YELLOW RAILS AND RICE FESTIVAL

Avian Events Support Team (AVESTEAM) is a non-profit corporation based in Louisiana and formed in 2010 to help organize or assist with organization of bird-oriented events, such as festivals, workshops, or tours and surveys with emphasis on, but not restricted to, promotion of regional birding, agritourism, and ecotourism.   

    The first event sponsored by AVESTEAM is the Yellow Rails and Rice Festival. 

   In 2015 we introduced Waders in Working Wetlands: Shorebird Extravaganza, a similar festival that expanded on the Spring Shorebird Blitz, which was its foundation. The Blitz was an all-out one-day census of shorebirds in the SW rice-growing region during spring migration. But with so many spring event offerings, competition for participants was intense and we did not achieve the interest we had hoped so following the 2016 event, this may be an intermittent event in the future.

    We have also helped sponsor four Audubon Christmas Bird Counts,  also in the SW LA area: Lacassine NWR -Thornwell CBC, Sweet Lake-Cameron Prairie NWR CBC, and White Lake CBC, as well as the Sabine NWR CBC based in Cameron; we have assisted with pelagic surveys in the Gulf of Mexico, and have supported research projects monitoring movements of Yellow and Black rails.

    For more information contact: 

Donna L. Dittmann at donnaldittmann@gmail.com