Happy Pollinator Week!
In honor of National Pollinator Week, enjoy $5.00 off your Habitat at Home registration fee. Click here to Join!
Valid July 20 – 26, 2022 / Only valid on Habitat at Home registration fees / Discount automatically applied
Habitat at Home – Celebrating Urban Habitat
Habitat loss is by far the leading source of human-caused bird mortality. The problem is so huge in its scope and scale that creating positive change through individual action can seem frustratingly futile. But our individual efforts to create and enhance habitat in the spaces we control can be incredibly effective.
Habitat at Home was founded on the basis and realization that urban landscapes are key in the ecological restoration of degraded and fragmented natural areas and that if we deem these urban, human-dominated landscapes as not suitable in supporting wildlife, we will lose an unforgivable amount of biodiversity. In defense of urban habitat’s importance and its potential to provide beneficial habitat for birds, pollinators and other wildlife, Habitat at Home enables homeowners to be stewards of their land; those who are willing to reconcile their needs with the needs of wildlife.
Our Mission:
To create and enhance bird, pollinator, and wildlife habitat in urban landscapes through education, individual and community participation, recognition, and restoration.
MORE NUANCED PROGRAM GUIDELINES
We’ve revised our general guidelines to be both more focused and inclusive. Our concepts are based on the fundamentals of Reconciliation Ecology, helping everyone to invent, establish, and maintain new habitats in our urban spaces.
RECIPE CARDS
Our Habitat at Home Recipe Cards are now available online! Find out how to attract hummingbirds, quail, “crested cuties,” and other birds and pollinators to your yard using native plants.
See the cards.
Join our Facebook Group to share info and photos, and be sure to follow us on our Instagram page!
CREATING URBAN HABITAT—4 Basic Elements & 7 Key Components
PLANTS
- LOCALLY APPROPRIATE PLANTS
- VEGETATION LAYERS
- REMOVAL OF INVASIVE SPECIES
PROTECTION
- REDUCING HAZARDS
WATER
- WATER FOR WILDLIFE
- WATER FOR HABITAT
HOME
- HOMES IN HABITAT
HABITAT A LA CARTE – DOING MORE WITH HABITAT AT HOME
Collect them all or pick and choose additional habitat enhancements and receive your approved sticker to add to your Habitat at Home yard sign.
See the detailed Habitat at Home A La Carte Menu.
START BUILDING YOUR HABITAT TODAY
We encourage everyone with access to an outdoor space, whether it is small or large, to join and participate in our mission of creating urban habitat.
Upon registration, you will receive a Habitat at Home yard sign as well as educational materials curated by Tucson Audubon Staff and local experts that will guide and teach you how to create beneficial habitat for birds, pollinators, and other wildlife.
REGISTER YOUR HABITAT
Do you already have a habitat at home? Looking to do more? Register your yard and join the community.
Upon registration you will receive your Habitat at Home yard sign with correlating level sticker(s) as well as all of our educational materials that will help you further enhance your backyard habitat.
GETTING STARTED IS EASY
- Sign up online, the cost is $35 for members, $45 for non-members (one-time registration fee)
- Take advantage of the additional resources on this site to assist you in building your habitat
GET INVOLVED
Share your achievements, get advice, and see what other Habitat at Home members are doing in their backyards by joining our Facebook Group. Or share your photos with Tucson Audubon by emailing habitat@tucsonaudubon.org.
Become a Habitat at Home Volunteer by emailing us at habitat@tucsonaudubon.org.
RECOGNITION LEVELS
Hummingbird
Do you have limited time, resources, or space for a landscaping project? Are you a renter who can’t make big changes to your yard? This level will guide you to make a small hummingbird planter garden on a patio.
Goldfinch
Are you working with small space, or integrating native plants into a majority non-native garden? This level will guide you to make a pollinator garden with a water feature that you can adapt to small spaces.
Thrasher
Ready to take on a full-scale yard project? It’s time to create a yard that collects water, produces food for birds and humans, and integrates a majority of native plants.
