Tweeting Bird Boxes at Freshkills Park
Freshkills Park is developing a unique digital app that will broadcast the ongoing ecological restoration of the Park and create new potentials in the field of scientific research. The launch of the app will highlight a research project investigating the health of the Park’s cavity nesting birds like tree swallows and house wrens.
In this first phase, two bird boxes will be outfitted with sensors that detect a bird’s comings and goings. When the sensor is triggered, a message “from the bird” will be sent to Twitter followers along with a photograph. The message will also direct to a live feed of the interior of the bird box.
This initial project will be the start of a much larger project, including technology workshops for youth to build the “live tweeting” bird boxes. As the project grows, it will serve as a way for Freshkills Park staff to share the restoration outcomes (such as the return of bird species) with the public, and get youth excited about using technology to spend more time interacting with nature and the outdoor world.
Thanks to more than fifty donations, we exceeded our ioby campaign goal to fund the project, raising $3,884 in less than two months! With the generous support of the community and the National Endowment for the Arts, our birds will be tweeting to the public in the spring of 2016.
