‘Put a Bird on It’

What’s rarer than spotting a snow goose, yellow-headed blackbird, summer tanager, or even chestnut-collared longspur out here in western Massachusetts, far outside of their usual ranges?

Getting the typical college student out of bed early enough to see them. 

Leave it to Smithies to do the unexpected: Early on a frigid morning shortly after spring break, a dozen or so members of the Uncommon Tits, Smith’s chapter of Audubon on Campus, meet at the top of the boathouse (or should we say “birdhouse”) stairs overlooking Paradise Pond. Armed with binoculars, field guides, and high spirits, they try their luck at catching a glimpse of some of the birds who call the campus home.

“I started going on [the bird walks] when I was a first-year,” says club co-president Brigitte Walla ’26. “I really, really loved it and didn’t skip a single one. There are so many birds, even just around campus, that I never even knew existed just because you have to look a little harder to find them, and I thought that was so fun.”

Originally called the Smith College Audubon Society, the bird watching club was co-founded by alum Florence Merriam Bailey 1886. After learning that roughly five million birds were killed each year so their feathers could be used to decorate hats, Bailey created the club to spread the word and hopefully end the practice. By the time she left Smith it’s said that one-third of the student population had denounced feather hats.

“[Bailey] went on to be a huge figure in bird conservation,” Walla says. “She was really the authority on birds of the west, and wrote one of the first books that was aimed at introducing people who weren’t ornithologists to birdwatching.”

Walla has become something of an expert on Bailey’s work. An article she wrote about the alum and her legacy—and how those ideas have shaped Walla's own plans for the future—was accepted by Audubon magazine and is set to be published later this year.

It’s a pretty great graduation gift for Walla, who is set to earn her degree in May in biological sciences with a concentration in biodiversity, ecology, and conservation.

As immersed as she is in all things avian at Smith, Walla—who grew up in northern New Jersey and would whale watch in Brooklyn—says her interest in birds is relatively recent. “When I decided to come [to Smith], I was like, ‘Okay, I’m going to be inland, so I need something to watch and not just be sad that I’m not going to see whales for four years,” she says.

A quick Instagram search led her to the Uncommon Tits, and just like that, Walla’s decision on her next favorite animal was made.

While there’s no such bird as an uncommon tit, the club’s name is inspired by birds within the Paridae family. Called chickadees here in North America, they’re broadly referred to as tits in the rest of the world. According to Abigail Dustin ’23, one of the club’s original co-founders who led its revitalization back in 2019, “The name felt funny and approachable, referenced an accessible bird to see as a sort of mascot for the club, and made the club feel special.”

In addition to leading bird walks (Fridays at 7:30 a.m. and Sundays at 4 p.m.), Walla and her fellow club members host events in collaboration with other organizations and offices. For a recent Birds of Prey event with the Wurtele Center for Collaborative Leadership, the club assisted in a visit by a handful of raptors to campus, and shared with attendees how those birds embody different characteristics of leadership. The club has also organized trips to the Kestrel Land Trust in Amherst and Berkshire Bird Observatory in Great Barrington.

Smith bird watchers hope to support more conservation-related efforts via trips to monitor and record the behaviors of nesting birds at a local National Wildlife Refuge, organizing an invasive plant species removal day, and participating in letter-writing campaigns to support local conservation initiatives.

As an offshoot project, Walla and club treasurer Rochele Worth ’26 are also finishing installation of new signage for trails along the college’s MacLeish Field Station. Each sign will feature an avian illustration by Walla, paired with a poem by Worth, as well as a QR code visitors can scan for more information.

It all makes for a rebranded and revived bird-watching club that’s sure to have made Bailey proud.

While it’s difficult for Walla to narrow down her bucket list bird (“I honestly just get excited for any bird I get to see”), her favorite part of being a member of the Uncommon Tits comes easy.

“Just knowing that people are [at our events] because they want to, because they’ve intentionally chosen to learn about [birds],” she says. “I appreciate it and love it so much because I am like that, and I love seeing that in other people too.”