The History of BCN
Join Us in Celebrating 30 Years of Conservation for Birds
Thirty Years of History, Passion, and Collaboration
Founded in 1996, the Bird Conservation Network has been active in Chicagoland bird conservation for almost three decades. Read below to learn more about the Early History of BCN compiled by Libby Hill.
The Initial Formation of the Bird Conservation Network
The Driving Force Behind Our Formation
In the years before BCN’s formation in late 1996, a group of COS birders would visit Cherry Hill in Palos, a Cook County Forest Preserve site, every year during nesting season. Craig Thayer reports: “My wife (Barb) and I performed nesting bird censuses at Cherry Hill Woods for several years in the 1980s. Blue-winged Warblers were abundant (if my memory is correct, we sometimes tallied as many as 15 birds) and it was also a reliable location for Yellow-breasted Chats. Sometimes there were also Alder Flycatchers at Cherry Hill.”
The shrubby habitat that harbored the birds was a short hike from the parking lot. On their visit in 1996, however, the group was astonished to see no blue Blue-winged Warblers or Yellow-breasted Chats, though there were birds. The staff of the Cook County Forest Preserves had removed the invasive buckthorn. According to Sue Friscia, who was part of the COS group, “the buckthorn kept coming back, but the birds never did.” FPDCC staff felt that the birds were still nesting in the Palos area where there was plenty of buckthorn; they would just be harder to find.
Birding groups had long been interested in conservation. Monitoring and keeping records were standard. The idea of birding groups working together had already been raised. In this author’s memory, this event at Cherry Hill was one of many triggers that created BCN. Once birding groups started expressing doubts about local restorations, they found many who shared their concerns.
How Our Organization Became a Reality
It didn’t take long before groups were meeting in Fall, 1996 to form BCN. In the May/June 1997 issue of Warblings, the newsletter of the Chicago Ornithological Society (COS), editor Christine Williamson, in her column “From the Editor,” described her excitement about “the formation of a new coalition of bird clubs, dedicated to the welfare of birds. A loose group of representatives from most of the Chicago area bird clubs has been meeting for more than six months now and finally has a formal name – the Bird Conservation Network of Chicago…. Going forward, the group will broaden its focus to create ways that birders can help with the information gathering about birds necessary to know what can best save them.“ In other words, data collection would continue to be at the core of saving birds. The input of birders would become essential to decisions made by land managers. Chris continues in From the Editor, “the formation of the Bird Conservation Network is the single most important event in Chicago birding since COS was founded early in the century!”
As Judy Pollock put it, “I would say we started because birders had many questions about how restoration was impacting birds and we felt we needed to find answers…. We wanted a strong birders’ voice to weigh in on how habitat restoration was affecting birds and to inspire more restoration that would benefit birds.”
Early History of BCN
The First Years of Our Organization
Judy Pollock was the first president, and Bob Fisher followed her.
Early meetings included continual discussions of the bylaws for this new nonprofit organization. Terry Schilling recalls, “I believe you are right in that I mostly "wrote" the bylaws. I was able to search online for what other organizations were using. The BCN bylaws were an amalgamation of two or three of those that I found, with modifications. …. I do remember Chris telling us that Geoff [Williamson] was instrumental in writing another organization’s bylaws, and that he had a good handle on Robert's Rules.” Geoff remembers contributing ideas for a decision-making structure that differed from the consensus-based approach that was finally adopted.
Four BCN committees were listed on an early memo (no date.): Monitoring, Liaison, Cook County Breeding Bird Survey and Conferences.
At the time of that memo, Member organizations were Chicago Audubon Society, Chicago Ornithological Society, Chicagoland Bird Observatory, DuPage Birding Club, Evanston North Shore Bird Club, Fort Dearborn Audubon Society, Illinois Ornithological Society, Prairie Woods Audubon Society, The Nature Conservancy Bird Committee, Thorn Creek Audubon Society, and Terry Schilling was an at large member. Contact people were: Jerry Garden and Judy Pollock, CAS, Lee Ramsey and Terry Schilling, at-large members, Jim Landing, Fort Dearborn Audubon, Christine Williamson, COS and Noel Zak, DuPage Birding Club.
