Buffalo Ornithological Society
Birding Western New York and the Niagara Peninsula of Ontario

Pine Siskin - © Sue Barth

See our CBC webpage for details: Christmas Bird Counts

See our CBC webpage for details: Christmas Bird Counts

See our CBC webpage for details: Christmas Bird Counts

Meet at 7 pm in the Cummings Room at the Buffalo Museum of Science.
Presentation on the WNY Land Conservancy by Andrew Gaerte.

Saving Land to Save the Birds

Come hear Andrew Gaerte, avid birder and BOS member, discuss how the Western New York Land Conservancy is permanently protecting and restoring critical bird habitats across the region. Learn how the Land Conservancy uses science, including the community science work of BOS members, in the preservation of vital migratory stopover sites and nesting areas, and how permanent land protection supports the diverse bird species that call Western New York home. Andrew will also share some exciting news about properties the Land Conservancy community will be protecting in 2025 as well as plans for more accessible birding opportunities in WNY.

UPDATE - This departure is full. If you are interested in this trip, a wait list has been started. Please email me for the itinerary at [email protected].

The bulk of the trip will be spent between two Amazonian lodges situated along the Napo River, which is a tributary of the mighty Amazon. Both Sani Lodge and Napo Wildlife Center (links embedded in the itinerary) have canopy towers which will offer spectacular views of the tree tops and close views of birds that would be very difficult to see from the ground as well as a clay lick where parrots/parakeets/macaws come in the early morning to ingest the clay minerals which help to neutralize toxins found in rainforest fruits and seeds. A recent video taken at Napo of an adult Crested Eagle raiding an Oropendola colony had me quite captivated! Travel to/from these lodges is in motorized boats which will offer views of birds and mammals as we come and go.
There are so many iconic species to be seen such as Blue-and-Yellow-Macaw, Zigzag Heron, Hoatzin, Horned Screamer, Gray-winged Trumpeter, Blue-throated Piping-Guan, Swallow Tanager, Ladder-tailed Nightjar, several of the large Woodpeckers, and Hawk-Eagles among so many, many others! We will take an interior flight from Quito to Coca to start off our Amazon tour. On the return trip, we will drive back towards Quito with stops along the way.
Our guide has also added Bellavista Cloud Forest Lodge which is in the cloudforest belt of the Andes. This will get us into position to see a different suite of birds such as Plushcap, Tanager Finch, White-faced Nunbird and others.

Photo is of male Swallow Tanagers.

The 2025 count period is from Saturday, January 18 through Sunday, January 26. The preferred target date is Sunday, January 19.

Debbie Suggs is the count coordinator. Some sections will need a compiler, and more counters are always welcome. Please contact Debbie via email at [email protected]


Male Harlequin Ducks from the Bird Island Pier by Don Dixon on November 17, 2024.

Meet at 7 pm in the Cummings Room.

Join Alec Humann as he presents a program highlighting the rare and unusual birds that were found throughout the BOS study area in 2024. Come and relive these high points of the past birding year with your friends!

Meet at 7 pm in the Cummings Room. Dr. Silu Wang, Assistant Professor, State University at Buffalo

The temperate and tropical rainforests harbor most of the terrestrial biodiversity globally, yet the origin of rainforest bird species remains elusive. Our work in the Forest Speciation Lab involves bushwhacking in the sword ferns and dancing with mist nets among the palm trees to disentangle the genomic and behavioral basis of species boundaries in temperate and tropical rainforests around of world. Please join me on this "evergreen" time travel. https://www.forestspeciation.online/

UPDATE 7/15 - This trip is now full. Wait list has been started.

UPDATE 7/03 - There are two spaces remaining for this departure.

UPDATE 6/17 - at this time, this trip is tentatively full. I anticipate 1 or 2 cancellations so if you are interested, let me know asap!
UPDATE 6/5/2024
Four spaces have already been spoken for. If this trip interests you, please get in touch with me sooner than later!

