Ribbon cutting at the viewing tower at St. Andrews Picnic Area

Have you ever wanted to have a birds eye view of the world? Not from the ground like these Wood Storks hanging out in the marsh. No way up so you can feel like a bird in the trees.

Well viewing towers can give us an opportunity to have that view.

Here is the new tower at Jekyll Island's St. Andrews Picnic Area.

Today we were invited to be at the Ribbon cutting for this tower. Being the early bird, I was there before the main group. Sharon, Judith and Jayne, who regularly join me for my Thursday Morning Bird Ramble birding tour, joined me. It is always nice to share the view. Here is part of the main group of Jekyll Island Authority (JIA) board arriving. See don't you feel a little like a bird? They came to officially open the tower & thank the maintenance staff spends hours putting this tower up with a ribbon cutting ceremony. Here is the group actually cutting the ribbon. Jones Hooks is the Executive Director for JIA. After the ribbon was cut the board members, staff and guest all came up to see the view. Here is Jones Hooks with Sharon, Jayne, and Judith.Well anyway it was a perfect day, just the right temperature the sky was very blue and made the water very blue. A few birds were around. Yes see the view, isn't it was stunning!

This tower is located in the St. Andrews Picnic Area on Jekyll Island's southwest side. From the parking lot walk right past the nice warm bathrooms and follow the path to the right through the cedar trees and it will be in front of you.

Painting away the old year.

First off, I do not consider myself a painter. I am a drawer and a printmaker. I enjoy working on my etching press. But for the last few months I have been talking to painters and it got me thinking. Can I paint?

Janet Powers invited me over for a boat ride out on the Little Satilla River. Thanks Janet, that was so much fun! Walking into her home and past her studio, there was the smell of oil paint. To top that there was creative pieces all around. It was inspiring.
So in January, Glynn Art Association is having a show Expand Your Horizons so I am working on this little painting. It is not finished but it is getting there.
Happy New Years!

Teaming Birding with Art for Nature

I have just gotten home from a full day of birds and art. Back a few years ago I suggested to Diane O Shea that we should do an art show and sale to raise money for Tidelands Nature Center. When we got that going, Eric Garvey, and I wanted to do something for birders that were wintering on Jekyll. It was a perfect match so we do the art show and birding around The Great Backyard Bird Count. This was an opportunity to get beginning birders out with good birders in a spirit of learning and counting birds.
Here is my idea. Jekyll Island is eleven miles long and just a few miles wide at the widest point. I divided the island into sections with no overlap of areas. This year four guides volunteered to help, so there were four areas. We met between 8:30 and 9:00 a.m. at the Jekyll Island Convention Center. I put up signs about the areas, the guides and the rigor of the field area. The folks choose who they want to go out with to learn. At 9 a.m. the teams are off to count birds. It is important to get an accurate count but it is just important that the beginners learn something from the group. The areas are divided up so there is no rushing around. Take your time to count the birds you see. then talk to each other about the birds and why they are there. Then around noon come back to the Jekyll Island Convention Center to gather around a computer table and see how to enter your data. When we are finished, there are wonderful arts and crafts to look at and take home. We have some incredible artists with wonderful work. It is a great opportunity to take home a little piece of the islands.
My group went down to the south end of the island. It was not as good as Thursday but it was still great. Look!
We carefully counted 710 Dunlin, 55 American Oystercatchers, and 26 American Avocets. To top it off , we had a large pod dolphin just beyond the beach. No not a bad day at all.

Shorebirds one day and art the next

Well yesterday I was helping count shorebirds on Sea Island. Capt. Clay was a great driver. We saw American Oystercatchers, Willets, and Piping Plovers just to name a few birds.

Today I was in my etching studio. The Space Coast Birding and Wildlife Festival is next week and I have to print. While doing this, I thought I would show you how to print an etching.

First ink the zinc plate

Then wipe the excess ink off the plate

Put the plate on the press place a damp sheet of 100% rag paper over the plate

The paper and the plate are run through the press and here is the image.

Here is another plate I pulled today.


It is call Dancing Water Spirits. Tree Swallows drinking water at the south end of Jekyll inspired the image. It is just hard to seperate my birding and my art.

EEK! Life is a blur

EEK! Sorry about being so quiet. Life has been a blur of birding, surveys and art. I've been working on a couple of new etchings for the Space Coast Birding & Wildlife Festival January 21-25. If you are down there, please stop by my Artworks by Lydia booth and say hello.

Now what we did today. Birding!

The weather forecast scared me. It was supposed to be bone-chilling cold so I put on triple layers. The surprise was it was not that bad. In fact it was a beautiful day starting at 39 degrees and by noon it was 60 degrees.

The interesting part of the morning was what we found on Glory Beach (southeast side of Jekyll Island.) There was a HUGE number of cannonball jelly fish washed up. See!

The Dunlins, Ruddy Turnstones, Willets and gulls were on beach clean up patron. Fascinating.

Botany for Artists Workshop

Can you tell me what this plant is please? I walk by it twice a day for the last few weeks. I will admit I am still learning coastal plants, native or nonnative. So if you can help me here are a couple of images.

On November the 8th Trish Rugaber offer a workshop, Botany for Artists.

Here we are watching as Trish gives us some great instruction and information.

This workshop is part of Glynn Art’s awareness & fund raising “gARTen ART pARTy” November. For me art and nature go hand and hand so I am so excited for my own art association, Glynn Art Association, to be dedicating a awareness & fundraise for our own children art programs. There is nothing like a garden to inspire all ages.. Check out The website http://glynnart.org/

In keeping with the theme of helping Children Art Programs, The Botany for Artist workshop was open to all artists of all ages. We had some very talented young people from high school and collage taking part.

Here is Glynn Art's Executive Director Ann Marie. She is looking through the microscope when I ask her to look up.

Here is Trish explaining some of the steps to creating a watercolor.

Getting set up to create

Trish teaches botany at the college in Brunswick. She opened her classroom to us for this workshop. There were microscopes set up. All kinds of plants were spread around the room to look at and draw. I brought in my mystery plant & put it under the digital microscope here are an image .

What a great morning. Thanks to Glynn Art Association and Trish for this wonderful experience.