NAOC Symposium "Island Treasures: Lessons Learned from 30 Years of Avian Research, Education, and Conservation” Session 2, Talk 6, plus Q&A for the session.

Raising Awareness and Building Capacity for Conservation of Birds in Puerto Rico: The Puerto Rican Ornithological Society

Gabriel Lugo, Nathaniel Gonzalez, Luis Ramos, Lisandra Izaskun

Puerto Rico has a rich diversity of birds, including 17 endemics, and dozens of neotropical migrants. It has been seriously challenged over the years with both natural and man-made disasters. Despite these challenges, since 1995 the Puerto Rican Ornithological Society (SOPI) has done an outstanding job sharing knowledge, raising awareness, and promoting the conservation of the birds in Puerto Rico and surrounding islands. We began with a small group of volunteers, mostly biologists. But over time, our membership has grown and become more diverse, bringing new ideas and people. SOPI identified a need to create regular training workshops that helped integrate our members into bird monitoring and research. Since 2000 50 workshops have been given on the identification of shorebirds, warblers, waterbirds and terns. In 2017, we established our annual Shorebirds Festival with average attendance of more than 600 persons. In February 2019 SOPI collaborated with BirdsCaribbean to host a week-long international shorebird training workshop in Cabo Rojo, a WHSRN site. Every year SOPI is an active participant in the Caribbean Endemic Bird Festival and World Migratory Bird Day, delivering activities in schools, shopping centers, universities and TV, that reach thousands of children and adults. Agreements with BirdLife International, the National Wildlife Federation, BirdsCaribbean and local organizations such as Para La Naturaleza, together with whom we manage the Puerto Rico eBird.org platform, allowed for studies such as Important Bird Areas (IBA), Limicola Network, Caribbean Waterbirds Census, and assessing the impacts of Hurricanes Irma and Maria in 2017 on our birds.

свернуть