And now I want to help save them.

According to the National Audubon Society, two-thirds of North American birds face the threat of extinction due to a warming climate. In the Fall of 2021, I participated in Zea Mays Printmaking’s “Canary in the Coal Mine” project to help raise awareness about this crisis. Each participant selected a bird from Audubon’s list of 389 bird species under threat of extinction, created and donated five prints for this cause. I selected the Cerulean Warbler. For months, I loved sketching this bird and creating a drypoint print. This is the beginning of a life-long passion.

I lost my job at the start of the pandemic. For the first week, I did not want to wake up. Yet, I was kept awake by a backyard bird singing his heart out every morning. He convinced me to get up and keep living. I vowed to find out who this bird was that I had heard every April and wondered about. (It was a Black-Capped Chickadee). Since then, I have been on many walks, exploring and observing birds, learning as much as I can about them.

In March 2021, I observed Spring migration murmurations for the first time. Each year, migrating birds have to stop when they reach Lake Erie, before moving west and flying around the lake. It is a massive “traffic jam” of birds. I am unable to find the right words to describe the experience of witnessing this firsthand. Clouds of birds, swirling and forming patterns in the sky. It felt like a “conversion” - a spiritual conversion. I went every night for five nights straight, to Huron Pier in Huron, Ohio. Since then, I have made many drawings and have paintings and prints in progress. This Spring was colder, diluting the numbers of birds on a given night. Still, I did get to see a few gatherings in Lorain, near the Lighthouse.