I know lots of birders have been pleased with the facilities and habitat protections the Franklin Co Metroparks have provided in recent years. Now the parks have new leadership, and planned focus groups over the next week will give us a chance to speak on behalf of the parks' birdlife. Two new parks will be joining a system that has distinguished itself in providing encouragement and protection for birds and other wildlife, and we are invited to make sure the Parks continue to provide them habitats in the future. It seems to me that birders will want to see that wild things--birds of course, but also insects and frogs and toads and native plants, will reign in wild places that we can visit, to learn and refresh our spirits. We need much more than green expanses of moved grass and bike and running trails. I remember that a few years ago an acquisition of some corn fields by the Parks at Battelle-Darby was so well dedicated to restoration of its former state that local birders were able to add over thirty new species to that park's checklist--most of them shore- and marsh birds that have suffered in the last century or two. The Parks are many things to many users, but most of all they protect natural history, and with it human history, in ways that might otherwise be lost. Check out http://www.metroparks.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Focus-group-meetings-web.pdf to get a schedule of opportunities to make sure wild things get their rightful place in planning the expansion of our irreplaceable parks. Focus groups meet next Tuesday and Wednesday, than Monday and Wednesday of the following week. See you there, Bill Whan ______________________________________________________________________ Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society. Please consider joining our Society, at www.ohiobirds.org/site/membership.php. Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list. You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at: listserv.miamioh.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]