In Search of Birds
State Park Quest Returns with Birding Theme
By Keri Luise
Maryland Park Service’s popular Park Quest program returns for its 14th year, luring visitors to explore all 23 locations in the statewide system. And this year’s program is for the birds.
Running from May 1 through Oct. 31, each state park hosts its own quest activity for guests to complete and be entered into a drawing for prizes at the conclusion of the program. There are an average of five quests per region.
This year’s Park Quest has a theme for the first time: “Spread Your Wings to Explore Maryland’s State Parks” and all of the quests will be focused on birds.
“We just thought that that would help spark some interest for our staff who have been planning some of these for over a decade,” says Melissa Boyle Acuti, chief of interpretation for the Maryland Park Service. “So changing it up to have a theme I think helped bring some enthusiasm to the program.”
This year, Park Quest will repeat their “do-it-yourself” version of the program from last year and all quests and instructions can be found online. Boyle Acuti says that this style “does make it more accessible” for more people and it has allowed the season to be extended. “You can plan your summer vacation [around the quest] if you wanted to—you could visit the mountains of western Maryland and do four or five quests while you were there.”
“[Park Quest] started with just a handful of parks on the Eastern Shore,” says Boyle Acuti. “Some of the smaller parks put together these activities, trying to encourage folks, locals or out-of-towners, to come do an activity at their park and kind of learn, find where it is, maybe do some camping in the area and stay.”
Longtime Park Quest participant Ashley Lynn of Middletown said, “We are always blown away at the efforts of park staff on each of the quests! I’m always surprised by their creativity and care.”
The program’s prize drawing will be Nov. 2. To enter, participants must complete a Google Form created by the Park Service proving that they have completed at least 12 quests by Oct. 31.
“Our prizes range from an annual pass to Maryland State Parks, which is a $75 value, to a weekend of complimentary camping, and also what I call Park Quest ‘swag’, so stickers, bandanas, magnets, those sorts of things,” says Boyle Acuti.
New Germany State Park’s Park Quest is called Birding by Ear, in which guests hike the Pink (Orchard) Trail, stopping at points of interest in order to listen for different types of birds and complete a crossword challenge.
“In Southern Maryland there’s a couple of really great ones,” Boyle Acuti says. “Cedarville State Forest is doing one called The Great Migration Challenge. You ‘become a bird’ and try to migrate and you learn a little bit more about the different hazards that birds face during migration.”
Chapman State Park, a designated Important Bird Area, has an activity called Chapman State Park Is For The Birds in which participants will visit different habitats and identify and record habitat observations and bird sightings along the way.
Pocomoke River State Park has a Bonus Quest. “We call it that because it does require a little bit extra because it is a paddle,” says Boyle Acuti. The Prothonotary Paddle leads visitors on a paddling adventure through the Great Cypress Swamp where they can uncover facts about the prothonotary warbler and what makes this habitat ideal for this unique bird species.
Ashley Lynn has been participating in Park Quest for 10 years now with her husband and three children, ages 14, 10, and 7.
“We started when the 10-year-old was 6 months old,” Lynn says. “We all participate. They are hiking pros at this point!”
Lynn says she has lots of favorite memories of “visiting all the beautiful places in Maryland and getting to know the state better, having our family working together as a team on the challenges, learning something new about history or science, a break from our day-to-day, and being adventurous!”
According to Boyle Acuti, Park Quest is “a great way to expand your world.”
“Our main goal is just to get folks…spending some time out in our parks, in nature, enjoying the fresh air and sunshine,” Boyle Acuti says. “We do hope that this will introduce more folks to our parks and maybe even camping and hiking or canoeing or kayaking, things that maybe they wouldn’t have tried without a little encouragement from a program like this.”