Birdwatching as a Gateway to Environmental Activism: A Conversation With Prof. Cin-Ty Lee

Birdwatchers. They’re both easy to envy (They know so much!) and laugh at (What nerds!). Yet birdwatching is one of the easiest and cheapest ways to connect with nature. Yes, as we discuss with Cin-Ty Lee, professor of geology at Rice University in Texas and author of the Field Guide to North American Flycatchers: Empidonax and Pewees, you could go buy all the books and gear and then book trips all over the world to start checking off boxes on your life list. Or you could just sit and watch out the window at whatever birds are out there where you live. All birds are interesting! 

And, as Christina and Prof. Lee discuss in this episode, watching them is habit-forming in a way that makes people of all political stripes want to start protecting their habitats. This doesn’t need to mean lying down in front of tractors. Instead, it could mean working to improve small patches of nature within cities and in your own backyard to make them better for birds and the plants and insects the birds need to thrive. Before you know it, you’ll be heading up neighborhood or citywide initiatives to better the spaces around you for the sake of the birds.

Socials:

You can find Cin-Ty Lee at @CinTyLeeEarth on Twitter, at @cintylee on Instagram, and at http://www.cintylee.org/. Or check out his YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/cintylee.

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