Good morning COG/Canberra Birds members and chat line subscribers, a reminder that the monthly COG/Canberra Birds meeting will be held tomorrow evening Wednesday 13 November
from 7:30 pm at our usual Canberra Girls Grammar School venue. However, please note the changed access arrangements which are in place while the construction in the Gabriel Drive parking area continues.
Details are below; unfortunately, the map is too big to put on the COG chat line.
Everyone is welcome so please come along to our AGM and then hear a great presentation by McComas Taylor and learn about how the ACT Bird Atlas and the ACT Field Guide came
about. Thoe who remember McComas from those early days will be aware that he is a very entertaining speaker.
You will also be able to enjoy a cup of tea or coffee after the meeting.
Jack Holland
The November 2024 meeting will be a normal face-to-face one held at our usual venue. As COVID is still widespread in the community attendees should heed social distancing and
good hygiene practice etc, and use their common sense and stay home if they have COVID symptoms. Mask wearing is recommended.
AGM – see details under Annual Reports and Administrative Papers on the web site.
McComas Taylor
-
Through the binoculars backwards: how the ACT Bird Atlas and Field Guide came about, and other ancient history.
Please note that construction is currently occurring around the Gabriel Drive parking area, and access to there is not available. So please use the Chapel Drive entrance
and park there. Then proceed to the Multi-media Centre (MMT) using the alternative route the Canberra Girls Grammar School has provided which can be accessed using the link on the Home Page of the COG/Canberra Birds web site under LATEST NEWS.
Once parked proceed down past the Chapel and smaller Admin Offices, keeping them to your left. Just past the latter turn left along a relatively flat and straight broad
path keeping the columns to you left. Near to the end, go left up the 3 m wide steps, turn half right and you will find an open glass door. Go through this, across the empty room and past the toilets, and then either enter the MMT either through the bottom
MMT door or go further along and up the steps where you reach the usual entry door. Though it is well lit, as it will be dark a torch for finding your way to the MMT and back to your car after the meeting is recommended.
After the AGM (for details see
https://canberrabirds.org.au/about-cog/annual-reports/ ) there will be a single speaker,
McComas Taylor
on
“Through the binoculars backwards: how the ACT Bird Atlas and Field Guide came about, and other ancient history.”
McComas will talk about his experiences during the planning and development of the 'Birds of the ACT: an Atlas' during the late 1980s and early 1990s. The Atlas was the first
attempt to map the distribution of every bird in our region. This was followed by the 'Field Guide to Birds of the ACT', generously funded by late COG member Alastair Morrison, and which has just been reprinted for the sixth time.
McComas has been involved in birds in the ACT since the day he arrived from Melbourne in 1979. He continues to watch every bird he sees and is not ashamed to admit that he
likes Blackbirds.
