Meet Your Guides

February 25, 2009

Topics: People Profiles

 

Get to know the knowledgeable and interesting cast leading Maine Audubon trips this spring.

 

Bob Bittenbender is Gilsland Farm Audubon Center's assistant property manager and has been a nurseryman for more than 30 years. A graduate of the National Outdoor Leadership School and a photographer, Bob has traveled much of the country on birding trips and has led numerous nature education programs, orienteering courses, and field trips for Maine Audubon.

Alexandra Conover has been a Registered Maine Guide for 30 years, helping hundreds of people forge deeper connections to the land through rustic snowshoe treks and canoe voyages through the wildest regions of the Northeast. When not guiding, she can be found making canoe paddles from a pattern used for over 100 years or playing the accordion.

Co-founder of guiding service North Woods Ways, Registered Maine Guide Garrett Conover is an expert on the northern travel skills sub-arctic people have used for generations. He has authored definitive canoeing and snowshoeing guides, as well as an award-winning fiction book about a young girl growing up in the Maine wilderness.

Greg Drummond has been a Master Registered Maine Guide for 25 years, guiding for hunting, fishing, and hiking as well as leading nature trips in the Bigelow area afoot and on the water. A wilderness EMT, he also works for a local ambulance service and manages lands for a local wilderness trust. Greg and his wife, Pat, a chef, have owned and operated Claybrook Mountain Lodge since 1985.

Susan Gallo is a wildlife biologist at Maine Audubon who oversees several projects that use "citizen scientist" volunteers to collect information about wildlife. During 10 years of living and conducting research in the intermountain West, Susan spent lots of time in and around Yellowstone National Park, where she had many memorable encounters with grizzly bears and wolves.

Kirk Gentalen works on Vinalhaven and North Haven islands a land steward, maintaining trails, monitoring conservation easements, working on management plans, conducting wildlife surveys, and doing educational outreach. He has 15 years of experience as an environmental educator.

Margi Huber is trips and tours program coordinator at Maine Audubon. A graduate of the National Outdoor Leadership School, she has 10 years of experience leading trips in the mountains of Maine and on horseback. Her degree in human ecology and her 20 years of experience in the horticulture industry provide her with an eclectic kind of knowledge that she enjoys imparting on her trips.

Maine Audubon staff naturalist Eric Hynes has conducted extensive fieldwork on raptors, migration, and neotropical migrant songbirds from Panama to the Pribilofs. He's also been a tour guide, owl bander, and ground squirrel rustler.

A U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist, Ron Joseph works with private landowners to restore habitat for migratory birds and other wildlife. In cooperation with private timberland owners in Maine, Ron also conducts annual surveys to monitor population trends of songbirds.

George Libby has been volunteering for Maine Audubon since 1990. A Maine native and Registered Maine Guide, he has been a sportsman and naturalist since youth. George enjoys sharing his understanding of nature and being in a community that advocates for the environment. He is the 1995 Maine Audubon Volunteer of the Year.

Registered Maine Guide Gary Roberts has led Maine Audubon walks and field trips on foot and by canoe for more than a decade. He enjoys helping others identify wildflowers as well as talking about edible and medicinal plants and introducing new friends to the pleasure of observing Maine's wildlife.