 Jay Davis was presented with a framed photo of a Red-headed Woodpecker by Tammy Poulnott. Photo by Dottie Head Jay Davis was presented with the 2024 Scottie Johnson Spirit Award at our annual Holiday Party and Annual Meeting on December 8. Jay has been an integral part of our organization's work, hosting field trips across the city, from Decatur to Marietta and all in between. It’s impossible to quantify how many birders and bird enthusiasts have been impacted by his bird-brained ideas. In 2004, he was part of a team that created the Bird Jam app, a revolutionary software that taught people how to hear and learn bird calls. Later, BirdNet and Cornell got wind of it…fast forward to today and we have the popular Merlin Bird ID App. Jay serves as the volunteer webmaster for Birds Georgia and helped create the first web presence for Atlanta Audubon when they first developed an online presence. Even today, he maintains the Birds Georgia website on his servers and helps troubleshoot when issues arrive. He’s also a prolific field trip leader (and excellent birder), leading our Georgia Bird Fest Hike Inn Trip and hosting “Wednesdays After Work Migration Watch at Cochran Shoals. Thank you, Jay, for impacting hundreds of people as you embody the curiosity, ingenuity, and character of the birds you love so much.
About the Scottie Johnson Spirit Award: In 2018, Birds Georgia lost an incredibly dedicated volunteer and dear friend, Ms. Eleanor Scott Johnson. Scottie, as her family and friends called her, was an avid birder and long-time volunteer for Birds Georgia. There wasn’t a task that Scottie wasn’t up for, whether that was giving educational presentations, walking a Project Safe Flight route, certifying wildlife sanctuaries, or writing the Ask Chippy column. Scottie always raised her hand to help us out. She was a nurse, a mother, a Master Birder, and a wonderful human being with an amazing spirit. Although we lost Scottie to cancer in 2018, we continue to celebrate her spirit, kindness, and perseverance annually by honoring an outstanding volunteer with the Scottie Johnson Spirit Award.
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(L to R): Bill Bell, Courtenay Dusenbury, Wink Weinberg Birds Georgia welcomed three new directors elected by members to the Board of Directors at their annual meeting on December 8. Bill Bell, Courtenay Anne Dusenbury, and Wink Weinberg were elected for three-year terms beginning January 1, 2025. In addition, Mary Anne Lanier, Ellen Miller, and Scott Porter will return to the Board of Directors for a second three-year term. Esther Stokes will return to the board for a special one-year term. Marc Goncher, Senior Legal Counsel, Environmental, Safety and Sustainability for The Coca-Cola Company, will serve the second year of his two-year term as board chair.
Bill Bell is a retired investment management executive with 29 years of investment experience. From 1999 to 2024, he worked at Atlanta Capital Management, an investment advisory firm with $33 billion in managed assets. During his career he served as a managing director, management committee member, and portfolio manager for the core equity team. Prior to joining Atlanta Capital, he worked for the Florida State Board of Administration where he was a portfolio manager for their special situations equity fund. Bill grew up in Tallahassee, FL and has a B.S. in Business from Florida State University. He has had a lifelong interest in the natural world and is a passionate outdoorsman and fly fisherman. He has a particular interest in ecological preservation and habitat restoration in the southeast. Bill currently serves on the board of directors for the Altamaha Riverkeeper and resides in Atlanta, GA. Courtenay Anne Dusenbury is retired from a 25-year career at Emory University’s Global Health Institute and affiliated Task Force for Global Health. She served as Director of Global and Federal Affairs for the Task Force, representing it at the World Health Organization and with Congress and the Administration. Previously, she was the Founding Director of the Global Partnership for Zero Leprosy, bringing together donors, non-governmental organizations, and persons who have experienced leprosy in a worldwide advocacy and disease elimination network. For 11 years, she was the founding director of the International Association of National Public Health Institutes (the “CDC’s of the world”) office at Emory University’s Global Health Institute, working with 100+ countries to create and improve their public health systems. She served as Emory’s Director of Global and Federal Affairs, worked as a Legislative Director in the U.S. Congress, and for the Governor of Puerto Rico in San Juan and in Washington, DC. She started her career at the Pennsylvania State Senate. She is a graduate of the Pennsylvania State University and Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health. Courtenay and her husband George live in Decatur, GA, with their two adult sons nearby. A master birder who coordinates the Project Safe Flight Decatur team, her favorite bird is the Eastern Bluebird. Winkler Weinberg is a lifelong birder. He was born in Rockaway