It’s shortly after 8 a.m., and 15 people are walking along the Dungeness River. Suddenly, a chitter fills the air, and faces turn skyward.
“Listen. Do you hear the crossbill?” asks Bob Boekelheide, the leader of the gang of walkers.
After scanning the skyline, the group next sees a quail scurry into bushes to the left.
Boekelheide cups a hand to his mouth and, using his lower lip and teeth, imitates a call, drawing the bird out of the brush.
It’s the Wednesday morning walk at Railroad Bridge Park, and, like every Wednesday morning for the past 13 years, up to two dozen bird buffs are following Boekelheide through some of the most lushly populated avian habitat in the world.
“This is an amazing place to be a birder,” Boekelheide says, a pair of binoculars hanging around his neck and a telescope flung over his shoulder.
Few have seen as much of this place as he has.
Boekelheide, 61, began leading the Wednesday morning bird walks in 2001. It was one of the first initiatives he took on as director of the Dungeness River Audubon Center, a natural history museum nestled in the park at 2151 W. Hendrickson Road.
“I’ve only had one of these bird walks where I was out with myself,” he said. That was during his first year.
Since then, he’s collected a solid roster of bird walkers, both veteran and rookie.
“I’ve been out here almost since the beginning,” said veteran Wednesday walker Gary Bullock of Sequim.
“I’ve lived here 15 years, and I haven’t been able to come out for this until now,” said Neal Burkhardt, who had retired the previous Monday with his partner, Jane Stewart, after 15 years of running McComb Gardens just outside Sequim.
Boekelheide said the people are almost as interesting to watch as the birds.
“I’ve kept better track of the birds, I think. But it is great,” he said, “to have new faces show up and get excited about this wonderful place.”
Boekelheide stepped down as the River Center’s director in 2011, partly to travel and partly to take care of his ailing father in suburban Los Angeles.
“I really have to say thanks to the people that helped pick up some of my bird duties while I took care of my dad,” he said.
“It means a lot to have a connected community like this.”
Last September, Boekelheide returned with his father to the home by Dungeness Bay where he and his wife, Barbara, raised their two sons, Eric and Isaac.
Before taking on the river center’s director post, Boekelheide taught science to high school students in Port Angeles and Sequim for 7 years. His knack for teaching is in evidence on the bird walks, whether he’s showing a newcomer how an Anna’s hummingbird’s hood changes its neon colors with a turn of the neck or sharing technology tips with some of the regulars.
“I just love showing people cool things and having them get excited about nature and everything that’s around here,” he said.
Technology makes that connection a bit easier.
Wednesday bird walker Dave Jackson, who teaches a class on recognizing bird songs, shared some apps, like iBird PRO, that can pick up a bird song and let the savvy, bird-watching smart phone owner know what just flew overhead.
Or you could take along an encyclopedia like Boekelheide, who takes joy in not only the rare species, but also in noting the changes in population and behavior of swallows and robins.
“They just tell us so much about what’s going on in the world around us,” he said. “I actually find more in the more common species, because they tell us more about our surroundings.”
Humans can gain more understanding of nature “just by listening and keeping an eye out.”
While the Wednesday bird walks attract a dozen or two to the park, the biggest crew comes during the Olympic BirdFest, as he leads the Dawn Chorus at Railroad Bridge Park.
“It’s a bigger crowd, maybe a little grumpier, too,” said Boekelheide, who volunteers to lead the outing.
The walk, from 6 a.m. to 7:30 a.m. this Saturday, will roam through riparian forests next to the Dungeness River as the calls of bald eagles, mergansers, warblers and any number of other bird species fill the tree canopy.
This year’s Dawn Chorus stroll, at $15, is one of numerous outings during the BirdFest this Friday through next Sunday, April 4-6.
These aren’t merely a pastime, the Wednesday walks in the woods.
As a new species is spotted, Boekelheide pulls out a note pad, covered in thick yellow plastic, to scrawl down the observations.
He has recorded the species and numbers from each of the bird walks he’s led these 13 years.
“I have to admit, the last few years need a little more interpretation,” he said. Boekelheide has yet to delve into the more recent data.
Boekelheide is vice president of the Olympic Peninsula Audubon Society, as well as being in charge of the society’s bird sighting and bird count committees.
Prior to his teaching stint, Boekelheide, with a bachelor’s degree in zoology and a master’s in ecology, was a wildlife biologist. In 1990, he co-authored the book Seabirds of the Farallon Islands with his colleague, David Ainley.
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley Editor Joe Smillie can be reached at 360-681-2390, ext. 5052, or at jsmillie@peninsuladailynews.com.
