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About The Birding and Nature Festival |
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Those who attend the New River Birding & Nature Festival find out in a hurry the key components that are at the very root of the experience we provide for our guests. Hospitality; field trips designed for the needs of the guest; promoting our area as a great place to live, learn, work and play; and being proactive in efforts to conserve the resources that bring colorful migrant birds our way each spring. These are the core values that drive our efforts to put on an event that is as good as it can be.
From our great food – you won’t find better at any birding event anywhere – to a sincere effort to make lifelong friends, the New River Birding and Nature Festival is - as Bill Thompson (editor of Bird Watcher’s Digest) describes it – “a down home, summer camp for birders where you never want to go home.” And when you do have to go everyone – from the hosts, to the guides, to the volunteers – leave you on a first-name basis with a heart-felt wish to see you again the following year.
Field trips with a maximum of 25 guests (many are just 10) and a minimum of two expert guides, send you off daily with a legitimate expectation of experiencing one of the best bird watching days you have ever had. No speeding busses going down the road with a guide ticking off the birds he/she hears, the New River Birding and Nature Festival prides itself in putting birds in the scope for as many of our guests as possible.
 Getting out and seeing the lush countryside that is Southern West Virginia is provided for our guests on each and every trip. Experiencing rest in places like Cathedral Café, Opossum Creek Retreat, Country Road Cabins, ACE Adventure Resort, WV Adventure Resort, and Songer Whitewater clarifies the impression of a place we are proud to call home.
As a participant in a birding festival, you know the delicate balance that must be maintained to sustain the woodland habitat of the warblers and passerines that keynote our event. The organizers not only share that knowledge with our guests, but we go one step farther by providing the same kinds of information to students in our local schools. Thousands of these students have been delivered the message – in countless ways – that birds are not only fun to watch, but that this beautiful resource can be a part of their economic future so long as they strive to maintain it.
Dave, Geoff, Keith, Rachel and all of the people associated with the New River Birding and Nature Festival have had the good fortune to be touched by all of the friendships that have been developed as an outgrowth of our event. For that very reason it is easy to keep a promise to you that we will do everything in our power to assure that the time and money you invest in joining us at the New River Birding and Nature Festival will deliver outstanding bird watching experiences and fond memories for a long time to come.
Birder Chatter
Visit these blogs to see what some very cool people are saying about us! |
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"While birds are always prioritized - they can fly away, after all! - we don't shun the flora. ... Even the nonplantpeople often find themselves becoming smitten with all of the sensational plants that brighten the spring West Virginia woods." - Jim McCormac
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 New River Birding and Nature Festival on 
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"There are plenty-plenty reasons why I love this annual spring birding bacchanalia: it's run by good buddies of mine, the birding is truly incredible, Swainson's and cerulean warblers, the landscape is breathtaking, it's a small and intimate gathering of the tribe, they let me play music, there are hottubs in the cabins, and it's only a three-hour drive from the Bill of the Birds man cave." -Bill Thompson, III
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"This is a great festival. One of our very favorites. ... Wherever you go, it drips with birds. Your guides call birds in and set you up with stunning looks in the scope and you rack up the life birds." -Julie Zickefoose
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"It's hard sometimes to really convey the wonderment of this place [Muddlety]. It's not only birdy, it's also full of butterflies and very cool flora, and if you're lucky you might get a bear." -Susan
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"I've never been to a birding festival before, but I think the bar has now been set pretty high for any future bird outings that I might go to. They really take care of you at the New River Festival. For one thing, having your meals provided for you is a huge convenience that I didn't appreciate until I came home and realized that I had to go back to fixing my own meals." -Heather
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"Crossing this [New River Gorge] bridge marked the beginning of what turned out to be one of the most challenging, unique and fun-filled nature vacations I've ever experienced." -Vickie
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"Struck by wonderful hospitality, enthusiastic participants high school through adult, and a dazzling assortment of spring Neotropical migrant birds, we've been back every spring since that first year [2002] to lecture, lead field trips, and band birds..." -Bill Hilton Jr.
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"... images... of perfect roadside wildflowers, of rivers rushing across bared toes, of ghost towns nestled in the mountains, weathered barns along the way, of impossible to photograph birds, memories of twisty country roads, lush hillsides and scenic saw mills, the laughter of an impossible-to-imagine mix of friends..." -Laura
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"The birding was fabulous- twenty-eight lifers for me!" -Lynne
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"It’s fun meeting up with several people we met here last year who also decided to return. And no wonder we are all back here, as it is one of the premier birding events in the country." -Ferd
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"If you have never been to this part of the world and you love looking at birds and all things nature……You must check out the New River Birding and Nature Festival." -Dawn
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"Total birds seen by the whole group for the week was 148 different species. Ferd and I saw 60 different kinds alone." -Gail
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