Hi Everybody!!
Last week I introduced you to Cassidy, the baby buzzard with a broken leg. In the photo you will notice she has a full rack of white feathers under the wing. This feature identifies her as a Turkey Buzzard. Black Vultures look similar to her black body, but have white only on the front wing tips. Now if you ever find an injured bird, you can find many places on Google for help. I have shared Wikipedia info below on one of the first groups to help birds on a large scale: National Audubon Society. This is an excellent resource for anything about birds. Now it is possible to get a Field Guide on your phone! I encourage you to get involved with birds on some level as it is fun and good for the birds. Enjoy!

I did not know years ago that I would have a baby buzzard come to the Bird Sanctuary I built. Yet here she is and she stays behind the cross. Who knew? Likewise, you never know what is just around your corner!

July 22 This is where I first saw Cassidy: In the Buzzard Tree across from my gate

https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/117645114459863049265/albums/6041863740217491073

At first she looked like a bird shooting the bird.
Turns out it is either a broken leg or deformed leg.

Great Resource in Birding:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Audubon_Society

National Audubon Society

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The National Audubon Society (Audubon) is an American, non-profit, environmental organization dedicated to conservation. Incorporated in 1905, Audubon is one of the oldest of such organizations in the world and uses science, education and grassroots advocacy to advance its conservation mission. It is named in honor of John James Audubon, a Franco-American ornithologist and naturalist who painted, cataloged, and described the birds of North America in his famous book Birds of America published in sections between 1827 and 1838.

The society has nearly 500 local chapters, each of which is an independent 501(c)(3) non-profit organization voluntarily affiliated with the National Audubon Society, which often organize birdwatching field trips and conservation-related activities. It also coordinates the Christmas Bird Count held each December in the U.S., a model of citizen science, in partnership with Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the Great Backyard Bird Count each February. Together with Cornell, Audubon created eBird, an online database for bird observation. The National Audubon Society also has many global partners to help birds that migrate beyond our borders, including BirdLife International based in England, Bird Studies Canada, and many partners in Latin America and the Caribbean. Audubon's International Alliances Program (IAP) brings together people throughout the Western Hemisphere to work together to implement conservation solutions at Important Birds Areas (IBA's).

The society's main offices are in New York City and Washington, D.C., and it has state offices in about 24 states. It also owns and operates a number of nature centers open to the public, located in urban settings, including New York City, Joplin, Phoenix, Dallas and Los Angeles, as well as at bird refuges and other natural areas. Audubon Centers help to forge lifelong connections between people and nature, developing stewards for conservation among young and diverse communities.

National Audubon Society

Formation	1905
Type	Non-profit organization
Purpose	Conservation of birds, other wildlife and healthy ecosystems.
Headquarters	New York, NY
Coordinates	40°43′45.21″N74°0′18.75″W
Region served	USA
President & CEO	David Yarnold
Main organ	Board of Directors
Website	audubon.org

History[edit]

"Audubon House", the former headquarters of the National Audubon Society at 700 Broadway in Manhattan,New York City

Development of Audubon societies[edit]

In 1886 Forest and Stream editor George Bird Grinnell was appalled by the negligent mass slaughter of birds that he saw taking place. As a boy, Grinnell had avidly read Ornithological Biography, a seminal work by the great bird painter John James Audubon; he also attended a school for boys conducted by Lucy Audubon. So when Grinnell decided to create an organization devoted to the protection of wild birds and their eggs, he did not have to go far for its namesake.