I am having Patrick O'Donnell, a great friend and previous BOS member who currently resides in Costa Rica, plan a Relaxed and Easy Tour March 15-24, 2025. This trip will extend 10 days/9 nights and visit such birdy locales such as the Sarapiqui Region, Arenal Observatory Lodge and the Cano Negro Wetlands. Despite the tour being 'relaxed and easy', participants will still come away with hundreds of species of birds! This tour will offer plenty of photo ops as well! Target birds are many. We will make special effort to see both Scarlet and Great Green Macaws, Spectacled, Crested and Black-and-White Owls, Great Curassow, Emerald Toucanet, several Motmots, White Hawk, a slew of tanagers and hummingbirds and so much more! If you are interested, please reach out to Alec for the trip details and itinerary!
[email protected]


Photo is of Great Green Macaws from the Sarapiqui Region.

Randi Minetor, President of the Rochester Birding Association is an author who will be giving a presentation on her book, The Complete Language of Birds

Leader - Matt Nusstein ([email protected]; (716) 446-3376)

Location - Meet at 8am at the Humphrey Nature Center, 6773 Trailside Road, Castile, NY 14427 (see map link above).

This year’s trip overlaps with World Migratory Bird Day! Scenic Letchworth State Park, embracing the Genesee River, boasts incredible numbers of migratory birds in May and June. In addition, more than twenty species of warblers nest in the park annually making for an exciting birding destination. This list includes the local Louisiana Waterthrush as well as gems like Hooded, Blue-winged and Mourning Warblers. Acadian Flycatcher is another local species we hope to cross paths with during our outing. We will be birding along the gorge making various stops with short hikes as we go. The trip could last 5-6 hours and we will have lunch overlooking the river. Carpooling is suggested. Bring a lunch, snacks and beverages.

Black-billed Cuckoo photographed by Scott Diedrich on June 29, 2019 at Letchworth SP.

Meet at 7 pm in the Cummings Room.

UPDATE 12/05/2024 - this departure has two spaces remaining!
The second departure in June/July 2026 is full - tour date not set yet.

June 7-15, 2025
This trip is limited to 6 participants. Our group will travel together by van.

Target birds are MANY, but Montana is a large state! Our tour will cover a wide range of habitats in western MT including spruce forests of the Bitterroot Range, high sagebrush valleys, short grass prairie and pothole wetlands. Yes, Great Gray Owls nest in Montana and that will definitely be a target species - why freeze your tuchus off at Zax-Sim Bog in February?!

Our group will fly in/out of Missoula where we will spend our first three nights. After that we hop around between Dillon, Helena, Harlowton, and Great Falls.

Other birds of interest include but limited to...Dusky Grouse, Black Swift, Long-billed Curlew, Goshawk, Ferruginous Hawk, Williamson's Sapsucker, Lewis's and Three-toed Woodpeckers, Prairie Falcon, Pinyon Jay, Dipper, Sprague's Pipit, several finches, 2 longspurs, Brewer's, Baird’s and Sagebrush Sparrows, MacGillivray's and Townsend's Warblers, Lazuli Bunting and more! Yes, we will also try for Great Gray and Flammulated Owls.

Photo of a Great Gray Owl, Powell, Montana.

The annual BOS picnic meeting will be held at Tifft Nature Preserve on Wednesday, June 12, at 6 PM.

Weather permitting, bring your meal, a folding chair if you like, and meet at the picnic tables outside the Visitor Center.

The gates will be open to drive back to the staff parking area outside the building. Also, the restrooms will be open 6:00 to 6:30.

After our meals, we will hike the preserve until sunset.

Meeting time is 8:00am in the gravel lot off Alleghany Road (Route 77) across from 10271 Alleghany Road.

