The Redstart Connection - A Great Success!

 

Thank you to all who donated to the Redstart Connection campaign. We reached and slightly surpassed our goal for funding each of these projects. Here at home, efforts are already well underway in the analysis of BCN monitoring data.

 

In Guatemala, plans are well underway as well. You can read a special thank you and update from Rob Cahill, Director and founder of Community Cloud Forest Conservation. You can also view a map of the reforestation area here.

 

About the Redstart Connection

 

Chicago area birders and the Q'eqchi people of the cloud forests (pronounced Kek-chi) have partnered together. We treasure some of the same birds; we just see them at different seasons. The Bird Conservation Network (BCN) has found a way to aid birds on both sides of the migration equation by partnering with Community Cloud Forest Conservation, a nonprofit social enterprise in the Guatemalan highlands.

 

The Redstart Connection is a grassroots effort to unite the bird conservation communities of the Chicago region and the Guatemalan cloud forest - to help the birds that we each enjoy in different seasons. Although the cultures and the political landscape may be different, the basic problem of habitat loss is the same.

 

Through The Redstart Connection, BCN successfully raised over $7,500 to be split between helping the Q'eqchi reforest over 5 acres of cloud forest habitat AND funding an analysis of 12 years of BCN monitoring data to guide local land habitat restoration efforts AND help local volunteer organizations plant migratory bird habitat in Important Bird Areas of the Chicago area.

 

 

 

Q'eqchi' bird monitor	Local bird monitor

 

 

Goal: Education & Reforestation	Goal: Research & Restoration

 

 

Restoration Site There	Restoration Site Here

 

 

Warbler Wintering Grounds	Warbler Breeding Grounds

 

 

Educating against deforestation

 

 

Restoring through reforestation

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Local Communities Saving Birds in Chicago and on their Guatemalan wintering ground."