On November 29th, at 9:00am, the GoodGiving Challenge kicked off!  This is the third year that CKAS is participating and we hope it will be our best year so far!  We have a lot planned—more Prothonotary Warbler nest tubes, some Barn Owl boxes, planting bird-friendly tree banks at Masterson Station Park, sponsoring another Earth Day movie, maybe starting a bird-themed speaker series, the 4th Annual Bluegrass Birding Festival, and even the possibility of backing a MOTUS station to track migrants passing through our state.  None of this happens without your support.  You can make tax-deductible GoodGiving Challenge donations until midnight, New Year's Eve.  This year-end campaign is CKAS's biggest annual fundraiser; please consider making a donation—minimum is $10 and any little bit will help. Also, watch for other e-mails about special dates when your donation might go further like helping us win extra endowment funds or during Matching Grant Challenges when your donation could be matched dollar-for-dollar!

Again for this year's Challenge, anyone who wants to help can (easily) become a CKAS social media ambassador.  If you believe in what we do and would like to help raise money for our cause, you can do so simply by adding us to your social media pages. It's easy to set up: just click here to start a personal fundraiser for CKAS.

So far, CKAS has orchestrated the building of 140 Prothonotary Warbler nest tubes, all placed by the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources and Wildlife Management Area managers throughout the state. Of the 100 tubes that were placed by last February, most were checked twice throughout the summer and those showed a 35% acceptance rate by PROW pairs who produced 63 documented chicks. Given this huge success, we want to do it again. CKAS aims to assemble and paint 140 more tubes on January 8th, 2017.  Save the date, location TBD.  We've applied for an Audubon Collaborative Funding Grant to help defer the cost and should know by then whether we've gotten some financial assistance for this, but we plan to move forward as if we have.  We're ordering parts and getting ready.  All we'll need is your help!  Drop us an e-mail to be added to the info & update list.

Project FeederWatch is a winter-long survey of birds that visit feeders across North America. FeederWatchers periodically count the birds they see at their feeders from November through early April and submit their data. This helps scientists track broadscale movements of winter bird populations and long-term trends in bird distribution and abundance.  Anyone interested in birds can participate - including children, families, individuals, classrooms, retired persons, youth groups, nature centers, and bird clubs. You can count birds as often as every week, or as infrequently as you like: the schedule is completely flexible. All you need is a bird feeder, bird bath, or plantings that attract birds. Click here to join.

You can also participate in the BirdSpotter Photo Contest. Now through early March, submit your bird photos for a chance to win cool prizes—great bird feeders, Cornell Lab of Ornithology logo wear, even a framed Charley Harper print—from Wild Birds Unlimited. Click here to learn more.