Leader is Matthew Nusstein - (716) 446 3376; [email protected]

Matt will be leading our group in search of grassland breeding birds at Darien Lake SP in Genesee County. In the fields at this location, we will be looking for Bobolink, Eastern Meadowlark, Eastern Towhee, Field Sparrow and Savannah Sparrow. Eastern Bluebird and Purple Martins also nest within this park. This trip will last approximately 3 hours.

Photo of an Eastern Towhee by Brad Imhoff 4/2021.

UPDATE 7/17/24 - This trip is now full. A wait list has been started.

This trip is still in its fledgling stage of planning. The date span for Joan to guide us is set, which will be Monday, June 30 - Wednesday, July 2, 2025 - which means you would plan on arriving at the ADK Hotel on Sunday afternoon/evening for 4 nights, departing Thursday morning for home. This will give us two days of guided birding with Joan and a built in rain day. If we don't need a rain day, then those who want to check out on Wednesday may do so. As soon as the itinerary and cost become available, I will email it out to the membership.

In the meantime, if you are interested in joining this trip, reach out asap as space will be limited!

I will be hiring Joan Collins as our local guide. Joan is a resident of Long Lake and has THE MOST incredible hearing! Joan is THE GUIDE TO GET for catching up to the 'Holy Trinity' of Adirondack birds - Canada Jay, Black-backed Woodpecker and Boreal Chickadee. In the past she has also tossed birds like Spruce Grouse, White-winged Crossbill and Bicknell's Thrush into the ring! We will certainly make a concerted effort to catch up with all of these specialties and more!

Tour participants will be in charge of driving themselves to the Adirondack Hotel which will be our base of operations, it is about a 5-hour drive from Buffalo. Expect early mornings - especially when we go for Bicknell's Thrush on Whiteface Mountain. We can carpool the days we are birding from the hotel since we will all be staying in the same place. Alec will reserve a block of rooms for the group.

UPDATE 11/26/24 - This departure is full. A wait list has been started.

This trip will be limited to 7 participants, plus myself, and will span 6 full days of birding plus 3 travel days (due to overnight flight and 6-hour time zone difference). We will depart on Sunday, August 31 on an overnight flight to Copenhagen, Denmark; arriving midday Monday, Sept 1. We then fly home on Monday, September 8, 2025. Flights for western Europe depart in the afternoon from the eastern US, fly overnight and arrive at destination the following morning/afternoon.
Our British guide, Stephen, will pick us up from the airport and drive 45 minutes across the Oresund Bridge to the southwestern town of Vellinge, Sweden where we will stay at a free-range, organic farm for our tour.
Falsterbo has a bird observatory where point counts and banding are conducted and our tour will be based nearby. Daily itinerary will be dictated by the weather as this is a migration bottleneck, like legendary Cape May, NJ or Point Pelee, Ontario. This tour will coincide with a wide variety of migrants, and if migration isn't especially active we will head inland to search out forest species such as Black Woodpecker! Target birds will be many including…Eurasian Hobby, Bearded Reedling, Eurasian Curlew and Oystercatcher, Pied Avocet and Lapwing, two species of Harrier, Wagtails, Pipits, Green Woodpecker and so forth and so on! Stay tuned for updates! If you are interested, let me know so that I can add your name to the wait list - [email protected]

Here is the link to the trip report from the September 2024 tour…

https://ebird.org/tripreport/273583


Photo is of the iconic White Stork.

Meet at 7 pm in the Cummings Room.

Our first meeting back after summer break. Members...please bring photos from your summer travels to share with the rest of us. Load your photos onto a thumb drive and bring with you.

Also looking to sign members up for the October bird count; whether as compilers or volunteers within the sections. Please help us improve our coverage from last year.

Meet at 7 pm in the Cummings Room.

Meet at 7 pm in the Cummings Room.

Annual Holiday Celebration at 7:00 PM in the Cummings Room of the Buffalo Museum of Science.

Please bring a treat to share and enjoy an evening of birding friendship.

