More about me……. And why did I create this website? What am I trying to do?
More about me …….. My name is Linda Hendricks Spence, and I live in central Illinois. I have a degree in elementary education and environmental education K-12 from Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania. I took cases in plant selection, plant care, and design from Longwood Gardens – also on Pennsylvania. I am an accredited nurseryman and horticulturist in Pennsylvania. For many years, I wrote a monthly column called Avian Adventures for the Decatur (Illinois) Audubon Society and I am still teaching birding 101 to each class of Illinois Master naturalists. I am also currently writing for the Friends of Malheur blog/newsletter – Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon. (Click here: Friends of Malheur NWR. For ten years, along with my husband, Avery Cleon Spence, I tracked nine species of grassland birds, raptors, and woodcocks, and monitored nesting boxes for the Macon County Conservation District. I also designed, helped to plant and was head gardener of the 2100 square foot formal native plant garden Rock Springs Nature Center in Decatur, IL.
I was born and raised in a housing development at the edge of a small town in the Piedmont region of southeastern Pennsylvania, moved to 10 completely wooded acres bordering a state forest in Lancaster County in Pennsylvania, then lived on 57 acres of woods and grasslands with natural springs for some years in the mountains of southeastern West Virginia, and now I live on a peninsula that juts into a 16 acre lake which is in a small neighborhood surrounded by huge agricultural fields of corn and soybeans in central Illinois. All four places represent different habitats not just for me, but for every plant, bird, insect, and animal living with me. In each of these places, my goal was to encourage my yard/land to be welcoming to wildlife.
Why did I create this website? What are my goals? This website is for everyone interested in birds – but it has expanded from just birds and I will explain later. Right now, back to birds and being a birder. It does not matter if this is your first day of birding or you are an expert with years of experience. There is something here for every birder – and for everyone who wants to make their yard/land a haven for wildlife.
The primary reason I had for starting this website was to help beginning birders. Those of us who have been birders for some time all remember how hard it was to get started. Most of us came to birding being able to recognize robins, Blue Jays, Mallards, maybe cardinals, but after that? Part of my college degree is in environmental education so I had many classes in wildlife, botany, and managing natural resources. That is when I discovered not just an appreciation for birds, but also a desire to know which species I was seeing and to understand what the birds I was watching were doing – and why.
I remember my first day of birding at the J.N. “Ding” Darling National Wildlife Refuge on Sanibel Island off the coast of Florida (J.N. “Ding” Darling NWR ). I spent time identifying water birds and waders – who were all big and with very little movement. I could look at them with my eyes and through my binoculars, page through my field guide, and repeat this over and over until I had an identification. That first day I spent several hours, but I did identify about more than a dozen of these birds and was able to watch them interact with each other. But day 2 of my birding hobby was so different.
I sat on a bench in this same refuge at a wonderful spot of trees and undergrowth where there were plenty of songbirds. It only took me a few minutes to realize I was in way over my head. These birds all seemed to be close in size, mostly brown, and flitting around so much that I could not get my binoculars focused on them. By the time I found a promising bird in my field guide, the bird I was observing had flown away. In the several hours I sat there, I could only identify a few species and of those few, I was only certain of two. This was such a frustrating experience. My field guide was full of small mostly brown birds! I just did not know where to begin.
My first goal when I started this website was to help beginning birders because most of us who are good birders began looking at songbirds with an experience just like this. To help you, the first eGuide I am offering is free – The American Robin. In this guide, I explain and demonstrate how to begin identifying an unknown bird. What to look for and how to sort out identifying marks. What to notice about behaviors. And for those of you who are already birders, you might be surprised at how much about the robin you did not know. I invite all of you to download this free eGuide. Click here: https://shop.birdingbeyondthefieldguide.com/
There is also a section on this website called Everything Bird! (Everything Bird!) This contains articles on all sorts of subjects from specific species of birds, to understanding and using binoculars, to dealing with too many blackbirds roosting in your trees, to getting a hummingbird out of your garage or shed, to leucism and albinism
I write a blog (My Blog). These are my observations and thoughts about everything I am seeing and hearing in our yard and also when we travel. I will post a review with everything I have seen and my recommendations after visiting wildlife refuges and parks. If you scroll back through the posts, you will see many of these reviews. And there will be more in the future as Cleon and I continue to travel.
There is also a section where I will post what you write about nature and being outside observing everything around you. (Natural Thoughts – Your Poems and Essays )Send me your essays and poetry! I think it is important for us to share with each other our thoughts about the natural world in which we live.
From this beginning, my website has expanded. At the core, it is still birds – and for all birders. As I have been writing for this website and for my other commitments, I find am still learning about birds every day. I learn from all of you who take time to contact me with your observations. And I have expanded the website into encouraging and helping you to turn your yard/land into your own wildlife refuge. I have added a Landscaping and Gardening for Birds and Wildlife section where I discuss specific plants and how to grow them. Every plant I have included, I have grown myself my own gardens. You can never have enough plants. Or books. Or friends. Or birds! (Landscaping and Gardening for Birds and Wildlife)
And the core of this website are the two livestream cameras – both on bird feeders and bird baths. Click on either one to enjoy watching birds interact with each other. (Bird Feeder Livestream and Bird Bath Livestream)
