' vanishing birds.”
April 15. A Season on the Wind: Inside the World of Spring Migration by Kenn Kaufman (2019). A story of the incredible spring bird migration that occurs each year. Some birds travel thousands of miles from South to North America. One spectacular place is along Lake Erie in northwestern Ohio, where the peak of spring migration is so spectacular that it attracts bird watchers from around the globe.
May 20. Night Magic by Leigh Ann Henion (2024). The author invites you to celebrate the living wonders and richness of the dark. The book moves through spring, summer and fall, each season focusing on a few different life-forms including spotted salamanders, glowworms, moths and bioluminescent fungi. Mixed in among these encounters, Henion laments the ever-growing theft of natural darkness by artificial light, and encourages readers to tune in to the darkness around them.
June 17 Eating Stone: Imagination and the Loss of the Wild by Ellen Meloy (2006). Long believed to be disappearing and possibly even extinct, the Southwestern bighorn sheep of Utah’s canyonlands have made a surprising comeback. Naturalist Ellen Meloy tracks a band of these majestic creatures through backcountry hikes, downriver floats, and travels across the Southwest. Meloy chronicles her communion with the bighorns and laments the growing severance of man from nature. Wry, quirky and perceptive the book is a brilliant and wholly original tribute to the natural world.
JULY 15. Brave the Wild River: The Untold Story of Two Women Who Mapped the Botany of the Grand Canyon by Melissa Sevigny (2023). Two lady botanists travelled through the Grand Canyon in 1938. No one had yet surveyed the plant life of the Grand Canyon, and they were determined to be the first. This is the story of their daring, historic boat trip down the dangerous Colorado River and the desert plant species they discovered. The author spoke in Montrose in 2024, and works for NPR in Flagstaff, AZ.
August 19. Silent Spring (1962) by Rachel Carson. Silent Spring was widely read by the general public in the 1960’s and became a New York Times best seller. The book provided the impetus for tighter control of pesticides and has been honored on many lists of influential books, including Discover magazine’s list of the 25 greatest science books of all time.
September 16. Birding Under the Influence: Cycling Across America in Search of Birds and Recovery by Dorian Anderson (2023). At a personal and professional crossroads, a man resets his life and finds sobriety, love, and 618 bird species, cycling his way to a very Big Year. The author, a neuroscience researcher, walks away from the world of elite institutions, research labs, and academic publishing to pursue a North American Big Year. This is a massive undertaking under any circumstances. But doing it on a bike while maintaining sobriety? That’s next level.
October 21. Bluebird Seasons: Witnessing Climate Change in My Piece of the Wild by Mary Taylor Young (2023). The Colorado author has monitored bluebird nest boxes for 28 years around her cabin in the hills above Pueblo, CO, as well as watching everything else about nature. In that amount of time, she began to see changes caused by climate change on her property. Susan knows the author, who has written many books about the wildlife of Colorado.
November 18. Alfie & Me by Carl Safina (2023). Alfie is an orphaned screech owl rescued, raised and released during the covid pandemic by Safina and his wife. Along the way, the author takes a deep dive into humanity's relationship with the natural world from antiquity to today. Safina is a prominent ecologist and oceanographer; his writing is described as "lyrical non-fiction."
December 16. The Birds That Audubon Missed: Discovery and Desire in the American Wilderness by Kenn Kaufman (2024). Renowned naturalist Kenn Kaufman examines the scientific discoveries of John James Audubon and his artistic and ornithologist peers in this fascinating “blend of history, science, art, biography, and memoir” that is “a bird lovers’ delight.” Raging ambition. Towering egos. Competition under a veneer of courtesy. Heroic effort combined with plagiarism, theft, exaggeration, and fraud. This was the state of bird study in eastern North America during the early 1800s, as a handful of intrepid men raced to find the last few birds that were still unknown to science.
Roubideau Rim Wildlife Rescue
Brenda Miller is in need of lumber - scrap or new - posts, plywood, rails, boards - for construction of rehabilitation cages.
Any condition.
Please contact Brenda Miller at her This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call her at (970) 209-5946. She has a truck and trailer and will pick it up.
This is a very worthy cause, as Brenda has been the only wildlife rehabilitator in the Montrose/Delta area and is trying to reestablish her service and maintain her license.
Roubideau Rim Wildlife Rescue is a 501c3 charitable organization. If you do not have lumber for her, perhaps you would consider donating to her cause.
Brenda Miller, Executive Director
Roubideau Rim Wildlife Rescue, 501c3
15498 Transfer Rd., Olathe, CO. 81425
Phone 970-209-5946
Click here for her Facebook page
Volunteers Needed
We are looking for some volunteers who can drive injured raptors to rehab centers. Usually the bird is in a pet kennel, and just needs a ride. Nothing hard about it. Please contact Bruce Ackerman at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call him at (727) 858-5857 to be on the list for future needs.
Chapter Goals
- To promote the conservation of natural resources through informative public programs, our newsletter and this web site.
- To provide the opportunity for the observation and study of birds and other wildlife, through our field trips.
- To offer early education programs including bird banding stations and classroom bird skin programs.
- To empower our members and the public with the knowledge to be effective environmental advocates.
- To contribute to the recovery of the Gunnison Sage Grouse (GUSG) through joint efforts with GUSG working groups and federal and state agencies.
Leucistic Red-tailed Hawk near Solar Road south of Montrose. Photo taken by Robin Lewis on March 26, 2019.
