Hi! My name is Abby Walter. Delaware born and raised, I grew up in my hometown of Newark, DE where I also attended the University of Delaware to study Wildlife Conservation and Ecology. I graduated in December 2014, earning two B.S. degrees and a Degree with Distinction. As an undergraduate, I was excited to get involved in lots of volunteer opportunities and student organizations to make the most of my time spent in college.

The Hawk Watch at Ashland Nature Center in Hockessin, DE was the place that I first became interested in birds in September 2011. I found out about it through the Wildlife Society at UD at showed up to volunteer one morning. There, I learned how each raptor had different flight characteristics that made them identifiable even as tiny specks in the distance! I enjoyed visiting throughout the fall, and the following spring I went on a bird watching trip with my professor and a few friends to Bombay Hook National Wildlife Refuge. The incredible abundance of bird diversity at that refuge had me officially hooked on birds for life. Instead of just hawks and falcons, I also saw songbirds, warblers, wading birds, and shorebirds! Since then, I have pursued my passion of ornithology and have strived to be the best I can be at protecting a myriad of bird species.

As I became more involved with wildlife in college, I also helped with habitat restoration projects and surveys that needed lots of volunteers. I counted spawning horseshoe crabs, planted trees, surveyed marsh birds from a boat one morning (at 4:00am!), and put up dune fencing to reduce erosion. I eventually became President of the Wildlife Society at the University of Delaware during my senior year. And in 2014, I raised over $1,000 for bird conservation through the Delmarva Ornithological Society for the Delaware Bird-A-Thon.

This past summer, I worked as a Piping Plover intern for the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service out of Ninigret National Wildlife Refuge. It was a great experience to watch endangered plovers mature from egg, to chick, to fledgling on Rhode Island beaches! I was dive-bombed by Least Terns defending their eggs and charaded by parent plovers who did a broken-wing display each time we got too close to their nests. My Rhode Island internship recently ended in mid-August, after which I gratefully accepted the offer to work on St. Marks NWR internship this fall with Red-cockaded Woodpeckers.

My goal is to keep learning as much as I can about birds and eventually attend graduate school for a Master’s degree in ornithology. These internships have allowed me to travel and live for the first time outside of Delaware. I have learned so much already about research techniques in Florida that is different from other habitat types. I would like to thank you for providing me with this chance to work with Red-cockaded Woodpeckers and guarantee I work my hardest and enjoy every moment of this fall field season!