Space Coast Birding & Wildlife Festival November 7-11, 2001 in Brevard County, Florida A celebration of birds and wildlife.

PORT CANAVERAL PARTICIPATES IN WILDLIFE FESTIVAL

Birders anxiously await getting under way for their search of pelagic birds offshore, while a brown pelican watches the birders

With hundreds of wildlife species and the habitat for many migratory birds, Brevard County, Florida was the perfect location for the Fourth Annual Space Coast Birding and Wildlife Festival. The festival included bird watchers (called "birders") from across the nation, Canada, and Europe who participated in seminars, field trips, workshops, environmental and eco-oriented exhibits, art competition, and a world-class birding competition.

More than 2 million people travel to or within Florida each year to watch birds and other wildlife, according to a Florida Department of Transportation and Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWCC) study. In total, they spent more than $1.5 billion on recreational activities. Birders sighted 199 different bird species in Brevard County during this year's festival.

According to Laurilee Thompson, who began the Space Coast festival four years ago with the Brevard Nature Alliance, avid birders traveled hundreds of miles recently to see a rare bird that was spotted by a birder in the Port's Central Turning Basin.

Offshore trip most popular of festival field trips

A new field trip this year included offshore trips aboard the Ocean Obsession out of Sunrise Marina, located in Port Canaveral, where enthusiasts paid $70 each to spend the day searching for pelagic birds, which seldom are seen near land. Many of the birders on the pelagic trip spotted and confirmed seven birds they had not seen in their birding experience. One extremely rare sighting was a Sabine's Gull, a species that normally migrate between the Arctic and the U.S. Pacific Coast. Of the many field trips offered, this one proved to be the most popular.

Two Port parks included on The Great Florida Birding Trail

Canaveral Port Authority Commissioner Ray Sharkey admires an osprey displayed at the birding festival by wood carver Chou Pham.

This year the festival was host to the grand opening of the East Coast section of The Great Florida Birding Trail. The program is sponsored by the FWCC and supported in part by the Florida Department of Transportation and the Wildlife Foundation of Florida. According to the FWCC, The Great Florida Birding Trail will be made up of four sections throughout the state and encompass more than 2000 miles of existing highways. Signs to be installed along highways and a detailed map will direct birding enthusiasts to between 600 and 800 birding sites. This statewide trail is scheduled for completion by 2006. Brevard County will have 26 designated sites on the trail.

Two areas within Port Canaveral were chosen to become part of The Great Florida Birding Trail. The two sites are Jetty Park and Ports End Park/Canaveral Lock area. Canaveral Lock is habitat for many species and is a favorite feeding ground for migratory white pelicans during the winter. Information and directions to all the Brevard County sites were included in a full-color map handed out at the Birding Trail groundbreaking celebration at Titusville's Sand Point Park.

Photo left top: A Sabine's Gull spotted during the offshore trip, a rare sighting off Florida's East Coast, was captured on film by national wildlife photographer Ed King
Click on the photos on the left to view an enlargement.

For additional information about The Great Florida Birding Trail, visit the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission website at www.floridabirdingtrail.com or contact Julie Brashears, Birding Trail Coordinator, at 850-922-0664. Her email address is: brashej@gfc.state.fl.us

Port Canaveral - November/December 2000; Vol. 18, No. 6; pg 12-13
Canaveral Port Authority
Public Relations Department
Publications Division
P.O. Box 267, Cape Canaveral, FL 32920

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