Botany for Birders: Conifers with Ryan Gilpin

Have you ever struggled to describe which tree a bird is in? Have you ever struggled to identify a tree making it difficult to know how to manage it? Join local arborist, ecologist and birder Ryan Gilpin for a series of online and field classes designed to help birders more confidently navigate the plant world. Ryan will focus on observing specific characteristics of trees to gather more information. This information can be used to assign a name to a plant, but the goals of the workshop are more about observing and describing than naming. 

Every month, Ryan will focus on a particular characteristic of trees (such as leaves or bark) and how that character can help you to understand more about the plant. Through coupled classroom and field sessions Ryan will help you increase your ability to describe plants and connect to the natural world around you. Field sessions will be dynamic birding sessions in places with interesting trees. When bird activity is high, participants will be encouraged to describe where they are seeing birds in as much detail as possible using plant characteristics. When bird activity is low, participants will be encouraged to observe and describe specific characters of the surrounding trees to work on plant identification skills. Please register seperately for each class in the series. 

Conifers

The most iconic features of the Portland area are probably rivers and conifers. The Portland area is rich in conifers, and they have played an important role in the history and development of Oregon. This class will focus on a plant identification process related to conifers. We will focus on how to identify whether a tree is a conifer, differentiate between different types of conifers, and how to identify some key conifers in the Portland area. Timing is not as important for conifer identification, so it is a good group to focus on in late winter/early spring.