Celebrate our winged friends through a day-long showcase featuring bird poetry, bird stories, bird art, bird sounds, and bird science with presentations from local writers, artists, naturalists and bird enthusiasts. Produced and hosted by Pamela Michael, Co-Founder and former Executive Director of River of Words — Children’s’ Environmental Art & Poetry* competition and Communications Director for the California Institute for Community, Art & Nature.
Event is Live and runs continuously from 12 – 5 PM.
Drop in for 15 minutes or stay for the whole afternoon! We will have 40-50 socially distanced seats available in the Brower Center’s lovely second-floor Tamalpais Room. If Winged Wonderment’s seating is full when you arrive, seats are likely to open up soon. Check in at with the Winged Wonderment welcome table just outside the entrance to the Tamalpais Room for more information.
Location: David Brower Center, 2nd Floor Tamalpais Room, 2150 Allston Way Berkeley, California 94704
Registration is not required (First come, first served)
Elizabeth Dougherty
Clean Water for Birds
Waterbirds or no, birds need clean water where they live and as they migrate. Humans, especially
those in urban areas like the SF East Bay, can have a direct impact on the water we make available to
the birds. Join Dr. Elizabeth Dougherty in learning about pollutants moving through urban spaces
and how to better protect the health of birds.
Elizabeth Dougherty
Elizabeth is the director of Wholly H2O, an Oakland-based nonprofit providing education on watershed health via water conservation and water reuse. She completed her PhD in anthropology of natural resources at the University of Pennsylvania in 2003. Previously, Elizabeth worked as a project manager for commercial, industrial and institutional energy efficiency for the Flex Your Power, the state of California’s energy efficiency campaign.
Judith Vaughn
From Caged Birds to Birds on the Wing—A Poets Evolution
Sonoma poet Judith Vaughn will read poems about birds and her evolving relationship with them. Her family had birds, parakeets, always with clipped wings, in cages. They were her friends, often nestling in her hair. Much later came her awareness of wild birds—the beautiful flying beings in their own world, no cages, no prisons, just blue sky, wind and storm and sun. Poetry followed, just as hummingbirds follow her on her daily walks.
Judith Vaughn lives in Sonoma, California with Tim, her husband, and Louie, their Catahoula puppy. She is a member of Poetic License Sonoma (PoeticLicenseSonoma.com); California Writers Club, Redwood Writers Branch; Sebastopol Center for the Arts Writers Salon; and Blue Moon Poetry Collective. Her work has been widely published in numerous anthologies, including Switching to ON, Train River Anthology, Kinds of Cool: A Collection of Jazz Poetry, and Moonlight & Reflections.
Mark Rauzon
Life in the Fast Lane: A Cormorant Success Story
Mark Rauzon, seabird biologist and Laney College geography professor, will discuss his advocacy and design for the stainless steel cormorant nesting platforms—dubbed “Corm Condos”—installed beneath the Bay Bridge’s new east span and the challenge of meeting the birds’ needs and navigating the complex regulatory, engineering, and public opinion landscape.
Mark Rauzon is a geography professor at Laney College, Oakland, and wildlife biologist specializing in seabird conservation via vertebrate predator control and artificial habitat creation. He’s also Vice-Chair for Conservation of the Pacific Seabird Group and a founding member of the Friends of Sausal Creek who has created riparian habitat in an urban setting. He is a bird photographer and writer, whose book Isles of Amnesia, published in 2017 by University of Hawai’i Press, is about island conservation in the American tropical Pacific. Mark works closely with Point Blue on San Francisco Bay cormorant issues.
Aaron N.K. Haiman
Complexity and Connections in the California Delta
Aaron N.K. Haiman will discuss his new book, Birds of the California Delta, which focuses on the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, a place where rivers meet one another, where freshwater meets salt water, where fish link inland forests with the open ocean, where birds from the north come for the winter, and where birds from the south come to breed.
