The WFO conference in San Diego was definitely one of the best parts of my year. I loved every aspect of it, including the science talks and field trips. I think something especially memorable for me was meeting so many new people interested in birds. I met many renowned birders like Jon Dunn and Paul Lehman, who wrote the bird guide that taught me so much. But what I enjoyed most was meeting so many other people around my age who shared my passion for birds. There aren’t many kids involved in birding in my community in Houston, so getting to meet and make friends with other young birders was amazing.

I also loved all the field trips. Two will stay with me for a long time. The first was a trip to Anza-Borrego Desert State Park in the heart of the Colorado Desert. We reached there early in the morning, and temperatures had already skyrocketed to 90 degrees. We explored many different hotspots and saw multiple desert species like the Black-throated Sparrow, Black-tailed Gnatcatcher, Greater Roadrunner, Costa’s Hummingbird, Phainopepla, and what looked like a Prairie Falcon. After a few hours of intense birding in 110-degree heat, I saw 21 life birds.

Another trip that I will remember forever was my first-ever pelagic trip. This was a 10-hour boat trip departing from Mission Bay harbor targeting several pelagic species that I had never seen. It was the most exciting trip of the conference by far, and I saw many amazing species. We saw the South Polar Skua, Guadalupe Murrelet, Manx Shearwater, Cocos Booby, and Sabine’s Gull, among others. I did spend about six hours of this trip throwing up over the side of the boat, but it was all worth it in the end.

This year’s conference was my first time being involved with WFO. I am now a member of the organization and hope to attend the conference in 2025 taking place in Yakima, Washington. I learned about WFO from Board member Teresa Connell, who told me about the organization on a coastal birding trip in Texas led by Dr. Cin-ty Lee in October 2023. Dr. Lee is one of my mentors, and I met him in 2020 when he led one of his famous coastal bird walks. I got to know him better when I went on a four-day birding trip with his class to Corpus Christi. He teaches me a lot about bird migration and recognizing birds by their calls every time we meet for bird walks. He encourages young birders on the Rice University campus and in the Houston community, and I join their activities whenever I can between school and homework.

I started birding at the age of six, in early 2018. This was a difficult time for me and my mom due to personal reasons. She started taking me out to parks and woods more often to distract us. I slowly picked up a growing interest in birds, since I saw them everywhere. I had always been interested in the natural world, and birding was a great way to grow that passion. She got me a pair of binoculars, and when she bought the National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America, I started to learn everything in it. Granted, I wasn’t the best when I started, but I soon developed the hang of it. In the subsequent years, I became involved with my local birding community, taking part in bird walks, and learning a lot from my mentors and friends. Since then, I have birded everywhere I can and have a United States life list of 376 birds.

I get asked, by birders and nonbirders alike, if I have a favorite bird. The truthful answer is no. I love all birds, and I find it very difficult to choose one favorite. However, I do like birding for some types of birds more than others. I have always loved birding for seabirds, whether they be gulls, alcids, terns, or whatever else! Being from east Texas, there aren’t too many options for pelagic birding nearby, so I have always birded for seabirds from shore. Though this style of birding may be slow, it does often give you great species. I have seen Magnificent Frigatebirds, Iceland (Thayer’s) Gulls, and Sandwich Terns less than two hours away from my home. There is just something about birding near the ocean that appeals to me.

—Siddharth Bharadwaj

Siddharth Bharadwaj, a 12-year-old birder living in Houston, Texas, was the recipient of a scholarship to WFO’s 48^th Annual Conference in San Diego. During the summer of 2024, he began working with Dr. Cin-ty Lee on Empidonax identification, and is now working on a separate project on meadowlarks with Dr. Lee. Siddharth also works to raise awareness about birds colliding with windows.