Birds of a Feather: Queer Birders Flock Together

BY SAMI STEWART

More and more members of the LGTBQ+ community are gathering together and populating spaces that haven’t always welcomed them. Although queer nature groups are on the rise across the nation, there’s one in Cincinnati that’s gained popularity quickly. Queer Birders of Cincinnati caters to a niche market ––not just birders, queer birders. Even so, the group has had consistently growing attendance since its inception in the fall of 2021.

“We can look in nature and see a lot of queerness,” says Ash Conway, founder and president of Queer Birders of Cincinnati. “I feel like a lot of queer people have been told that queerness is unnatural. And then you look in nature and you see plants and animals that are not directed by this binary. They’re not male or female. There are animals that exhibit queer behaviors. There’s just so much around us that is queer.”

Conway founded Queer Birders after seeking community with queer people in outdoor spaces and not finding it. In college, Conway founded University of Cincinnati’s Ornithology Club, but once she graduated she struggled to find herself and other queer people represented in the outdoor community, so she created bigger overlap between these two groups she identifies with.

“A lot of times we don’t feel safe nor welcome in outdoor spaces, especially if you’re nonbinary, transgender, if you’re a person of color, if you have a disability. All of those things lead to people feeling excluded from the outdoor movement. So I wanted to create a group where all of those people could come together and feel at home,” Conway says.

She’s been birding for about six years now, and still fondly remembers the bird that first sparked her interest in bird watching –– the pileated woodpecker. It’s the largest and most striking of the woodpeckers with its rufous crown and boldly striped face.

“It ignited that interest and after that I couldn’t stop,” she says. “Every time I go outside, I see something different. I think that’s what’s so cool about birding is that you’re always going to see something different. You’re always going to be amazed,” she says.

Queer Birders has held bird walks at parks and nature preserves around the city. Conway intentionally fostered a culture that was welcoming not only to people who have been clocking birds for years but also to those who’ve always had the interest but never the means. “There’s a lot of people that come on our walks and they don’t know a cardinal from a tufted titmouse, and that’s OK. As long as they are having a good time and they are able to find people like them, I think that’s really what a lot of people, especially queer people, are seeking in today’s world,” Conway says.

When organizing events, she reaches out to members of the community who have expertise in different areas, like plant identification or mindfulness. In early June, Queer Birders hosted a morning of nature journaling at Caldwell Nature Preserve with Mary Gordon, a naturalist with Greenacres Foundation and a teacher of 20 years. Earlier this spring, Queer Birders hosted a bird banding demo at UC’s Center for Field Studies. Members got to handle birds and examine them up close while learning the ins and outs of bird banding (the process of putting aluminum or colored bands on birds in order to identify and track individual birds) and its place in ornithological research.

Conway has been volunteering with Dr. Canterbury, one of just a few ornithologists at UC, for almost five years. While pursuing her undergraduate degree, she helped Dr. Ronald Canterbury’s research on avian mortalities due to window collisions. Today she still helps him with banding birds during migrant seasons.

Beyond creating a safe space where queer people can gather, Conway notes that it’s extremely important for queer people to be able to envision themselves in STEM, academia and other fields where they have historically been underrepresented. “The outdoors doesn’t always feel like a safe and welcoming space for queer people. And a lot of times, higher education also can feel that way. Being able to see themselves doing something like that is good for queer people,” she says.

Queer Birders’ first meeting was last April. Twenty people turned up to have a walk in the woods and look at birds together. These days, well-attended events more than double those numbers. “It’s been really exciting to watch,” Conway says. “I hope that it only continues to grow because it’s clear that this is something that queer people want. They want this space as well as this experience. And that’s really cool to see in a place like Cincinnati.”

Though the bulk of the spring migration is behind us, Queer Birders will be hosting a handful of summer events in the coming months. This summer they’re hosting:

• Hiking Basics at French Park on Sunday, July 9 from 10 a.m.-noon

• Summer Bird Walk at Mt. Airy Forest on Sunday, July 23 from 10 a.m.-noon

• A Walk in the Woods at Avon Woods Nature Preserve with Queer Climbing Cincinnati on Sunday, August 6 from 11 a.m.-1 p.m.

For more information about Queer Birders of Cincinnati, visit facebook.com/queerbirdersofcincy.

JULY 10-16, 2023

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