It’s a breezy Sunday in March and the St. Augustine Fowl Membership is assembly up at Masters Tract, a stormwater remedy facility recognized to locals as a birding hotspot. The group at this time is made up of seven younger adults of their twenties and thirties, and somewhat than an organized chapter subject journey, this outing feels extra like a bunch of mates assembly up. There’s not an apparent journey chief — everybody speaks as much as level out what they see, and the place to go subsequent is a bunch choice. Highlights of the journey embody a Peregrine Falcon and a white peacock butterfly. For membership founder Taza Jenkins, this informal meetup is a dream come true.
When then-28-year-old Jenkins moved again to their native St. Augustine in early 2025 after years within the Pacific Northwest, they had been prepared for an enormous change. The lifelong nature-lover was residing with a continual sickness and escaping an abusive relationship by which they had been not often allowed to go exterior. “I regarded out the window all day, on daily basis, watching the birds,” they are saying. “I knew there was a birder model of me someplace beneath all of the distress however I didn’t suppose I had the time for the trouble I knew I’d wish to put into it.” They started birding in 2022 in Seattle, and located it to be an amazing outlet for stress.
Shifting again to Florida gave Jenkins the push to pursue birding additional, each as a person passion and because the founding father of St. Augustine Fowl Membership. Jenkins’ preliminary concept was to create a welcoming, inclusive group modeled after the Feminist Fowl Membership (FBC) chapters they obtained to know within the Pacific Northwest. FBC’s mission is to “promote inclusivity in birding whereas fundraising and offering a secure alternative for members of the LGBTQIA+ neighborhood, BIPOC, and girls to attach with the pure world.” St. Augustine Fowl Membership held its first occasion in March 2025.
On the similar time, Jenkins had additionally been attending St. Johns Regional Audubon conferences. Impressed with Jenkins’ initiative, SJRA president Amy Koch invited them to hitch the board of administrators in Could of that 12 months. Hesitant at first, Jenkins accepted, realizing the place would enable them to develop as a birder and produce new sources to Fowl Membership.
With the speedy development of birding as a passion for millennials and Gen Z lately, St. Augustine Fowl Membership supplies an area for this demographic to satisfy up and get extra concerned with out making the dedication to a chapter, the place it may be intimidating to hitch such a longtime group. Fowl Membership has round 30 members, and no dues, no strict tasks, and no expectations. All a potential member wants to hitch is a need to be in nature with others. Due to the collaborative nature of Fowl Membership and SJRA, members can slowly get extra concerned with the chapter as they really feel extra comfy. Jenkins says there’s no competitors between Fowl Membership and SJRA, however somewhat a collaboration. When SJRA president Amy Koch meets younger individuals simply getting began with birding, she connects them to Fowl Membership. “We get a lot help from SJRA. It’s actually encouraging,” says Jenkins. Likewise, Fowl Membership has helped SJRA recruit extra volunteers to work on chapter tasks.
For Jenkins, Fowl Membership has offered neighborhood once they wanted it most. On the first SJRA assembly they attended, Jenkins met Liz Cernik, then a Conservation Management Initiative scholar with the chapter. The pair turned inseparable after that, and Cernik is now Jenkins’ proper hand in terms of organizing Fowl Membership outings, together with Linda Brown, one other SJRA member. In fall 2025, Hattie Odell joined the group, rounding out an preliminary “board of administrators.” Odell now leads month-to-month outings just like the one at Masters Tract.
A web site is in Jenkins’ speedy plans, however for now, the group’s Instagram account serves as each a scrapbook and an occasions calendar, with flyers for upcoming occasions and picture carousels from previous meetups shared each few days. Jenkins, an artist, designs all of the flyers and created the membership’s emblem.
In its first 12 months, St. Augustine Fowl Membership has had some thrilling alternatives: in September 2025, they led hen outings as a part of the Sing Out Loud music pageant, in partnership with Dwell Wildly, a conservation nonprofit. The membership additionally participated within the St. Augustine Satisfaction Parade final summer season and took a subject journey to the Florida Museum of Pure Historical past in Gainesville to sketch hen specimens from the museum’s ornithology assortment. Native birding occasions happen a minimum of as soon as a month, usually extra.
As St. Augustine Fowl Membership continues to develop, Jenkins has no scarcity of concepts. They’re searching for funding to buy binoculars and different gear to mortgage to new members, and by providing all kinds of occasions — from group volunteer days to film nights — they hope to develop a wider membership base. The collaborative spirit of St. Augustine Fowl Membership and St. Johns Regional Audubon is a mannequin for the way forward for the birding neighborhood: intergenerational, inclusive, and simple to get pleasure from.
