Costa Rican naturalist Ernesto Carman will join Bill Hilton Jr. and the first annual New River Hummingbird Festival this weekend at ACE Adventure Center. Carman is Hilton’s critical link in the chain of studying ruby-throated hummingbirds on their Central American wintering grounds, and together they form the only scientific team currently studying ruby-throats in both their summer and winter habitats.

The Hummingbird Festival is free to the public and will kick off Friday evening at 7 p.m. with a program featuring Hilton and Carman’s studies and how these birds weighing less than a nickel manage to migrate thousands of miles annually, including 500-mile crossings of the Gulf of Mexico.

Then on Saturday and Sunday (Aug. 14-15), beginning each day at 9 a.m., there will be comprehensive banding demonstrations. During these demonstrations participants will learn how the birds are captured and banded by licensed experts, their anatomy, what to do and how to report a banded bird if you find one, and some lucky attendees will even have the opportunity to hold a banded bird and their hand and release it back into the wild.

Hilton, the consulting director of the New River Birding and Nature Center at Wolf Creek Park, and Carman have been teaming up for the past several years with citizen science trips in Costa Rica and Belize. The ACE-hosted event will mark Carman’s first scientific trip to the U.S. This past week, they were working a similar event at the Land Between the Lakes Festival.

While most of his work is done at the Piedmont Center for Natural History in Rock Hill, S.C., Hilton has been doing workshops in West Virginia for many years, including the past eight at the New River Birding and Nature Festival. Three years ago, he came in to band a western migrant — a rufous hummingbird — which had been visiting a local feeder in Scarbro.

His first exposure to the Mountain State came when he was appointed as a South Carolina delegate to the National Youth Science Camp in Pocahontas County. He later served as a board member of the camp for several years.

“Bill helped us do a hummingbird event several years ago for an Elderhostel  group at Hawks Nest and he has been wanting to do something similar here for the public ever since,” said Dave Pollard, Fayette County Resource Coordinator.

“We are delighted to be able to provide this through the auspices of the Wolf Creek Birding and Nature Center and through our partnership with ACE. We have been filling feeders at the site for a number of weeks now and the birds are thick. Those who come out will most definitely have close encounters with ruby-throats and it is incredible the knowledge that Bill and Ernesto both have to share. The first time I was able to hold a hummer in my hand it was a life-changing experience,” he said.

“I encourage everyone to come out and learn about these incredible birds.”

For more information regarding the event, call Pollard at 304-574-4258 or e-mail him at goshawk@birding-wv.com.