All are invited to Bread Loaf Section's 2023 Annual Meeting, featuring guest speaker Jason Hill, conservation biologist from Vermont Center for Ecostudies

Doors open to the public at 6:30 p.m. with a brief social time, followed by the Annual Meeting at 6:45. After brief section reports, Keegan Tierney, the club's Director of Field Programs will present a report from GMC headquarters in Waterbury Center. The business meeting will adjourn following elections of members to the 2023 Executive Committee. Our guest speaker's program will begin at 7:30p.m.

Our guest speaker will be Jason Hill, conservation biologist from Vermont Center for Ecostudies (VCE). Jason will present a 45-minute talk and slideshow "Mountain Birdwatch" a citizen science program on montane birds in New England and Quebec. He will also discuss the high elevation regions and new work they are doing on invertebrates and beyond.

Read VCE's description of Mountain Birdwatch: https://vtecostudies.org/projects/mountains/mountain-birdwatch/

ABOUT JASON HILL: Following the business meeting, the evening's guest speaker will be Jason M. Hill, quantitative ecologist. As a kid from Iowa, Jason (he/him) grew up enamored with how the natural world managed to exist in a heavily modified agricultural landscape. A lifelong naturalist, Jason followed graduation from the University of Montana (BS, Wildlife Biology) with a series of wildlife-based adventures that found him monitoring sea otters in California, tracking endangered Red-Cockaded Woodpeckers in Florida, researching House Wrens at La Selva Biological Station in Costa Rica, and many others. On Maui, his crew was tasked with capturing the three remaining po'ouli: a Hawaiian honeycreeper that has now been declared extinct. His biocentric wonder (and his partner) led him to New England, where he joined the Vermont Center for Ecostudies (VCE) as a quantitative ecologist and conservation biologist in January 2015.

At the VCE, Jason wears many hats. He primarily investigates avian and invertebrate ecology within the montane spruce-fir community, coordinates and directs the community science project Mountain Birdwatch, studies the effects of powerline management practices on bumble bees and milkweed specialists, coordinates the Suds & Science discussion series and cranks out R and BUGS code on demand for his colleagues.

Come hear Jason's talk and observe nature with him by following along with his adventures on iNaturalist.org: https://www.inaturalist.org/people/118888

This event is free and open to the public. (Directions: https://www.cvuus.org/about-us/location/)
More about Jason Hill at https://vtecostudies.org/about-us/staff/jason-hill/ and GMC Bread Loaf Section at https://www.gmcbreadloaf.org/about/annual-reports-bylaws.

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