Birding festival starts Friday, runs to May 7

The annual Stikine River Birding Festival has a busy first weekend planned.

It starts up Friday with a 1 p.m. virtual storytime at the Irene Ingle Public Library, then continuing the educational fun agenda with a Birding 101 class at 6 p.m. Friday at the Nolan Center, led by Bonnie Demerjian.

The library event will present an Earth Day theme, with activity kits available for pickup at the library. The meeting ID for the Zoom event is 935 4298 0052, passcode 8743535.

There are three events on Saturday’s calendar. A community cleanup is planned for 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., sponsored by the Wrangell Cooperative Association and Paula Rak. Meet at the covered basketball court behind the elementary school.

An Earth Day walk, starting at 9 a.m. Saturday, will start at the entrance to Volunteer Park, sponsored by St. Philip’s Episcopal Church.

And at 6:30 p.m. Saturday at the Nolan Center, Zak Pohlen will talk about his trip along the Stikine River in 2019 in a search of Alaska’s rarest breeding birds. Pohlen is a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

This year’s Stikine Festival will stretch over three weekends, to May 7, and will focus on educational programs.

The festival is sponsored by the borough in conjunction with the Wrangell Convention and Visitor Bureau, the U.S. Forest Service and several businesses.

Demerjian will lead a bird walk starting at 7 a.m. next Saturday, April 30, at Muskeg Meadows Golf Course. The Angerman’s Inc. golf tournament will follow at 10 a.m.

Along with scavenger hunts, bird-banding exhibitions and crafting, there will also be jetboat tours up the Stikine to look for migrating birds.

For a full list of festival events and contests, check out the flyer in this week’s Wrangell Sentinel, or visit wrangell.com/birdingfestival/birding-festival-schedule.