Welcome, all new members. And welcome back current members.

For the opening meeting of the 2024-25 season, we invited all island residents to join us – to learn what the club is all about, listen to our committee members talk about what they do for the club, and meet some members. We had 8 visitors and most of them signed up on the spot!

Cindy started us off (taking Sue’s place) by describing our Monthly Special Speaker meetings.

Jack introduced Workshops ( sitting in for Kimberly ), Photo Walks & Small groups.

Nima followed Jack with a new program to explore further away this year, starting with Birds of Prey this Oct 30th, including potential visits to Caw Caw and Lake Moultrie, and as far away as The Aligator Farm in Florida.

Joe subbed for Sylvia and gave us 5 reasons to join the club: Fun, Good Value, Social, Learning, and Fun! again. Joe also manned the membership table, and was busy with our new members signing up on the spot!

Tina introduced Monthly Challenges & we showed the challenge slideshow from last May “Fun on Kiawah (and other places)”

Linda then gave us a 20-minute overview of using your iPhone, which everyone participated in.

Pam talked about her enthusiasm for the club and the necessity of preserving our bird population.

Susan Calkins finalized the formal presentations with her intro to the club’s Instagram account and encouraged everyone to join the program.

Pam’s slideshow on birds was shown on a loop for the rest of the meeting, while we broke to get coffee & snacks (thanks, Linda). Visitors had a chance to ask questions of the various presenters, and members got a chance to say hello & catch up.