Cardinal
You’re ready to be a champion for birds! This level will guide you in designing a “naturescape” that is bird friendly, sustainable, and designed to lower heat island effects through an integrated approach to landscaping.
Tucson Audubon Society
300 E University Blvd. #120 Tucson, AZ 85705
Mason Center
3835 W Hardy Rd.
Tucson, AZ 85742
Paton Center for Hummingbirds
477 Pennsylvania Ave.
Patagonia, AZ 85624
520 415-6447
RARE BIRD ALERT
FIELD TRIPS
JOIN
DONATE
e-News sign up
520 629-0510
CONTACT US
Tucson Audubon Society
300 E University Blvd. #120
Tucson, AZ 85705
Mason Center
3835 W Hardy Rd.
Tucson, AZ 85742
Paton Center for Hummingbirds
477 Pennsylvania Ave.
Patagonia, AZ 85624
520 415-6447
RARE BIRD ALERT
FIELD TRIPS
JOIN
DONATE
e-News sign up
520 629-0510
CONTACT US
Tucson Audubon Society
300 E University Blvd. #120
Tucson, AZ 85705
Mason Center
3835 W Hardy Rd.
Tucson, AZ 85742
Paton Center for Hummingbirds
477 Pennsylvania Ave.
Patagonia, AZ 85624
520 415-6447
RARE BIRD ALERT
FIELD TRIPS
JOIN
DONATE
e-News sign up
520 629-0510
CONTACT US
Michael T. Bogan (he/him)
Michael is an Assistant Professor of Aquatic biology at the University of Arizona. Originally from California, he earned his PhD at Oregon State University, where his research focused on stream ecosystems of the Madrean Sky Islands and Sonoran Desert. He is well-known for his work on Santa Cruz River Heritage Project, and his beautiful photos of dragonflies. His research topics include Arid Lands, Conservation Biology, Invasive Species and Population and Community Ecology.
Michael serves as the faculty advisor for the UA chapter of the Society for the Advancement of Chicanos Hispanics and Native Americans in Science, a national Diversity in STEM organization. Michael is a partner on our Santa Cruz River Heritage Project work and has contributed to the Vermilion Flycatcher in the past year.
Michael has a hard time choosing a single favorite bird, but says that Curve-billed Thrashers are pretty hard to beat. “I could watch them goofing around through the leaf litter and be entertained for days!”
Alberto Búrquez
I currently work at the Instituto de Ecología, Department of Ecology of Biodiversity, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM). I got my bachelor and master’s degree at UNAM, and my PhD at the University of Cambridge, UK. I do research in Ecology, Evolutionary Biology and Ethnoecology. Drylands ecology and societal use of resources in water-limited systems have been an ever-present passion through my life. It might be because I am a Sonoran Desert born person. However, my personal theory is that once someone experiences the desert landscapes they are smitten for life. I am passionate about bird and honorary bird species like bats and hawkmoths, particularly in their mutualist interactions with plants. My current projects include: 1) Columnar cacti: ecology, evolution, societal services. 2) Effects of extreme events on vegetation, 3) Species Distribution and Biogeography, 4) Indigenous lands and ecosystem processes, and 5) drought and freezing resistance in plants at the edges of distribution.
Jeanne Calhoun
Fascinated by wilderness and everything wild since growing up backpacking with her family in the Sierras, Jeanne pursued a diverse environmental career over the past 30+ years. With a Bachelor’s in Biology (Carleton College) and a Master’s in Geology (Oregon State University), she pursued multiple aspects of environmental protection, with the last 23 years focused on ecological conservation in Arizona, working for The Nature Conservancy, US Fish & Wildlife Service, and the US National Park Service. During her ten years at TNC, Jeanne was responsible for on-the-ground conservation in four ecoregions in Arizona, management of TNC’s preserve system, land management and restoration, government relations, and water policy.
Jeanne spent seven years with the USFWS where she oversaw threatened and endangered species issues in southern Arizona. She enjoyed the challenges of dealing with controversial issues such as the international border, proposed mining projects, energy infrastructure, wilderness management and climate change.