Aaron N.K. Haiman
Aaron N.K. Haiman volunteered from a young age with bird research organizations before receiving a BS in Environmental Science from UC Berkeley as well as MS degrees in Avian Science and Animal Behavior from UC Davis. Aaron guides bird walks, mentors high school students in ecology and sustainability, leads a youth bird-a-thon team, and gives presentations on birds and habitat restoration. He works for the State of California and lives in West Sacramento.
Lucille Lang Day
West Coast Birds in Poetry
From her books Birds of San Pancho, Infinities, and The Curvature of Blue, Lucille Lang Day will read poems about the birds of Mexico and Costa Rica, where she has traveled, and California, where she has always lived. She will give free copies of Infinities and The Curvature of Blue to attendees.
Lucille Lang Day is the author of four poetry chapbooks and seven full-length collections, most recently Birds of San Pancho and Becoming an Ancestor. The Cosmos and Me: New and Selected Poems, 1975-2025 will be published by Trio House Press in 2026. She has also edited three poetry anthologies and published two children’s books and a memoir. Her poems have appeared in more than 200 magazines and anthologies, and her many honors include the Blue Light Poetry Prize, two PEN Oakland – Josephine Miles Literary Awards, the Joseph Henry Jackson Award, and eleven Pushcart Prize nominations. She runs a small press, Scarlet Tanager Books.
Chris Olander
Birds of a Feather
Poet and bio-educator Chris Olander will discuss how birds have contributed to human behaviors and nourishment from the beginning of human existence. Chris blends performance techniques with the spoken word, creating poetry in the oral and bardic traditions. He has been a poet-teacher with California Poets in the Schools since 1984.
J.C. (Chris) Olander is a poet/teacher with California Poets in the Schools since 1984, is an innovator of spoken word poetry arising from land-based ethics rooted in science, observation, and reflection. He has published numerous CDs and chapbooks and two poetry books, River Light (Poetic Matrix Press) and Twilight Roses (R. L. Crow Press).
Kirk Lumpkin
Meet Two Corvid Rappers
Poet and performance artist Kirk Lumpkin will perform two bird raps in costume, one from the perspective of a Steller’s Jay (MC Stellar Jay) and one from the perspective of a Scrub Jay (MC Brilliant Blue).
Kirk Lumpkin is a poet, spoken word & performance artist, lyricist, environmentalist activist, and California state certified Naturalist; author of the poetry books, In Deep and Co-Hearing, and three poetry/music CDs, The Word-Music Continuum, Sound Poems, and the recently released Wild Flowers of Collaboration. Kirk worked for the Ecology Center & the Berkeley Farmers’ Markets for more than 20 years and has co-produced the Watershed Environmental Poetry Festival for more than 25 years.
Aleta George
A Golden Rookery: The 19th Century Egg Wars at Farallon Islands
Before the Petaluma chicken industry hatched in the 1880s, San Franciscans whipped up Hangtown fries and fresh noodles with murre eggs plucked from precipitous cliffs on Farallon Islands. Journalist and author Aleta George will tell the story of how the fight for common murre eggs in the 19th century led to an egg war that culminated with a shootout and murder.
Aleta George is a journalist and author Aleta George writes about the nature, history, and culture of California. The author of the award-winning biography, Ina Coolbrith: The Bittersweet Song of California’s First Poet Laureate, Aleta is currently writing a biography about Jack London and his lifelong relationship with San Francisco Bay.
Larissa Babicz
When Art and Science Meet: The Birds of Palomarin
In 2023, artist and bird bander Larissa Babicz completed a colorful drawing called The Birds of Palomarin, which includes all 78 species she observed while doing research at Point Blue’s Palomarin Field Station. In her presentation, Larissa will share some of the stories hidden in the intricate artwork and will also describe how this drawing became a turning point in her life—a moment that showed her how art and science can work together.