Original BCN Committees
Below is a summary of the early work of BCN, organized in sections reflecting each of the four initial committees, with the exception that the Monitoring and Breeding Bird Survey sections are combined.
Monitoring
Bird Monitoring before BCN
Before BCN, birders had been keeping track of breeding birds. According to Alan Anderson: “The Illinois Breeding Bird Atlas (IBBA), started, organized and compiled by Vern Kleen, Avian Ecologist of the Illinois Department of Conservation (later renamed the Illinois Department of Natural Resources), had many volunteers in the state collect information on what birds nested in the state, and where. Many birders and bird organizations, especially Illinois and National Audubon chapters, as well as local groups such as ENSBC, IOS and COS took part. Each county had their own local coordinator, and Alan Anderson was the one for Cook County.
The IBBA ran 6 years, from 1986 to 1991, and the information was finally published in 2004 by the Illinois Natural History Survey. In Cook County, we also did a 'pre-Atlas survey', in 1985, as a kind of test, although this information was not included in the final IBBA book.
Since Illinois birders were familiar with bird counts, such as the Illinois Spring Bird Count, and the many Christmas Bird Counts, Alan Anderson started a new June Bird Count - the Cook County Nesting Season Bird Census (CCNSBC) - in 1985. This was to get more birders involved in collecting data on numbers of nesting season birds in the county. The CCNSBC was continued through 1997, when the BCN survey was getting established and would concentrate also on confirming birds’ presence in individual areas during nesting season. Rather than just counting birds at a given site, it would concentrate on point-counts.
Around 1998, Jerry Sullivan, who was then working for the Cook County Forest Preserve District, Audubon of the Chicago Region and BCN wanted to get more precise information on nesting birds at particular areas by using point-counts. Then Jerry, ACR, BCN and others came up with a more standardized program for bird monitoring. Using point-counts could be more replicable over the years and provide more comparable data.”
Early BCN monitoring:
On December 6, 1997, BCN sponsored a lunchtime meeting for people interested in bird monitoring. The agenda was:
- Update on bird monitoring activities, with Alan Anderson providing “the past” and Judy Pollock speaking about “the future.”
- How we can work with VSN (The Nature Conservancy’s Volunteer Stewardship Network) and we need to work Chicago Wilderness in too,
- Solicit ideas for activities from the group (there was a backup list of ideas in case no one suggested any)
- Send around signup lists to volunteer for projects discussed and to be on the mailing list.
At the time of the meeting, 86 people had signed up, and about 100 people showed up.
Following this meeting, another meeting was held with land managers from several counties, to get input about what they would find valuable from monitoring.
To tie the monitoring story together, because monitoring is so important to today’s BCN, the following “A Brief History of the BCN Survey,” and the monitoring portion of the minutes of the October 20, 2001 meeting are included, taken from the BCN website:
A Brief History of the BCN Survey
Bird Monitoring initiatives by community scientists have been active in the Chicago region since at least the 1980s. In the past, a lack of standardized protocols and the daunting task of entering reams of data into digitized files meant that much of the information amassed over the past years remained inaccessible and difficult to analyze.
Standardized protocol for bird monitoring was implemented in a 1998 effort - spearheaded by Judy Pollock, Alan Anderson, Terry Schilling, Lee Ramsey, and Elizabeth Sanders of the Bird Conservation Network (BCN), with major participation from a group of dedicated birders, scientists, land managers and conservationists including Jerry Garden (Chicago Audubon Society), Jerry Sullivan (Cook County Forest Preserve District), Doug Stotz (Field Museum), Stephen Packard (Audubon - Chicago Region) and Dan Niven (Illinois Natural History Survey). This effort transformed monitoring practices and resolved central difficulties.
Web publication and quick analysis of this data became a reality in 2001 when Cornell Lab of Ornithology's BirdSource teamed up with BCN and the Field Museum to unveil a new website. This site came about thanks to the efforts of Debby Moskovits and Doug Stotz (Field Museum), Terry Schilling, Lee Ramsey, Alan Anderson and Suzanne Checchia (BCN volunteers), Steve Kelling and Michael Brutvan (Cornell Lab of Ornithology) and Judy Pollock, Rickie White and Steve Frankel (Audubon-Chicago Region).
