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CREDITS

Publisher

Mitchell Waite

Computer book author, publisher, web designer, entrepreneur--is best known for writing numerous books on programming and computer technology, as well as innovative titles published by Waite Group Press in the areas of multimedia, fractals, biofeedback, nanotechnology, and virtual reality. Mr. Waite sold his publishing company to Simon and Schuster in 1996. His web site www.mitchwaite.com provides a glimpse into some of his accomplishments.

Authors and Ornithologists

David Lukas & Simone Whitecloud

David Lukas has been an avid birder for over 25 years, during which time he has worked on field research projects in Borneo, Peru, Central America, and every western state. As a professional naturalist he has led hundreds of birding tours, classes, and programs, many of these in the last 3 years with his partner Simone Whitecloud. David is also the author of Wild Birds of California, Watchable Birds of the Great Basin, and the newly revised Sierra Nevada Natural History, as well as many magazine articles. His weekly column Field Guide appears in the Los Angeles Times newspaper.

Simone Whitecloud, a native of New Orleans, moved to the Bay Area in 1996 to obtain a degree in biology from the University of San Francisco. As a freelance naturalist, Simone leads nature walks and teaches workshops for many organizations such as Point Reyes Field Seminars, Yosemite Association, and the National Park Service. She is also on the faculty at the College of Marin. Her love for birds begin with a childhood pet Mallard named Bob.

Gary Owen Dick

Born in Covington, Louisiana in 1956, Dr. Dick received his B.S. and M.S. degrees from Southeastern Louisiana University and Ph.D. from the University of Mississippi. He currently works as an aquatic restorationist and naturalist at the Institute of Applied Sciences, University of North Texas.

Nataliya Kovalenko

Nataliya Kovalenko graduated from the University of Kiev-Mohyla Academy. She has over 10 years experience as a freelance writer and translator.

Ashli Maruster

Known as “FlycatcherGirl,” Ashli Maruster graduated from The Ohio State University with a B.S. in Natural Resources, Wildlife Management. She has worked on various wildlife projects including Northern Cardinal and Acadian Flycatcher breeding studies, and Southwestern Willow Flycatcher surveys, nest searching, and monitoring. She currently works at the Wild Bird Center in Albuquerque, works as a volunteer bander for Rio Grande Bird Research Inc., and the Sandia Crest Rosy Finch project. Ashli has been certified as a “Bird Nerd,” by her loving fiancée, Nathan.

Jane Wright

Jane Wright is a writer and naturalist living with her husband and family on a beautiful farm along the Pilchuck river. She is not a classic birder but a genuine bird lover. She knows how to scratch the underside of a Brant goose's chin when you hand feed it, how warm a Spectacled Eider's belly is and how hard a trumpeter swan can bite your nose. She learned much of this when she worked at Northwest Wildfowl. The job was routine caretaking of a flock of over 600 ducks, geese and swans, but for Jane it was a labor of love. She continued her work with birds at the Washington Zoological Park and as a volunteer at Woodland park Zoo. She wears the scars from a seagull that she rescued as a badge of honor and likes nothing better than waking up to the sounds of birds on the farm.

John Schwarz

Born in NYC in 1945, John S. Schwarz MD, a graduate of MIT and UCLA Medical School, has retired from ophthalmology on Boston's north shore, and now divides his time between the Connecticut shore and the east coast of Florida. An avid bird photographer, you can view John's photos at his web-site birdspix.com.

Mary Beth Geisel

Mary Beth Geisel is a retired English teacher, a veterinary assistant, and a lifelong amateur naturalist. She earned her BA in English from Northern Kentucky University. Her published works include poetry, short stories, essays, and news pieces. Range: Ohio River Valley, extending southeast into Appalachian Mountains. Infrequent, unwilling vagrant outside that range. Nonmigratory. Semicolonial. Gregarious but wary. Enjoys dwelling among other species, especially canids. Known to frequent communal perches. Flight often erratic and labored, but capable of soaring. May be seen hovering over food.

Jason St Sauver

Originally from South Dakota (where i got my love of the outdoors and birds) I have been a New Yorker for almost 15 years now. Been out in Baiting Hollow on the North Fork of Long Islands on weekends for a few years - where I love to hike and birdwatch. Play tennis actively.

Crystal Adams

Crystal Adams graduated from William Woods University with a double major in Equestrian Science and Studio Art. She teaches and trains hunt seat and dressage in Connecticut and is currently working on her USDF Bronze Medal. Her interests in birds began as a child, when she had parakeets in Africa and canaries in England. Sadly, her 7 year old canary just passed away, and she is hoping her husband will find another for their anniversary. In the last year she has become a mother and loves it. In her rare spare time, she enjoys SCUBA diving, surfing, cooking and scrap booking.

Programmers

Rick Stephens

Chief programmer of the WhatBird database and search engine, Rick Stephens is based in Pensacola, Florida, where he consults for business in the areas of web system design. Rick has designed and programmed numerous features of WhatBird including the architecture of the browse and wizard. He is an expert in C#, ASP, and Microsoft 's .NET platform.

Dan Johansson

Dan Johansson was born in Kalix, Sweden in 1983 and moved to the United States in 1987. He has a Bachelors degree in Animation from the Art Institute of Minnesota, and experience in graphic design and web design. Dan designed and programmed the XSLT for the WhatBird species account pages, the Laptop Buyer’s Guide pages and the World Fact’s pages, as well as the comparison pages.

Robert Levy

Robert Levy, original architect of the WhatBird search engine platform, is a Program Manager in Microsoft's Mobile Devices Product Group, where he works on Pocket PC and Smartphone SDKs for 3rd party developers. Robert programmed the original Pocket PC application that got WhatBird rolling, as well as the first version of the WhatBird web client. He majored in Software Engineering at Rochester Institute of Technology.

Audio Recordist

Martyn Stewart (Naturesound)

Born United Kingdom 1955, Martyn began his recording birds at the early age of 13 with a tape recorder. He steadily collected bird and animal sounds from all parts of the country and over a period of over 35 years has accumulated well over 50,000 recordings He has contributed his recordings to the London and Glasgow zoo exhibitions, BBC radio, NPR Radio, as well as conservation groups for bird sound reference tapes and compact disks. His extensive library of sounds at Naturesound.org includes bird calls of the endangered Hawaiian Crow to the incredible mimicry of the Lyrebirds of Australia.

SOURCES

A Field Guide to Western Birds: A Completely New Guide to Field Marks of All Species Found in North America West of the 100th Meridian and North of Mexico, Roger Tory Peterson, Copyright © 1990, Houghton Mifflin Company, New York, NY ISBN 0-618-13218-X

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