This is how we make a difference. More than 2,500 important bird areas designated by Audubon identify, prioritize and protect vital bird habitat from coast to coast in partnership with BirdLife International. Our IBA conservation efforts support species and their habitats across the Western Hemisphere. The Audubon Society is best known for the efforts of its chapters to promote bird watching and create local and backyard habitats for birds.
Audubon's Important Bird Areas program has protected 370 million acres along migratory bird routes in the United States and is a key part of Audubon's work with BirdLife International and other conservationists around the world. When the Audubon Society was first formed in 1886, tuft hunters were decimating North American bird populations in the name of fashion. Over the decades, the Audubon Society expanded its mission of protecting birds from plume hunters to lobby for federal policies on air, water and endangered species. The Theodore Roosevelt Sanctuary and the Audubon Center in Oyster Bay, New York, were donated to New York Audubon in 1923 by Emlen Roosevelt and Christine Roosevelt in memory of their cousin, who is buried in the adjacent Youngs Memorial Cemetery.
The Audubon Society helped create the first Federal Bird Reserve, which ultimately led to the formation of the National Wildlife Refuge System. Even before Grinnell's Audubon Society was organized, the American Union of Ornithologists, founded in 1883, was aware of the dangers faced by many birds in the United States. Cory, the elected president of the AOU, refused to attend a meeting of the Audubon Society of the District of Columbia stating that he does not protect birds. With that 10-acre donation, Wright created Birdcraft Sanctuary, the country's first private songbird shelter, and literally laid the foundation for the Connecticut Audubon Society.
While the National Audubon Society focuses on large-scale issues, such as restoring ecosystems, protecting the Endangered Species Act, and maintaining the restrictions of the Clean Air Act and the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act, the organization also encourages grassroots initiatives to protect birds and other wildlife. Many members of the Audubon Society participate in the annual Christmas bird count, a voluntary census of bird populations. The Connecticut Audubon Society received its first land grant in 1914 thanks to the generosity of philanthropist Annie Burr Jennings of Fairfield. Currently, the Audubon Society funds conservation programs for birds, but it also encourages initiatives to control invasive species, manage the human population through family planning, and protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The activities of the Audubon Society are responsible for many laws that establish gaming commissions and hunting guardian forces, or prohibit the sale of game. But John James Audubon's career as a scientific illustrator of birds made his name a natural choice for an ornithological society.
