Public Program: The Hidden History of American Shorebirds

An evening discussion with Kenn Kaufman!
Note: This event is online-only.
Registration is required at https://maineaudubon.ticketspice.com/an-evening-with-kenn-kaufman-february-10

The shorebirds – sandpipers, plovers, and their kin – are beautiful, but telling the many species apart can be a confusing challenge for birders. However, the level of confusion was much greater in the early 1800s, when naturalists were struggling to classify all these birds for the first time. Some species were described to science over and over, under different names, while some other species were overlooked completely for decades. And for many years, everyone underestimated the amazing migrations of these long-distance travelers. In this program, based on a chapter from his most recent book, Kenn Kaufman will describe the misadventures of early shorebird-watchers, and how those events are reflected in our experience of birding today.

Kenn Kaufman is the author of more than a dozen books, including Kingbird Highway, his memoir about traveling the country searching for birds as a teenager in the early 1970s. His other titles include The Birds that Audubon Missed, A Season on the Wind, Flights Against the Sunset, and the Kaufman Field Guide series, covering birds, mammals, insects, butterflies, and other subjects.