Kristen Johnson - 2025

Kristen Johnson’s passion for birds began at an early age, thanks to her mother who introduced her to birding. Since then, birding has become a lifelong pursuit, shaping Kristen into a skilled naturalist, photographer, and field researcher. She recently graduated summa cum laude from Mount Holyoke College with a double major in Biology and Music and plans to continue her ornithological studies in graduate school.

Kristen has contributed more than 5,700 checklists, 6,100 photographs, and 100 audio recordings to eBird. Her deep commitment to avian science is evident in her extensive experience with bird banding, including over 15 years working with passerines, Purple Martins, and Northern Saw-whet Owls. Her fieldwork has taken her to saltmarshes and beaches along the East Coast, where she has monitored vulnerable species such as Saltmarsh and Nelson’s Sparrows, and Piping Plovers. Her senior thesis at Mount Holyoke focused on avian predators of Piping Plovers on Fire Island, and she presented her findings at the international Waterbird Society Meeting in 2022.

At the Kachemak Bay Shorebird Festival, Kristen’s presentation, Banding Resighting: Citizen Scientist Involvement, shared her long-standing enthusiasm for tracking banded birds. With stories ranging from elusive Least Sandpipers to a legendary American Oystercatcher last seen in 2015, Kristen illustrated how resighting banded birds reveals powerful insights into migration, longevity, and behavior. She encouraged attendees to see birding as a global scavenger hunt—one that allows anyone to participate in conservation and scientific discovery.