State College Bird Club Meeting
February 25, 2026


Presiding: Doug Wentzel

Recording: Peggy Wagoner Saporito

Attendance: 31 in person/11 on zoom

Meeting Format: Hybrid: In-person and Zoom

Meeting Location: Millbrook Marsh Spring Creek Education Building


Treasurer’s report:(Karen Kottlowski):

SCBC account balances: savings: $22,580.64 and checking: $6833.99.


Upcoming Bird Field Trip Activities:

PSO (Pennsylvania Society of Ornithology) will be holding its annual gathering in Blair County this coming June. Connor Schmidt and Joe Gyekis are currently working to organize local bird walk leaders for the event.

PSO is conducting a County spotlight in Huntingdon County in mid-March. Several bird walks are planned for March 13-15 at various locations in the county including a woodcock and owl prowl with Jon Kauffman. Joe G. will send out more information to the listserv.

SCBC sponsored field trips will begin in March. Details can be found on our website: https://www.scbirdcl.org/.


Announcements/Other Activities:

Jon K. introduced this season’s official Tussey mountain hawk counter, Tom Filip. Tom had a good first day on the mountain today with two golden eagles migrating past the watch site. He encouraged everyone interested, to join him at the watch this spring.

Doug announced that this is Shaver Creek’s 50th anniversary year with special activities to be announced.

Funds raised this year from Birding Cup in early May will support interpretation at the new Hawksview Observation Platform.

On May 2, Millbrook Marsh is hosting the PA Native Plant Society Annual Festival and plant sale and has invited SCBC to participate. This event occurs at the same time as Birding Cup. Coty Ehrenhaus is coordinating our tabling effort and she is looking for volunteers who will not be participating in Birding Cup. If interested please contact Coty.

$20K Charitable Gift to SCBC
Jon Kauffman, chair of the fund distribution committee, discussed the progress on our project to implement installation of bird friendly treatments on windows at Spring Creek Elementary School to prevent bird strikes and to educate the children and their parents about how these benefit bird conservation. Members of the committee and Joe Gyekis, our resident window treatment expert, met with the principle, Paul Brigman, and SCASD facilities manager, Mike Fisher, to discuss options such as application of dots on windows, addition of Acopian cords in front of windows and window paints on lower windows that children could apply as class projects. Details will be worked out during the spring and we anticipate that any applications of commercially available window treatments will take place during the summer when school is out of session.

Annual SCBC Endowment Grant:
Peggy W. announced that the 2026 granting season will open next week. This year we have $1463.00 from our Endowment managed by Centre Foundation to distribute for bird conservation projects, research or education. The official announcement and application form will be sent out on the listserv during the first week of March. The grant selection committee, consisting of Sue Braun, Deb Escalet and Peggy, welcome other members who wish to join us on the committee to select projects to fund.


Birds of Note (January 29-February 25, 2026)

At the beginning of tonight’s meeting, Julia Plummer provided, via zoom, an overview of some of the interesting and unusual birds seen in our region since our last meeting in January. These included sightings of a pine grosbeak last seen on February 10, northern shrike, rough legged hawks, Lapland longspur, a pair of sandhill cranes and two trumpeter swans, one of which unfortunately died due to a run in with electrical lines. A tree swallow was spotted on February 24 near Bellefonte which appears to be the earliest record of that species in our county. And a highly unusual garganey, a Eurasian teal, continues to be recorded at Woodbury Reservoir in Bedford County. Julia also mentioned the impressively large single flocks of common birds seen recently, such as 2000 robins and 600 ring-billed gulls in State College.


Speaker: David Toews: “What’s on the menu? Diet Variation in Wood Warblers.”

This entire presentation can be viewed for a limited time at:

https://psu.zoom.us/rec/share/nuJQFJYu9PL63m3wi1JMTNW4vzzdYVvt2uZEnE-FxXCc6WhvVWT31zQGGNeebAYZ.COWubFwmICqM-o1O

David Toews, Associate Professor in the Department of Biology at PSU, focuses his research on the evolutionary ecology and genomics of birds, primarily the colorful New World wood warblers. He provided us with a lively presentation about research he has been conducting during the past nine years to understand diets of wood warblers. This is an extensive research project involving collaboration with a number of ornithologists across the country. The question being addressed is “How do insect eating wood warblers living in the same habitat divide food resources?”

David discussed some of the historical research and ecological concepts formulated since the 1950’s to describe species competition and coexistence, including Gause’s law, the “competitive exclusion principle”. Since insectivorous wood warblers coexisting in the same habitat do not appear to be competing with each other, they must be dividing food and spatial resources in ways we don’t fully understand. In the 1960’s, studies showed that different warbler species living in the same habitat tend to occupy different parts of the tree canopy. There was however, scant evidence about their diets.

To begin identifying the arthropods that different warbler species were consuming, David and his colleagues analyzed DNA in warbler fecal samples. Much of the work to collect samples was done in the Adirondacks in collaboration with Elliot Miller, Cornell Lab of Ornithology. They collected samples by mist-net-capturing at least five individuals of each of 10 warbler species during early-mid June for each of five years.

In the field, they recorded where in the canopy and in which micro-habitat each warbler species was primarily found. In the lab, extension DNA analysis of fecal samples provided information about the arthropod groups (beetles, flies, spiders, moths etc.) consumed by each warbler species. Analysis showed that there was considerable overlap of the types of arthropods groups being consumed among these warbler species.

At this point, DNA analysis down to the arthropod species level is difficult. In an effort to discern dietary differences, David conducted a second study in Rothrock State Forest where he collected fecal samples from two warbler species with distinctly difference foraging strategies, ovenbirds, a ground foraging warbler, and black throated green warblers, a canopy forager. In this case, DNA analysis showed distinct dietary differences among the spiders consumed by each warbler species. Ovenbirds consumed almost exclusively ground dwelling wolf spiders. On the other hand, black throated green warblers had only canopy dwelling spiders’ DNA present in their fecal samples and none from wolf spiders.

These results indicate that in the future, as DNA analyses are able to discern differences among species within arthropod groups, a better understanding of warbler diets could emerge and the interconnectedness of all species within a habitat can be better appreciated.