Most recently, she worked for Grand Canyon National Park as Chief of the Science and Resource Management Division, where she oversaw all science research as well as natural and cultural resource management activities in the park. During her years at the Grand Canyon, Jeanne initiated the first Paleontological Resources Inventory for the park, led a Climate Change Analysis for the park’s watershed, reinitiated the effort to designate 94% of the park as Wilderness, and led publication of the Natural and Cultural Resource Condition Assessment for the park.
Recently retired, Jeanne has a passion for water sports, hiking and exploring Arizona’s spectacular landscapes, and is learning how to play the saxophone.
Colleen Cacy
Colleen is a partner with the firm Gadarian and Cacy, PLLC, a Tucson law firm specializing in professional Tax Strategy, Estate Planning and Asset Protection law.
- J.D. from the University of Kansas School of Law (1986)
- President of the Board of the Southern Arizona Estate Planning Council
- Elected member, American College of Trust and Estate Council
- Memberships: Executive Committee of the Probate and Trust Section of the State Bar, the State Bar of Arizona, the Probate and Trust and Tax Sections of the State Bar, the American Bar Association, and the Pima County Bar Association.
- Past President of the Board of ZUZI Dance Company
Richard Carlson
Richard started birding as a child in Minnesota 70 years ago. After a brief interlude at Harvard, where he majored in caving, mountain climbing, winter mountaineering and economics, he began birding again in Washington DC with the Maryland Ornithological Society. He was one of Chan Robbin’s volunteers in establishing the first Breeding Bird Surveys. Bribed by the Nixon administration to leave town with a fellowship to Stanford, he moved West in 1969. He worked at Stanford Research Institute, where he co-authored “Solar Energy in America’s Future” and led field trips for the Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society. He became President of the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory and expanded his birding to Latin America. He has birded throughout the Neotropics and in Africa, Australia, Antarctica, India, China and Europe. He hopes to ultimately see at least half the birds of the world. He and his wife Pat now migrate between homes in Tucson and Lake Tahoe depending on where the birds are.
Tricia Gerrodette
Tricia never wound up with a career but instead had a variety of jobs and life experiences. She's been a bookkeeper, a typist, a proofreader and then a test analyst for a defense contracting company. She was a tour guide for trips into Mexico's Copper Canyon for Elderhostel (now Road Scholar). The trips focused on Mexican and railroad history as well as the history and culture of the Rarámuri (Tarahumara) natives.
Secretary of the board for Tucson Audubon, member of the board for Friends of the San Pedro River, president of the now-defunct Huachuca Audubon Society, treasurer for Sky Island Unitarian Universalist Church, Water Sentinel with Sierra Club Water Sentinels, Steering Committee for Sustainable Water Workgroup.
When Huachuca Audubon Society disbanded in May 2016, Cochise County became part of the "assigned" territory for Tucson Audubon Society. That was a huge amount of land, although not too many people, to absorb. I was invited to be on the Tucson Audubon board to help with that effort, and to help protect the San Pedro River. That work still continues! Photo by Mark Levy.
Kathy Jacobs
Kathy Jacobs is a professor of Environmental Science at the University of Arizona and Director of the Center for Climate Adaptation Science and Solutions (CCASS). CCASS is a component of the Arizona Institutes for Resilience, and builds capacity to accelerate adaptation and on-the-ground solutions to climate issues. She is currently a member of a team that is building the Indigenous Resilience Center at the UA. From 2010 – 2013, Jacobs worked in the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the White House. She was director of the Third National Climate Assessment, and the lead advisor on water science, policy, and adaptation. From 2006-2009 Jacobs was Executive Director of th
e Arizona Water Institute, a consortium of Arizona’s three universities focused on water sustainability. She worked 23 years for the Arizona
Department of Water Resources, including 15 as the director of the Tucson Active Management Area. She was engaged in multiple aspects of implementing Arizona’s Groundwater Management Act, including development of water conservation programs and the Assured Water Supply Rules. Jacobs has served on nine National Academy panels; she earned her M.L.A. in environmental planning from Berkeley.