UPDATE - this departure is already filled. If you are interested in this trip, please reach out as I can add a 2nd departure if enough interest warrants. The 2nd departure would run Sunday, February 8 - Saturday, February 20, 2026.

Tour 1 will run Sunday, January 25 - Friday, February 6, 2026.
This tour will span a full 12 days on the famous and well-travelled northern Colombia birding route including Barranquilla, the Santa Marta Mountains, the ProAves Preserves of El Dorado and Perija, the flamingo sanctuary at Camarones and more! The Santa Martas host a bevy of endemic species including Blossomcrown and Woodstar hummingbirds, an antpitta, a brush finch, the endangered Santa Marta Parakeet and more. We will not only be looking for the endemics but for other species such as Scarlet Ibis, Vermillion Cardinal, Northern Screamer, Wattled Jacana, Dwarf Cuckoo, Russet-throated Puffbird, White-tipped Quetzal, Blue-naped Chlorophonia, Golden-breasted Fruiteater and so many more jewels!
I have a Colombian guide that will make all of the tour arrangements and travel with us to show off the wonders of Colombia! The itinerary will be finished soon and sent to those that are booked on the first departure. If you are interested in the 2nd departure, let me know and I will get an itinerary to you when it becomes available!

Photo is of the endangered Santa Marta Parakeet.

UPDATE 12/13/2024 - This departure is now full. A waitlist has been started.

Stay tuned for details on this trip. We will be joining Audubon of Kansas during their spring Prairie-Chicken festival. This festival offers field trips, a keynote speaker and evening socials. This trip will run for about a week…from Tuesday, April 7 to Tuesday, April 14, 2026.

***I do not have the exact date of this festival at this time, so it could run the following week (April 14-21, 2026). Please keep both weeks open until further notice if you plan to join this trip.

Pre-dawn field trips will offer views of Greater and Lesser Prairie-Chickens as the males gather to dance on their leks to impress the girls. Other field trips offered during the weekend will include the famous Cheyenne Bottoms and Quivira NWR. Species we hope to see at these locations include Franklin’s Gull, Cinnamon Teal, Baird’s Sandpiper, Snowy Plover, and Yellow-headed Blackbird. My scouting trip in April 2023 yielded a flock of 6 Whooping Cranes!
Additional trips to Smoky Valley Ranch and Little Jerusalem Badlands will offer opportunities to see Ferruginous Hawk, Say’s Phoebe, Rock Wren, and Harris’s Sparrow.
As with any BOS Travel Trip, please email Alec at [email protected] if you are interested to get on the participant list!

This tour does not yet have dates set. I am currently aiming to run this tour late June into early July. Whatever the dates, this departure is full. A wait list has been started.

Target birds are MANY, but Montana is a large state! Our tour will cover a wide range of habitats in western MT including spruce forests of the Bitterroot Range, high sagebrush valleys, short grass prairie and pothole wetlands. Yes, Great Gray Owls nest in Montana and that will definitely be a target species - why freeze your tuchus off at Zax-Sim Bog in February?!

Our group will fly in/out of Missoula where we will spend our first three nights. After that we hop around between Dillon, Helena, Harlowton, and Great Falls.

Other birds of interest include but limited to...Dusky Grouse, Black Swift, Long-billed Curlew, Goshawk, Ferruginous Hawk, Williamson's Sapsucker, Lewis's and Three-toed Woodpeckers, Prairie Falcon, Pinyon Jay, Dipper, Sprague's Pipit, several finches, 2 longspurs, Brewer's, Baird’s and Sagebrush Sparrows, MacGillivray's and Townsend's Warblers, Lazuli Bunting and more! Yes, we will also try for Great Gray and Flammulated Owls.

Photo is of a Flammulated Owl.

