The Goa Bird festival 2016 was the first bird festival in Goa; it was conducted by the Goa Forest Department and the Government of Goa. Lectures on various topics from Eco-tourism to online data analysis were organized during the festival. A birding trails at Bondla, Mollem, Caramboli and Dr. Salaim Ali Sanctuary were organized too. Ms. Tejashree D. Nakashe, IT Assistant from BNHS ENVIS attended this festival from 11th -13th November 2016.
The Festival started with an inaugural lecture by Dr. Asad Rahamani on Endangered birds and their conservation, followed by a presentation by Dr. Vijay Mohan Raj, CFO of Karnataka Forest dept, Belagavi on developing local capacities for eco-tourism in and around protected area. The last lecture for the day was on Birds in urban setting by Dr. Dhananjay Mohan CFO, Uttarakhand.
The second day began with a lecture on Conservation of Wetland for Aquatic birds by Prof. B. C. Choudhury, Retd. Faculty of Wildlife Institute of India and on Managing Nature based eco-tourism (JLR) by Mr. Kartikeyan. The lectures ended with talk by Mr. Suhel Quader on ebird.org and the use of freely available data.
The Goa Bird Festival gave an opportunity to spread the word about ENVIS, and the work done by the BNHS ENVIS centre. Ms. Tejashree D. Nakashe, had a dialogue about website and activities of the ENVIS Centre on Avian Ecology with the participants of the workshop. She also spread words about ENVIS Newsletter BUCEROS, which resulted in adding 24 new members to the centre. She promoted ENVIS Newsletter BUCEROS which added 24 new members in our ENVIS member family.