Birding Expert Adrian Binns Will Share His Adventures at Radnor Hunt

Willistown Conservation Trust will host bird expert Adrian Binns Friday night for an of colorful slides and stories.

Binns, born in England and now living in Delaware County, is a senior leader of Wildside Nature Tours and former president of the Delaware Valley Ornithological Club. On Friday, he'll come to to recount some of his adventures traveling the globe in search of rare and amazing birds.

"I will basically be talking about my travels around the world, the places I have been to and some of the light-hearted things I've seen," Binns said.

Tickets are still available at $35 each, and will be available at the door at the same price, according to Willistown Conservation Trust's Susie MacDonnell. All proceeds will benefit the trust's birding programs, including its new Junior Birding Club.

"What I want to see is what birds Adrian has captured in photography someplace else in the world—the crazy ones," MacDonnell said.

Photographs, arranged in a PowerPoint slide show, will be projected on a screen as Binns speaks.

Asked if he had any funny stories about experiences in the Willistown area, Binns said he had one, but he was saving it as his closer for Friday night's lecture.

The event will feature light fare and a cash bar. Guests will be able to ask questions of Binns at the end of the night.

This time of year, he said, is great for birding in this area.

"Spring migration is going to be happening very soon. Tropical passerines that have been spending the winter in Central and South America, all the song birds, will be coming into our area within next week or so, through the end of May," Binns said.

"You get a lot of warblers, in particular. Willistown, up at Rushton Farm, is a wonderful place to go birding in the springtime."

If his face or name looks familiar, you might have seen him on MIND TV, the local broadcast channel that airs five-minute segments on various topics. When the channel was first starting a few years ago, he was asked to share some of his knowledge on camera. 

"I talked about backyard birds, waterfowl and ducks over at John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge by the airport," he said. "They wound up piecing together a half-dozen segments out of it."

He assumes the clips have re-aired periodically, as he still gets people coming up and saying they've seen him on TV.

will run from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at Radnor Hunt.

[Edited 3/31/11 12:40 p.m. to correct name of Binns' tour company, Wildside Nature Tours, and added link to tour company site.]