Larissa Babicz is an artist and biologist who grew up in eastern Pennsylvania and was first introduced to birding in middle school. This hobby grew into a passion for wildlife and the outdoors. She earned a Bachelor’s degree in biology from Dickinson College in 2020 and has subsequently held several seasonal field biology positions, primarily concentrating on birds. In 2022 Larissa became a bird banding apprentice at Point Blue’s Palomarin Field Station, where she now works full-time as a banding supervisor.
Mark Brunst
Wings Over the Bay and Mesa
Mark Brunst, poet, designer, and photographer, reads poems inspired by birds from the San Francisco Bay Area and the Southern Rocky Mountains. His presentation includes original photography and sound recordings of birds from our foggy coast, as well as the Colorado high mesa.
Mark Brunst
Mark Brunst was born in England of Cornish stock. He studied poetry at Stanford University with Diane Middlebrook, Donald Davie, and John Felstiner. He has translated verse from French and Spanish, including the whole of Federico Garcia Lorca’s last collection. After a 40-year detour into graphic design, fine printing, and letterpress, Mark rejoined his true love, poetry, and is currently enrolled in the MFA in Creative Writing program at Pacific University. He is also on the Board of Directors of California Poets in the Schools. Mark splits his time between San Francisco and West Sonoma County.
Wendy Blakeley
An African Aviary
Living adjacent to Hwange National Park in northwest Zimbabwe for over 10 years, Wendy Blakeley became an accidental—ultimately avid—bird watcher. Ornithology guides indicate that there are over 400 species in the park and surrounding areas. Her camera was always on hand during weekly game drives, and she’ll be sharing her glorious gallery of bird photos.
Following her own drum all her life, Wendy Blakeley has had an eclectic chain of jobs and titles. Actress, mother, teacher, camper, photographer, to say nothing of trapeze dance instructor and performer. Wendy was one of the first people onstage at Woodstock as a member of Earthlight Theater. A longtime resident in the East Bay, she moved to Sonoma County recently.
Craig Nikitas of Bay Raptor Rescue
Keep ‘Em Flying: Helping Raptors Survive in the Human Environment
Bay Raptor Rescue founder Craig Nikitas discusses what raptors are, how they get in trouble, and how we help them. We think you will enjoy this insider’s look at a very specialized and compelling niche in Wildlife work.
Craig Nikitas, a retired urban planner, has been a wildlife volunteer working with raptors for over
fifty years. His career has included caring for captive animals at the Randall Museum, Steinhart
Aquarium, and the San Francisco Zoo, tending birds in rehab at WildCare, and trapping and banding
migratory and dispersive birds of prey for 30 years with the Golden Gate Raptor Observatory. In
2015 Craig founded Bay Raptor Rescue to provide a free service to aid predatory birds in distress.
Jeffrey Peterson and Jos Sances
Wings in the Whale
Master-printer Jos Sances and bird-photographer Jeff Peterson will share their collaborative work as bird artists, focusing on the ways birdlife animates Sances’s magnificent 51-foot scratchboard mural, Or, The Whale, a work of sweeping cultural-historical reference and ecological urgency. A half-size vinyl print of the mural will be on display, and attendees will be invited to practice their birding skills by locating and identifying the birds in the mural’s rich visual landscape.
Recently retired, Jeffrey Peterson taught at The College Preparatory School in Oakland for many years, offering a range of courses channeling his love of language and the natural world: a Moby-Dick seminar called “Deadliest Catches,” a river course called “What the River Knew,” and a survey of avian literature called “Life of the Skies.” He is the author of Or, The Whale by Jos Sances: Ark of the Anthropocene (Johns Hopkins University Press).
Jos Sances has made his living as a printmaker and muralist for more than 45 years in the San Francisco Bay Area. He founded Alliance Graphics, a successful union screenprint shop, and earlier co-founded Mission Gráfica at the Mission Cultural Center. The Library of Congress acquired 495 of his prints that represent this output. He has shown artwork in at the Museum of Modern Art in NYC and at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Jos is a founding member of the Great Tortilla Conspiracy.