“Birder on Berry Lane” Book Talk with Robert Tougias

Foster your appreciation for all the birds in your own back yard with nature writer Robert Tougias, author or Birder on Berry Lane: Three Acres, Twelve Months, Thousands of Birds, who will present on Zoom for the Essex Library on May 4 at 7:00 p.m.

Tougias welcomes us into his own backyard to experience the lives of the birds who have also staked a claim and call the woods, stream, and meadow on the three-acre property their home. With acute powers of observation, Tougias reveals subtle changes of season and habitat as we move through a year homecoming, song, and leave taking as the birds repeat timeless cycles of migration and raising their young. Month by month, the birds make themselves known to their fascinated neighbor, who records their activity in gorgeous prose and line drawings as delicate as the subjects they portray.

A native New Englander, Tougias has been fascinated with the natural world since childhood and has been an explorer and observer since his youth. By third grade, he was gifted his first birdfeeder and field guide. His education at the University of Massachusetts in natural resources and his work with the Massachusetts Audubon Society and the US Department of Agriculture go hand in hand with his writing, which includes the book Birding in Western Massachusetts, Quest for the Eastern Cougar, and the column “Birds Eye View, which has appeared in newspapers throughout the Northeast.

This program is FREE and open to the public on Zoom. Registration is required. For more information or to register, please call the Essex Library at 860-767-1560 or visit www.youressexlibrary.org.