Note: Celeste Hinds is an expert birder and well-loved birding trip leader. Starting Jan. 23, she will be teaching a course for beginning and intermediate birders for ESILL, the Eastern Shore Institute for Lifelong Learning.

FAIRHOPE, Ala. — In the 1930s, buying oatmeal in bulk meant my mom was the recipient of special premiums, premiums that included cute little candy dishes and an occasional deck of cards. My sisters loved the dishes, and my brothers fought over the baseball cards. Being the youngest of eight, I was left with the bird cards, and nothing could have pleased me more. Those bird cards helped to inspire my lifelong pursuit of watching birds.

As a child, from those bird cards I corrected my siblings when they called a red-headed woodpecker a “peckerwood.” What they said was a “pulldoo” was really an American coot, and not all blue birds were bluebirds; some were indigo buntings and blue groesbeaks. Bluebirds often had rusty breasts and white under-parts, and the females weren’t blue at all.

My sisters were proper ladies of the South, while I was a tomboy who preferred climbing trees to tea parties. I should have pursued a career in natural history or ornithology. But no, I studied business, knowing all along I really wanted to hike the woods and study birds and plants and rocks.

My only recourse was to plan our family vacations around birding hotspots. During those getaways, I was seldom seen without binoculars around my neck. But then it was back to the office where I anxiously awaited the weekend promise of avocets and stilts on the Bolivar Flats of Texas.

I got in the habit of reading field guides, spending time with fellow birders and enjoying Saturday field trips to places like High Island, Texas and Madera Canyon, Ariz. While professional ornithology wasn’t in the cards for me, inspiring others to enjoy nature became a great reward for all the hours of desk work.

After retiring in Fairhope about 15 years ago, I began to bird places like Fort Morgan, Polecat Bay and Dauphin Island, major destinations for avid birders. I found that Alabama’s many inland bays and waterways support wading and shorebirds ideal for birding field trips.

If you still call any blue bird a bluebird and would like to learn more, perhaps you would enjoy the birding classes I will be teaching this winter for ESILL, the Eastern Shore Institute of Lifelong Learning. Classes begin Jan. 23. The cost is $60 for six sessions, which includes four field trips.

E-mail Hindsite5@bellsouth.net or call 928-6526 to sign on or for more details.