Beach, NYC, and first paid close attention to wild birds at the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Sanctuary at age nine. After leaving New York, Wink lived in Columbus OH, Augusta GA, Washington DC, and the Republic of the Philippines before settling in Atlanta. He has resided in Georgia for over 44 years. He practiced medicine as an infectious disease specialist for 45 years. He is the author of No Germs Allowed!: How to Avoid Infectious Diseases At Home and On the Road, and a co-author of The Water We Drink. Wink has served as spokesperson for Reckitt and Coleman (for Lysol), Georgia Pacific (Chairman, Health Smart Advisory Board), and Kimberly Clark (for anti-viral Kleenex). After retiring in 2022, Wink was able to devote more time to biking, woodworking, reading, grandparenting, and he rekindled his passion for birds and conservation. Wink resides in East Cobb with his wife Lynn, a talented designer and avid gardener. Together, they have two children and four grandchildren. “We are excited to welcome Bill, Courtenay, and Winkler to the Birds Georgia Board of Directors,” says Marc Goncher, board chair. “These individuals bring a wealth of talents and experiences to the Board that will help Birds Georgia fulfill its mission of building places where birds and people thrive.” Additional Birds Georgia board members include Joshua Andrews, Michael Chriszt, Robert Cooper, Joshua Gassman, Marc Goncher, Gus Kaufman, Paige Martin, Susan Maclin, Colleen McEdwards, Jennifer Johnson McEwen, Jon Philipsborn, Marlena Reed, Jim Renner, Sally Sears, Amy Beth Sparks, and Ayanna Williams. For more information on Birds Georgia visit https://www.birdsgeorgia.org/.  Volunteers from Augusta’s River Region Chapter of the Georgia Native Plant Society and the local community helped identify plant species in the restoration field prior to treatment. Photo by Heather Levy. by Heather Levy, Stewardship Coordinator Our project at Laverlea Preserve, funded by the Cornell Land Trust Bird Conservation Initiative, is officially six months underway. Laverlea Preserve comprises 345 acres of forests, fields, and riparian buffer nestled among an urbanized area in Evans, GA. The property was donated to the Central Savannah River Land Trust (CSRLT) in December of 2022, after its sole living owner, Ms. Laverne Dorn, passed away. Ms. Dorn wanted the preserve to remain undeveloped, providing wildlife habitat and a resource for the community to enjoy. Approximately 20% of the preserve consists of remnant fields that were used for cows and hay production. Since these fields are no longer being used for agriculture, Birds Georgia and the CSRLT decided to restore the fields to native grassland habitat that would benefit wildlife and also serve as a place where the community can learn more about native habitat and local flora and fauna. We selected a 14 acre field that is visible and easily accessible from the long driveway and parking lot near the home where Ms. Dorn previously lived. During the first few weeks, we surveyed the fields with the help from our partners at Georgia Department of Natural Resources, Augusta’s River Region Chapter of the Georgia Native Plant Society, Augusta-Aiken Audubon Society, and the Butterfly Monarchy Club. We documented what species of birds, plants, and butterflies that were present in order to compare species lists after treatment. We also conducted these surveys to ensure that there were not any species of conservation concern present that may be adversely affected by our efforts. We found that the majority of grasses were non-native species used for livestock, and that the few native species present would quickly return after treatment. We did not find any butterflies during our surveys and the bird species we found were all common to the area and habitat and would benefit from the restoration efforts. In September, we applied herbicide to the field to kill the non-native grasses and prepare it for planting. To further remove the duff layer left over by the herbicide application, we are planning a prescribed burn for sometime in January. The prescribed burn, being conducted by a local contractor, will be open to the public as an educational demonstration of the importance of prescribed fire both for restoration and for management of native southeastern habitats. Following the prescribed fire, we will apply any additional herbicide as needed and prepare to plant warm season native grass and wildflower seeds in the spring and early summer of 2025. We are currently working on securing additional funding to continue to plant additional native plants and maintain the grassland with fire, as well as tackling restoring additional acreage. If you live in the Evans/Augusta area and are interested in getting on our list of volunteers to learn more about upcoming workdays, events, and bird walks, please contact Heather Levy at [email protected].  The restoration field two months after herbicide application. The planned prescribed fire will clear the remaining duff layer and leave a clean bed for native seeds to be planted. Photo by Heather Levy. |
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