Family ESCape Days
Get moving outside, exploring your neighbourhood while learning science!
Upcoming Events
3rd Paper Airplane Competition for Kids
Buckley Park, Sat July 8 2023 @ 1pm
Free, register here
Thanksgiving Sat Oct 9 @ 1pm, Tickets on sale soon!
Bring your family on a guided journey learning fun science about birds that inhabit Brydon Lagoon
6th Christmas Bird Count for Kids & Youth
Brydon Lagoon, Sat Dec 30 2022 @ 9am
Free
Join us for a day of citizen science. We will walk around Brydon Lagoon identifying and counting birds as part of a Canada wide study. All ages, stroller friendly route. All our data will be submitted to Bird Studies Canada.
3rd Hearty Fun in Nature GPS Hunt
Campbell Valley Park, TBA
A morning of sleuthing with ESC's heart themed GPS family scavenger hunt!
Stay tuned to ESC's events by joining our newsletter!
2nd Paper Airplane Competition
Buckley Park, Langley, 2022
A huge thank you to the families that took time from their weekend to come out and participate in ESC's 2nd Paper Airplane Competition for kids! We had some serious skilled participants!
A special heart felt ‘Thank You’ to each of the brave kiddos who participated. Participants ranged from 3-16 years old! Participating in a competition is more important than winning and even the best of Olympians have days where they do not perform to their skill level. So never feel bad for where you placed in a competition because what matters most is that you showed up!
Thanks to the Langley Advance Times for featuring this event.
Check out the article as well as the interview by clicking here.
A special thanks also goes out to Penny, who volunteered to write down the results for us that day!
The winners are:
Martin at 30.38m. This is about half the distance of the world record.
Second Place went to Jonathan with J.C.G.12 at 16.50m.
Third place went to Bilal with BILL at 14.30m.
ESC had a great time organizing this event! We hope your family will join us next year! To stay tuned for ESC Paper Airplane Competition 2023 by signing up to our newsletter!
FREE Family Fun
FAMILY ESCAPE DAYS
5th Annual Christmas Bird Count for Kids & Youth
Thanks to all those who participated in ESC's 5th annual bird count at Brydon Lagoon.
We had a great turnout, with about 18 families joining us for the morning. It was a true pleasure to see familiar faces and returning counters. It was also great to see such a diversity in participating families. We had families for whom it was their first ever bird count to some serious birding families. Your enthusiasm and dedication is what keeps this count going.
Thank you for continuing to support ESC's Family ESCape Days, free family events that give back to community.
Considering we had pretty mild weather at the Lagoon, it was a pretty quiet day on the bird front. We counted 21 species. Our overall individual count was lower than last year's at 392. ESC tallied the top 19 birds that were present in 4 out 5 of the counts. It is interesting to see trends within species across the different years. The top 5 birds by number of individuals are: Canada Goose, Mallard Duck, Common Merganser, Black-capped Chickadee, Glaucous-winged Gull. Last year’s top 5 were: Glaucous-winged Gull, Mallard Duck, Song Sparrow, Common Starling, Black-capped Chickadee.
The geese and “sea gulls”, who normally dominate the Lagoon, were obviously absent in the main pond area. Occasionally, we would see a pair fly by.
We did see several Bald Eagles, but the eagle nest still did not have a fledgling this year. In fact it appeared smaller than previous years suggesting it has not been inhabited in some time. This is the second year we have not seen a fledgling in that nest. Eagles migrate south in fall when the artic freezes. Often, eagle pairs return to the same nest. It is possible that this pair did not make it back from their migration. It will be interesting to see if it gets occupied by another pair in future years.
In addition to the Bald Eagles, we also saw several Anna’s Hummingbirds, Great Blue Heron, and a Belted Kingfisher! We also got to look and analyse a small nest we found in one of the trees. If you are looking to learn more about Brydon Lagoon Birds, ESC does offer a Guided Tour during March Break (See Family EScape Days Schedule).
The results from our count have, once again, been submitted to Bird Studies Canada. Thank you to all those who participated, shared and made this event possible 5 years in a row. Looking forward to next year's count!
Stay tuned for information on our summer event, Paper Airplane Competition, by joining our newsletter!
More information below!