Joining eBird in 2003, the database moved to a special BCN version of the eBird website, a nationwide site for data entry managed by Cornell Lab of Ornithology & Audubon. This move provided easier access to data for research purposes and casual observations, and also allowed monitors to easily enter their sightings at any of the predefined birding hotspots in the Chicagoland area.
Update From the BCN Minutes of October 20, 2001
"PROJECTS/INITIATIVES - Monitoring: Judy reported that she has been working with Terry Schilling and Lee Ramsey on switching the monitoring database over to BirdSource at Cornell. The next step is to get new instructions up on the Field Museum site. Mary Cannon is working on a press release. Luke Harding and Jeanette Bider have volunteered to join the Monitoring Committee. The major need is money to convert the existing data in the Field database to Oracle. The CD with songs and calls of Chicago area breeding birds has been distributed to monitors. BCN Survey workshops will be held again in March. The county coordinators will meet in November. Steve Bailey is giving a talk about breeding birds on January 19 at Brookfield Zoo. This is the day of the next BCN general meeting. We’ll try to schedule our meeting there so that all who wish can attend Steve’s talk."
Liaison Committee
Two pieces of correspondence were available from Judy Pollock for this article: Bartel Grasslands and Glenview Naval Air Station.
Glenview Naval Air Station:
On August 20, 1997, Judy Pollock sent a letter to Glenview on behalf of BCN urging the protection of the Glenview Naval Air Station habitat and listing the grassland birds breeding there. The letter specifically mentions Upland Sandpiper, Sedge Wren, Bobolink, Dickcissel and Grasshopper Sparrow, as well as the Short-eared Owl that winters there.
Bartel and Orland Park Grasslands:
On September 17, 1999, Judy Pollock and Marianne Hahn wrote a letter to Joseph Nevius, at the Forest Preserve District of Cook County, congratulating the FPD on “another successful season for breeding birds at the Bartel grasslands: Bobolink, Henslow’s sparrows, meadowlarks, sedge wrens and grasshopper sparrows. The letter explains that “under the auspices of BCN and the Friends of the Forest Preserves Bird Conservation Campaign toured the grasslands and developed a set of recommendations to maintain the usefulness of Bartel grasslands for grassland birds. Jim Herkert contributed to the plan, which was based on his research. A field meeting was held with Chris Merenowicz of the FPCC. Merenowicz liked the plan and said it would be easier to implement if we found the funding. Within the year, Openlands identified funding from a polluters’ fine.
The plan bore fruit, as can be seen in the October 20, 2001, minutes: Judy Pollock: “Extensive projects are planned at both sites. The Cook County FPD is working with Audubon at Bartel. The hedgerows are being removed, and hydrology work will be done. Kickoff day is November 3. The Orland Park project is being managed by Conservation Design Forum; Audubon will probably have the contract to do monitoring there. Judy is looking for partner organizations to attract volunteers.”
Conference Committee
At its first BCN conference, held on December 6, 1997 at Northeastern Illinois University, the theme was “Birds and Habitat Management.” There was a full conference schedule, with a welcome by Dan Williams, Past President of the American Birding Association, and a Keynote speech “What are the Challenges Facing Our Birds?” The morning continued with a selection of well-known speakers, and the afternoon featured concurrent sessions. Co-sponsors were BCN, the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies at NEIU, the Field Museum of Natural History, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service. The project was funded by Chicago Wilderness through a grant program supported by the USDA Forest Service Northeastern Area.
At the second BCN conference in 1999, again at Northeastern Illinois University, the theme was Migratory Birds. Chandler Robbins, a keynote speaker, stressed the importance of the Chicago area for migrants. This conference was followed by a surge of habitat creation by the Chicago Park District.
The first Wild Things conference was held in 2005. It was sponsored with other partners and included Habitat Restoration and other taxa besides birds.
Compiled by Libby Hill (Spring 2024)
Acknowledgments
Thank You to Those Who Helped Summarize Our History
A huge thank you to Libby Hill for dedicating the time and effort to document the early history of our organization. Thank you also to Judy Pollock, Alan Anderson, Terry Schilling, Geoff Williamson, Sue Friscia, and Craig Thayer for their correspondence, document gathering, and helping with the text. Thank you to Suzanne Checchia for proofing, and to the BCN Communications Team for formatting and sharing the content on the BCN website.