Within a year of its foundation, the early Audubon Society claimed 39,000 members. Eventually, it attained a membership of 48,862.^[1] Each member signed a pledge to "not molest birds." Prominent members included jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., abolitionist minister Henry Ward Beecher, and poet John Greenleaf Whittier. This society was later discontinued, but the name and plan survived.^[1]

Organizations for the protection of birds were not a wholly new idea. Even before Grinnell's Audubon Society was organized, the American Ornithologists' Union, founded in 1883, was aware of the dangers facing many birds in the United States. There were however influential ornithologists who defended the collection of birds. In 1902 Charles B Cory, the president elect of the AOU refused to attend a meeting of theDistrict of Columbia Audubon Society stating that "I do not protect birds. I kill them."^[2]

In 1895 Audubon societies were organized in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, and during the next few years bird lovers in many other states followed suit. St. Louis Audubon Society (SLAS) was established in 1916 as the St Louis Bird Club. In 1944, the Bird Club became the first local Audubon chapter in the United States.St. Louis Audubon The national committee of Audubon societies was organized at a meeting held in Washington in 1902. 1905 saw the organization of the National Association of Audubon Societies for the Protection of Wild Birds and Animals; William Dutcher was president, and T. Gilbert Pearson was secretary and financial agent. During this time, Albert Willcox provided financial support, more than $331,072 in 1905 and 1906. At the end of 1906, the Association had an interest-bearing endowment fund of more than $336,000 and an income from other sources of approximately $9,000.^[1]

Bird Protection[edit]

Birds in the US were threatened by hunting for sport as well as for the fashion industry. Pressure from shooting enthusiasts was intense. For example, great auks, whose habit of crowding together on rocks and beaches made them especially easy to hunt, had been driven to extinction early in the century. During one week in the spring of 1897, nature author Florence Merriamclaimed to have seen 2,600 robins for sale in one market stall in Washington alone. By the start of the 20th century, the sale of bird flesh had never been greater. The second equally great threat to the bird population was the desire for their plumage. In the late 1890s the American Ornithologists' Union estimated that five million birds were killed annually for the fashion market. In the final quarter of the 19th century, plumes, and even whole birds, decorated the hair, hats, and dresses of women.

But public opinion soon turned on the fashion industry. Bolstered by the support of Boston socialite Harriet Hemenway, President Theodore Roosevelt, an avowed Audubon Society sympathizer, and a widespread letter-writing campaign driven by church associations, many of whom distributed the Audubon message in their various newsletters, the plume trade was halted by such laws as the New York State Audubon Plumage Law (May 1910), which banned the sales of plumes of all native birds in the state. By 1920, similar laws were enacted in about 12 other states. Audubon Society activities are responsible for many laws for the establishment of game commissions and game warden forces, or prohibiting the sale of game.^[1]

Refuges[edit]

In 1918, the NAS actively lobbied for the Federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act. In the 1920s, the organization also played a vital role in convincing the U.S. government to protect vital wildlife areas by including them in a National Wildlife Refuge system.

The association also purchased critical areas itself. Theodore Roosevelt Sanctuary and Audubon Center in New York was established in 1923, and the Audubon Center of Greenwich, Connecticut was founded in 1943. The Paul J. Rainey Wildlife Sanctuary in Louisiana was acquired in 1924, and at 26,000 acres (110 km²) it is still the largest.

In the late 20th century, the organization began to place a new emphasis on the development of Centers in urban locations, including Brooklyn, New York; East Los Angeles, California;Phoenix, Arizona; and Seattle, Washington.

Field guides[edit]

In 1934, with membership at a low of 3,500, and with the nation in the throes of the Great Depression, John H. Baker became the NAS president. Baker, a World War I aviator and ardent bird lover, was also a businessman, and he set about to invigorate the society and bolster its budget prosperity through publication. Baker's innovation was to begin publishing book-length descriptive and illustrated field guides on major forms of bird and mammal life. Soon, in association with New York publisher Alfred A. Knopf, the Audubon Field Guides became a staple of every artist's and environmentalist's library. Today, many Audubon field guides have been adapted for mobile phone apps.^[3]

(See above link for complete article)

Cassidy in the Memory Garden July 2014
https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/117645114459863049265/albums/6042018443705271025

Cassidy is a protected bird and it is against the law to keep Birds of Prey in captivity. Cassidy is not caged or otherwise contained by me. She comes here on here free will and leaves by her free will. It is her choice (and her Mother) to be at my place. It is a special bond between me and the buzzards, not a crime.