May 25, 2023 – It was a beautiful day for the inaugural bird walk with Drew Monkman (we hope there will be more!) Despite the light frost and chilly temperatures at 7:00 am, the group of 10 participants were enthusiastic, the birds were active and with Drew Monkman’s knowledgeable guiding, 22 species were observed and logged on e-bird – See them all here: https://ebird.org/hotspot/L1498285
Hosted by Ashburnham Memorial Stewardship Group, supported by a City of Peterborough Community Grant, and guided by Drew Monkman, the beautiful 2 hour walk was a lot of fun, with casual lessons in Ornithology, Geology, WW1- WW2- era local history and Botany. We even had a draw prize! It was a pleasure learning from Drew and we are grateful that he made himself available on this beautiful morning.
It is always a pleasure to spend quiet time in this unique urban park observing many of the migrating birds. This is one of the many reasons that Ashburnham Memorial Stewardship Group is working to increase local awareness and responsibility for this space. We hope to continue to offer events like the bird walk, to provide educational interpretation of the park and its species, opportunities to connect with the landscape and ways of spending leisure time with other members of our community.
As mentioned before, anyone can add observations to the Ashburnham Memorial Park project on iNaturalist: https://www.inaturalist.org/…/ashburnham-memorial-park...
When you add to our project, the data is also automatically displayed on our website (thanks to the most recent project completed for AMSG by Trent University Computer Science students). Check it out: https://ashburnhamstewardship.com/species_inventory.php