April's Volunteer of the Month Is...Dave Faike!
Congratulations to our April Volunteer of the Month, David Faike! David is a volunteer on the Rosy-Finch Project with a deep love of rosy-finches.
David Faike with his good friends, rosy-finches
What brought you to Sageland Collaborative and this particular project?
I’ve been feeding Rosy-Finches at my home in Challis, Idaho, for the past 25-30 winters. Some folks in the Idaho birding community knew this and a few were also aware that I’d been recording periodic observations of numbers, arrival times, and weather. So when a request for Rosy-Finch Project volunteers first hit the streets, I received multiple copies of it and, needless to say, it fit like a glove. Hooray, someone can make use of my observations!
What has been your favorite part of volunteering so far?
First of all, I’m a retiree so providing service and having purpose these days is a bit more gratifying than usual. Second, through participation in the project, I’m more dialed-in to literature about the plight of our Rosy-Finches and wishing/wanting to share some of that information with anyone who is curious and willing to listen.
Do you have any stories from the project that you'd like to share?
Rosy-Finches typically start arriving at my feeders around mid-December. Following habituation and, I suspect, hunger, they soon begin landing on my arms and feeding trowel as I pour out seed along a backyard deck rail. Birds become conditioned and even start to swarm the back door as I open it, clamoring for food.
Once, while walking with my wife and dog along the trail between our house and Hwy 93, a flock of Rosy-Finches suddenly started swarming around us and attempted to land on me. I could only imagine how strange that must have seemed to passing motorists. It was unexpected, amazing, humbling, and all I could do NOT to break into a verse or two of Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah.
Why is this work important to you? What keeps you continuing to volunteer?
For me it’s a lifestyle, probably a reflection of early mentoring I received during my formative years. As a child I went through cub scouts and boy scouts where I learned about nature, conservation, and performing volunteer work. I suspect a scouting background prompted ensuing studies of wildlife, plant ecology, forestry and entomology in college and graduate school, and why I subsequently joined myriad committees and boards in the communities my wife and I called home. I spent a career working in a land management (conservation) agency as a forester, wildlife biologist, ecologist, entomologist and silviculturist where volunteer work wasn’t just a norm, but actively encouraged.
In this realm, sharing my knowledge, skillset, appreciation and sheer joy of simply learning about nature and natural systems, the how and why various things work the way they do, and why it’s utterly important to address priority issues where we need to make positive differences is now, for me, best addressed through voluntary participation. And besides, it’s fun!
Have you learned anything interesting being a volunteer?
The following quotes are tell-alls:
Volunteers don't get paid, not because they're worthless, but because they're priceless - Sherry Anderson
Volunteers are paid in six figures: S-M-I-L-E-S - Gayla Lemaire
We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give - Winston Churchill
Volunteers do not necessarily have the time; they have the heart - Elizabeth Andrew
Service to others is the rent you pay for your room on earth – Muhammad Ali