As most all of you know, the San Vito Bird Club is actively involved in offering the Detectives de aves course in several schools each year in Coto Brus. Last year we were in 9 schools and offered the course during the winter break at finca Cántaros as well. For more information about the course you can go here.

A critical part of the curriculum is teaching the kids to use binoculars and giving them plenty of opportunity to use them to birds up close, and learn more about their behavior and how to identify them. However, we need to grow our supply of binoculars in order to add more teachers and schools, and to replace older binoculars that are no longer in good condition. We are adding at least one new teacher this year. Over the last couple of years we have had the chance to evaluate several types of binoculars for the kids and have found the Celestron Outland X 8×42 binoculars to be an excellent value and a very good performer. For between $50-$60 they are a real bargain. Up to now we have accumulated 17 pairs of these binoculars from the generous contributions and courier services of our members. I would really like to increase this to 44. This number will allow us to have two complete sets of 20 so that we can teach the course in two schools with two different teachers at the same time, plus 10% for inevitable breakage.

How can you help? We need two kinds of assistance, money and transport, and both are important. Shipping the binoculars to Costa Rica will add about 40% to the price. I would rather spend that money on more binoculars, or more classes. By far the cheapest way to get them is to buy them from Amazon, or another seller, for delivery in North America, and bring them here in small batches in personal luggage. Those of you who travel regularly to the States and Canada, or who have friends that do, can help out. You don’t need to buy the binoculars yourself, although that would also be nice! The Club can help out with the cost, but we do need your suitcase! I have created a Google form that those who can help can fill out so I can contact them directly. You can access the form here, and you can contact me with any questions here.

I will be posting regular updates on our progress on the homepage of the website. Thank you for your support.