Another Successful CEBF in 2006!

We are pleased to report the successful celebration of the 5th edition of the Caribbean Endemic Bird Festival. With 20,322 persons taking part in 260 activities in 11 countries, the 2006 CEBF is the most successful festival yet!

Among the highlights this year, Tortola, British Virgin Islands joined the festival for the first time. The BVI National Parks Trust organized guided bird tours to major wetlands in Tortola, Beef Island, Virgin Gorda and Jost Van Dyke. The response to the tours, led by local ornithologist Clive Petrovic, was tremendous. “It was like a miracle to me,” exclaimed Esther Georges, BVI NPT Director “Everyone enjoyed the birding so much and now we are getting calls to our office to schedule more tours.” At one site that was visited, Josiah’s Bay Pond, it was a “festival of birds” said Ms. Georges, “we had never seen so many birds there.” Unfortunately, this pond and all of the other wetland sites visited are threatened by development. The NPT used the tours to raise awareness of the importance of the wetlands to birds and people. “Participating in this year’s festival left me with a lot of hope and excitement,” commented Ms. Georges, “I’m already looking forward to celebrating next year.”

The Virgin Islands University went all out with their activities. They organized a new event called “Birding the Best Birds” which encouraged people to go out in the field and observe as many of the birds of the Virgin Islands as they could in a 2-week period. From novice to expert birders, all signed up for the birding "competition" to find the best birds.  All participants received a copy of the new “The Best Birds of the Virgin Islands” photo field guide and checklist, plus instructions about birding etiquette and use of the new Virgin Islands ebird website (www.eBird.org/usvi). Many interesting and beautiful birds were spotted. A compiled checklist was posted on the eBird website news page and entered into the data records. Check it out!

If we talk about “outreach” we must mention Cuba. Congratulations to Antonio Rodríguez and the Cuban team for reaching 10,666 participants this year! These folks went to schools, museums, universities and town plazas to get the message out. Photographs of birds being released and first prize winners of art competitions convey the excitement that was generated by the many activities that were organized. Their hard work will pay off because the next generation in Cuba will be conscious of caged birds and illegal trafficking. Great job!

Another big surprise this year was Jamaica, the Jamaica Environment Trust (JET) hosted the Jamaica Endemic Bird Festival at Emancipation Park as part of the weekend-long activities for the Jamaica Wellfest 2006 (April 28th - 30th). JET mounted displays on Jamaica’s threatened and endemic birds, and organized bird games, story telling and bird art and craft workshops. Four schools performed a song or skit about Jamaican endemic birds, including performances of an original song about Jamaican endemics entitled “True Jamaicans.” Several schools participated in an endemic bird costume competition; many more schools that were not able to attend the festival organized their own CEBF activities. A total of 4,217 people in Jamaica celebrated the festival this year.

A number of new materials were also produced this year for the festival. For example, the Bahamas National Trust published a gorgeous “Birds of the Bahamas” coloring book, complete with natural history information on each bird. Sociedad Ornitológica Hispaniola published an informative brochure about the endangered Ridgeway’s Hawk. The National Trust of the Cayman Islands made a new identification card showing all the landbirds and distributed it to all schoolchildren. Ana Trujillo created an “Endemic Birds of Puerto Rico” Memory Game. A number of children had fun playing the game in an “Endemics World Cup” tournament!

Well, unfortunately there isn’t time and space to describe everyone’s wonderful activities in this short summary; please read the CEBF Full Report 2006 to find out more and get ideas for future festivals. Thanks to all the coordinators for doing such a fantastic job organizing events and also for your reports and photographs. It’s clear that thousands of people enjoyed the festival this past year, thanks to your creativity and hard work.

Download CEBF FULL REPORT 2006

See below - more images from CEBF 2006!

For more information please contact Sheylda Díaz Méndez, CEBF Coordinator, otoarina77@yahoo.com