I enjoyed my time this morning at the Birding event, and wished I'd known about the Gilbert Riparian Preserve when the kids were growing up; I think they would really have enjoyed it.  Now I can add Black-Necked Stilt to my list.  As my book says "outrageous length of the red-to-pink legs make this shorebird hard to confuse with any other". 

Of course most of the folks there had serious cameras, which is why they get such wonderful shots of the birds.  While I did snap a few photos of the birds, mostly I took pix of the folks at the event.  The woman wearing this bird dress was later introduced as one of the organizers.

Not surprisingly, this guy had an impressive camera:

I saw lots of fun bird shirts, like this online dating one.

I bought copies of these books in the Raptor Series, each of which told a wonderful story and was illustrated with drawings by school children.  TINY but MIGHTY is about a kestral, the smallest member of the falcon family.

This title of this one is pretty self-explanatory, and is a true story.

I remember sitting out at Marilyn's, by the top of the cliff, watching turkey vultures soaring on the thermals below us.

Some of the volunteers from Liberty Wildlife (a rescue/rehabilitation group) displayed birds for a photo op.

http://www.libertywildlife.org/

  

Quanah, the 'star' of the story above, was there.

So was a kestral

a red-tailed hawk

with a sign

a burrowing owl

and someone else brought this macaw to the party.