The Summer 2026 WOSNews has arrived!
Summer ‘26 at the Washington Ornithological Society brings a new board and a heartfelt thank-you to retiring webmaster Jane Hadley after eight years of service. Samara Hoag shares how a spare pair of binoculars can change a conservation worker’s day in Colombia, while Ed Pullen signs off, at least for now, from the Bird Banter Podcast. The issue’s centerpiece follows Seattle’s urban peregrines through a hard 2026 season, when window strikes claimed most of the year’s fledglings, and looks at new transmitters and signs of regional decline. It also remembers Ann Marie Wood, whose 705 ABA species and devotion to her neighborhood patch inspired fellow birders, and closes with a roundup of Washington’s rarest recent sightings. And there is much, much more.
Check out the latest WOSNews: Issue #207.
The WOS “Hells Gate” Annual Conference
The 2026 WOS Annual Conference held May 14-17, 2026 in Lewiston, Idaho has concluded — and was a big success, we hear. But it’s not too late to buy conference shirts at https://bonfire.com/wos-2026-hells-gate-conference.
State Checklist Continues to Grow
The Washington Bird Records Committee (WBRC) met May 7, 2026 for its spring meeting, accepting 34 valid new records of sightings and not accepting 12. Among the accepted reports were two species never before recorded in this state. One was a Yellow-green Vireo first seen on October 15, 2025 at the Grays Harbor National Wildlife Refuge by Bob Boekelheide and subsequently by others. The second was a Cave Swallow seen first on March 28, 2026 by Liam Hutcheson at the Hoquiam Sewage Treatment Plant, also in Grays Harbor County. The state checklist now sits at 531 species. Other review species reported to the committee included Common Crane, Little Gull, Vega Gull, White-winged Dove, Red-footed Booby, and Yellow-bellied Sapsucker. For more information, check out the committee’s full report for Spring 2026.
WOS Monthly Meetings
Our Montly Meetings are held on the first Monday of the month, October through June, with the meeting in June being “Members’ Photo Night.” Since 2020, the vast majority of our Monthly Meetings are conducted via Zoom (no in-person attendance). Once a year, in the Spring, we hold a combined in-person and virtual meeting at the UW Center for Urban Horticulture. Monthly Meetings are open to all, as WOS invites everyone in the wider birding community to attend!
Thanks to the generosity of our presenters, recordings of nearly all past programs are available on the WOS YouTube Channel
Go to WOS’s Monthly Meeting page for information on the upcoming program, and instructions on participating via Zoom. If you are a member of WOS, this information is sent directly to you each month.