This trip will be limited to 7 participants, plus myself, and will span 6 full days of birding plus 2 1/2 travel days (due to overnight flight and 6-hour time zone difference).
We will depart on Friday, August 28 on an overnight flight to Copenhagen, Denmark; arriving midday Saturday, August 29. We fly home on Saturday, September 5, 2026. Flights for western Europe depart in the afternoon from the eastern US, fly overnight and arrive at destination the following morning/afternoon.
Our British guide, Stephen Menzie, will pick us up from the Copenhagen airport and drive 45 minutes across the Oresund Bridge to the town of Vellinge, Sweden where we will stay at a working organic farm for our tour.
Falsterbo has a bird observatory where point counts and banding are conducted and our tour will be based nearby. Daily itinerary will be dictated by the weather as this is a migration bottleneck, like legendary Cape May, NJ or Point Pelee, Ontario. This tour will coincide with a wide variety of migrants, and if migration isn't especially active we will head inland to search out forest species such as Black Woodpecker! Target birds will be many including…Eurasian Hobby, Bearded Reedling, Eurasian Curlew and Oystercatcher, Pied Avocet and Lapwing, there species of Harrier, Wagtails, Pipits, both Green and Black Woodpeckers and so forth and so on! Stay tuned for updates! If you are interested, let me know so that I can add your name to the participant list - [email protected]

Here is the link to the trip report from the September 2024 tour…

https://ebird.org/tripreport/273583


Photo is of a Bearded Reedling taken by Tim Schadel on our September 2024 tour.

UPDATE 11/26/24…Speaking with Brent to set up a second departure that will begin on February 4, 2027 and extend two weeks. It will be likely that I would have Group 2 arrive on Wednesday, February 3 with the tour beginning the next day.

UPDATE 8/7/24…this trip is now full at 8 participants. A waiting list has been started.

Well, I never thought I would be even considering a birding trip to New Zealand, BUT HERE WE ARE! This is an incredible opportunity to bird New Zealand with one of her native sons and past BOS member, Brent Stephenson! Brent lived in the Buffalo area for a few years before moving to Vermont with his wife, Lisa.
This trip is a ways out and Brent and I are still figuring out the logistics but the 2-week itinerary will embark on or around January 18, 2027. The group will plan to arrive a day before the tour begins (Jan 17) to give us a day to adjust to the loooong travel day and time zone difference! This trip will be limited to 8 participants and the land-based portion of the trip will cost about $6500 (this includes all lodging/meals/guiding/travel within country/multiple pelagics/ferry rides) plus your airfare. It is a trip worth saving for and you have a good two years to do so!
Details and itinerary will be added here over the next few months…
In the meantime, if you are considering this trip, you may want to order Brent’s book “Birds of New Zealand: A Photographic Guide” by Scofield and Stephenson. I just ordered mine off of Amazon! You have 2.5 years to study….GO!

Photo is of an endemic parrot, the Kea.

Well, I never thought I would be even considering a birding trip to New Zealand, BUT HERE WE ARE! This is an incredible opportunity to bird New Zealand with one of her native sons and past BOS member, Brent Stephenson! Brent lived in the Buffalo area for a few years before moving to Vermont with his wife, Lisa.
This trip is a ways out and Brent and I are still figuring out the logistics but the 2-week itinerary will embark on February 5, 2027. The group will plan to arrive a day before the tour begins (February 4) to give us a day to adjust to the loooong travel day and time zone difference! This trip will be limited to 8 participants and the land-based portion of the trip will cost about $6500 (this includes all lodging/meals/guiding/travel within country/multiple pelagics/ferry rides) plus your airfare. It is a trip worth saving for and you have a good two years to do so!
Details and itinerary will be added here over the next few months…
In the meantime, if you are considering this trip, you may want to order Brent’s book “Birds of New Zealand: A Photographic Guide” by Scofield and Stephenson. I just ordered mine off of Amazon! You have 2.5 years to study….GO!

Photo of Yellow-eyed Penguins, Katiki Point, South Island by Brendan Tucker 11/2024.