Where: Grace Episcopal Church, Kilmarnock, VA

Program: Blue Birds 

Speaker: Beth and John Elkins 

Said Hendry David Thoreau, �His soft warble melts in the ear, as the snow is melting in the valleys around.  The bluebird comes and his warble drills the ice and sets free the rivers and ponds and frozen ground.�  

How may of us have fond memories of hearing the bluebird song or seeing the glorious bright blue in the spring as the bluebirds find a cavity in an old wooden fence post to make their nests?   

On February 4^{th ,}  in Kilmarnock, Beth and John Elkins, charter members of the Virginia Bluebird Society formed in 1997 in Northern Virginia, will present a talk on the near extinction of the bluebird.  They will explain how providing appropriate nesting boxes in organized trails and backyards will help bring them back. Beth and John established a 36 box nesting trail at the Fawn Lake Country Club golf course in 1998.  

Also on the program will be Northern Neck Audubon member Tom Teeples of Irvington, who will be talking about a local blue bird trail.  Tom has been monitoring the bluebird trail at the King Carter Golf Course at Hills Quarter since it was established in 2006.  The Northern Neck Audubon Society has been building and distributing between 800 and 1,000 bluebird boxes a year since 1975.  These boxes are available at many local merchants in the Northern Neck and the Middle Peninsula. (Store Locations )

The program, open to all, will be held at 7:00 p.m. at Grace Episcopal Church in Kilmarnock.  Attendees are invited for refreshments after the program.