Earth Week Birding Classic at Penn State Altoona

04/02/2020

The Earth Week Birding Classic has been postponed until further notice. Please stay safe and healthy.

03/01/2019

Here are all of the forms for the 2019 EWBC. Don't forget the Luncheon is on April 28th, 2019 at 1pm in the Penn State Altoona Slep Fire Side Lounge.

03/01/2019

ATTN: Get excited about locally funded and executed research! Pledges raised during this years event for JVAS will go towards the Bald Eagle Mountain Fall Hawkwatch project.

Bald Eagle Mountain is the western-most ridge in the Ridge & Valley province and joins with Brush Mt, Canoe Mt, Lock Mt, Dunning Mt, Evitts Mt, and Wills Mt to the south in Pennsylvania. Historical part-time hawk counts on Bald Eagle Mt indicate its promise as a raptor migration pathway, particularly for golden eagles and red-tailed hawks. Based upon those historical counts, Bald Eagle Mt was named a Pennsylvania Important Bird Area, but we don’t really know the full extent of its value to raptor migration.
High counts of these species in the fall at the Franklin Mountain (NY) hawk watch on northwest winds are often followed by high counts of these species several days later at Allegheny Front hawkwatch near Central City if the wind turns to be out of the east or southeast. We think that many of these birds are using Bald Eagle Mountain or the Allegheny Front to get there. Further, we suspect that the Allegheny Front hawkwatch tallies only a fraction of the migrant raptors that may use this migration pathway, because that site is highly dependent upon E/SE winds.
To assess the raptor migration on Bald Eagle Mountain, the project will conduct a single full-season fall hawkwatch from September through December 2019. To assist with full-time coverage, Juniata Valley Audubon has formed a partnership with the State College Bird Club and Shaver’s Creek Environmental Center to support a paid full-time hawk counter. We anticipate that this project will document the considerable importance of Bald Eagle Mountain as a raptor migration pathway.

04/23/2018

We want to thank everyone who participated and donated to this event. Our continued success would not be possible without you! Thank you!

04/09/2018

We are still accepting registration forms for the 2018 Penn State Altoona Earth Week Birding Classic! Please email Catie Farr at [email protected] if you are interested!

03/27/2018

02/11/2018

The Earth Week Birding Classic will be held from April 15 to 22, 2018. Registration is free. The goal is for teams in seven different categories to count as many species of birds as possible over a 24-hour period any time during the week beginning on Apr 15 at 12 noon and ending at noon on April 22. This non-profit event is co-sponsored by the Environmental Studies program at Penn State Altoona and Juniata Valley Audubon Society. Pledges that team members garner will support bird conservation and education in central Pennsylvania. Teams of 3 or more (2 or more for Senior citizens) will count birds in Blair and surrounding counties, and prizes will be awarded during the closing ceremony at the Slep Center on the Penn State Altoona campus immediately following the event. Registration deadline is April 8 - to register and for more information, please contact Catherine Farr at [email protected].

04/28/2017

Hello All,

I wanted to let you know how the 2017 Birding Classic turned out.

We had seven teams compete this year in five of the seven categories.

The Winners for this year are:
Osprey, Penn State Student Team: Team Raptor - 31 Species
Pipit, On Foot Team: FBI - 91 Species
Coot, 65+ Team: Black Valley Buzzards - 78 Species
Towhee, One County Team: Scranton Spotters - 52 Species
Ruffed Grouse, Grand Prize Team: Beards and Birds - 103 Species

We also had two more Coot Teams, The Three Amigos who saw 66 species and the White Crowned Sparrows who saw 53 Species.

All together, our teams saw 135 different species and raised over $1600.00 to be split between JVAS and the Penn State Altoona Sustainability Council.

Thank you all for participating, donating, and having a great time with us. We will see you next year!

04/25/2017

Everything you need to participate in the 2017 Penn State Altoona Earth Day Birding Classic is Here!!!