Elisabeth (Lissie) Jaquette
Elisabeth (Lissie) Jaquette had been an occasional birder prior to moving to Arizona in 2018. Since connecting with Tucson Audubon, she has become increasingly passionate about birding, and is excited to give back by serving on the board. Lissie first became involved with Tucson Audubon by participating in the Habitat at Home program, then by joining as a member, and more recently by volunteering with the Southeast Arizona Birding Festival, the Birdathon, and several bird surveys.
Lissie’s education includes a BA from Swarthmore College and an MA from Columbia University. Since 2017 she has served as Executive Director for the American Literary Translators Association, a non-profit membership organization.
When Lissie is not birding, she enjoys hiking and trail running in the Sonoran Desert, and translating literature from Arabic to English (her latest book was a finalist for the 2020 National Book Awards). She lives in Tucson with her 1-year-old son, Cassin (named for the kingbird); dog, Cooper (named for the hawk); and husband, Dan (sadly not named for any birds).
Riana Johnson
Riana Johnson is a skilled researcher with experience in quantitative, qualitative, and data visualization within the energy efficiency and utility industry. She brings creativity along with strong data analysis skills to her work. She uses her background in fine art and econometrics to deftly craft data visualizations and tell data-driven stories. Riana is a new birder and loves living in Tucson where the Vermillion Flycatchers are plenty. She recently started a chapter of the Feminist Bird Club in Tucson where she can mix her passion for activism, art, and birds. Riana has degrees in Political Science and Studio Art from New York University and a Masters of Public Policy from the University of Arizona.
Linda McNulty
Linda’s education includes a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from the University of Rochester, and a Juris Doctorate from the University of Arizona, where she graduated Summa cum Laude and was elected to the Order of the Coif. A recently retired partner at the law firm of Lewis and Roca, LLP, Linda was a member of the firm’s Real Estate and Finance practice group. Her law practice focused primarily on commercial real estate, business and natural resources law. Linda has served a number of board roles, including: President of the Tucson chapter of Commercial Real Estate Women (CREW) and member to the board of directors of the Pima County Sports and Tourism Authority, the Arizona Center for Law in the Public Interest, and the Wilderness Land Trust. Early in her career, Linda worked for the Arizona Department of Water Resources and she’s maintained a connection to water policy issues in Arizona. Linda has been a member of Tucson Audubon Society since 1976 and lives with her husband Michael in Tucson.
R. Cynthia Pruett
For a long period I was what you might call a "lapsed birder". I started birding in college with a boyfriend who became my husband and we traveled all over the United States while he was in the service; leading to a pretty comprehensive bird list. Then suddenly, other life activity got in the way and for about 25 years birding was shelved. In the late 80's I was introduced to an avid woman birder at an environmental conference and the passion came back. My work career involved many executive jobs, some of them key environmental positions, which only reinforced my understanding of the need to protect important habitat around the world. It's (the birding) led to many trips to many countries, a joy of seeing both new and revisited birds and of course, to becoming active in Audubon chapters, both here and in Virginia.
Cynthia M. VerDuin, CPA
Cynthia began birding when she was 10 by participating with her girl scout troop create a bird-watching badge. In the 90’s she began birding with family, friends and with bird walks in various Ohio regions. Since 2010, she has enjoyed Tucson Audubon bird walks and short trips. Beginning in 2016, she has participated in the Birding Festival, serving as a volunteer in 2017-2019 and at Meet your Birds events. She served on the Gala and Finance committees in 2016-2017, and joined the board in 2018. She now serves as Treasurer and Search Committee co-chair.
Cynthia founded her accounting firm in 2007, focusing on not-for-profits, small companies and individuals, providing accounting, tax planning and reporting services, calling upon her Kent State University (BA degree in accounting with honors) and her experience at one of the “Big Eight” accounting firms (Arthur Andersen). Cynthia is also a Physical Therapist and commercial hot air balloon pilot, and enjoys hiking, birding, biking and swimming.