The Delaware Valley Ornithological Club (DVOC) is one of the oldest ornithology organizations in the United States. Founded in 1890, the club has held regular meetings at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia for over 125 years, and has published the periodical Cassinia since 1901. Membership is open to any dues paying person with an interest in birds. The club organizes birding field trips throughout the Delaware River valley region, including a dedicated year-round trip schedule within the city limits of Philadelphia (BirdPhilly).
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Bob Billings Big Year Award
Results of the 2024 Photo Contest
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Meetings
January 16, 2025 @ 7:15 pm - 9:30 pm
1900 Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia
The in-person portion of the meeting will be held at the Academy of Natural Sciences, BEES classroom (3rd floor).
Meeting agenda:
7:15 PM: Zoom opens
7:30-8 PM: Club business
8 PM: Presentation followed by questions (might start earlier if club business finishes earlier).
Please register for the meeting whether you will be attending in person or via Zoom. Then watch for the meeting link in your email. Disregard the meeting link if you will be attending in person.
Crafting Your Own Bird Adventure
Speakers: Tanya Burnett
Have you ever started to plan a birding trip and thought:
- no itinerary provides exactly what I want
- those travel dates do not work for me
- the prices are too high
- or even worse you booked a trip but it got canceled
These are just some of the reasons Tanya prefers to book directly with local tour operators. She will share tips on how to plan a tailored, private tour and some of the lessons she has learned.
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Tanya Burnett is a semi-retired finance and banking professional who began birding seriously in spring 2019. Since then, she has birded in 10 countries. Her goal is to get to 5,000 birds on her world life list.
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Field Trips
https://ebird.org/hotspot/L1025772
Free to all members and non-members
Glen Foerd mansion sits along the Delaware River in the northeastern-most corner of Philly and is one of the best places in the city to study gulls during the winter. While there is no guarantee, we are hoping to see a rare gull such as Iceland or Glaucous Gull. There should also be a good amount of waterfowl out on the river and we can discuss how to distinguish Double-crested Cormorants from the Great Cormorants that visit the area in winter.
We plan this as a stationary event overlooking the river, but if folks want, we can also explore the parkland surrounding the mansion.
Please dress according to the expected weather.
We will meet at 11.00 am at the flagpole along the river. Folks can join at any point during the event. There is limited parking on-site and along the surrounding roads so please share a ride if you can. The location is also reachable by bus lines 19 and 84. The Torresdale regional rail station is a 15 min walk away.
No binoculars? No worries! Birding backpacks with binoculars and field guides are now back on loan at the following local Philly libraries: Andorra, Cobbs Creek, Cecil B. Morre, Falls of Schuylkill, Frankford, Greater Olney, Logan, Richmond, South Philly, Torresdale, and Widener.
For questions, please reach out to birdphillywalks@gmail.com.
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Free to all members and non-members
Join Audubon Mid-Atlantic and the DVOC for a special winter birding day!
We’ll be breaking out the boardgames and connecting over hot chocolate, all while viewing some great birds.
Games included will be: Wingspan, Ecologies, Catan, Aquamarooned, Forbidden Island, and so much more! Guests are encouraged to bring their own boardgames and puzzles (Let’s keep electronics at a minimum) .With dozens of duck species over-wintering at the Strawberry Mansion Reservoir, we’ll break out the spotting scopes, binoculars, and guides to find who exactly is making their way down here for the winter.
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BirdPhilly is an initiative of the Delaware Valley Ornithological Club. Founded in 1890, the DVOC has been based at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia since 1891. The DVOC runs fields trips throughout the tri-state region, however BirdPhilly focuses on trips within in Philadelphia city limits in collaboration with Philadelphia Parks & Recreation and the Fairmount Park Conservancy.
Through BirdPhilly our goal is to increase interest and awareness of Philadelphia’s birds by providing quality birding experiences on expertly guided field trips. All field trips are free unless the site charges an admission fee. These trips are open to children, adults, and well behaved pets. BirdPhilly also participates in DVOC’s Philadelphia Bird Race to raise funds for conservation and research projects.
The club enthusiastically welcomes new members – young people, beginners and anyone else who is genuinely interested in birding. Members benefit from the wealth of information and expertise that this club offers. The bi-annual club journal, Cassinia, is provided to members.
People interested in receiving the club's weekly email newsletter can sign up by using the button below. Note that new club members start to receive the newsletter automatically after joining the club.
© Bert Filemyr
The Delaware Valley is the name given to the region that lays on either side of the Delaware River, centered on Philadelphia. This consists of southeastern Pennsylvania, central and southern New Jersey and the state of Delaware. Tell me more...
The following counties fall within our boundaries.
In Pennsylvania;
Berks County, Bucks County, Chester County, Delaware County, Lancaster County, Lebanon County, Lehigh County, Montgomery County, Northampton County and Philadelphia County.
In New Jersey;
Atlantic County, Burlington County, Camden County, Cape May County, Cumberland County, Gloucester County, Hunterdon County, Mercer County, Middlesex County, Monmouth County, Ocean County, Salem County, Somerset County and Warren County.
In Delaware;
New Castle County, Kent County and Sussex County
DVOC Flickr Page
Want to see and share photos of Delaware Valley birds? Check out our Flickr page.
BirdPhilly is an initiative of the Delaware Valley Ornithological Club. Founded in 1890, the DVOC has been based at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia since 1891. The DVOC runs fields trips throughout the tri-state region, however BirdPhilly focuses on trips within in Philadelphia city limits in collaboration with Philadelphia Parks & Recreation and the Fairmount Park Conservancy.
Through BirdPhilly our goal is to increase interest and awareness of Philadelphia’s birds by providing quality birding experiences on expertly guided field trips. All field trips are free unless the site charges an admission fee. These trips are open to children, adults, and well behaved pets. BirdPhilly also participates in DVOC’s Philadelphia Bird Race to raise funds for conservation and research projects.
New Bins for New Birders (NB4NB)
Partnering with DVOC's World Series of Birding Team's corporate sponsor, Nikon Sport Optics, NB4NB is committed to supplying new, serviceable binoculars to organizations that expose young people to birding and the outdoors. We focus on those organizations that are local to the Delaware Valley Region: southeastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey, and Delaware.
You can quickly and easily make a donation to various DVOC initiatives using PayPal. Click the "Donate" button above to do see a list of initiatives. If you have a Paypal Account please log in. If you do not, use the "Don't have a PayPal account?" section in the lower left-hand corner of the page that appears after you click one of the "Donate" buttons on the next page.
The DVOC is a 501(c)(3) organization.
Contributions to DVOC are tax-deductible.