Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary Volunteers Sharon and Dick Stilwell were recognized as Audubon Florida 2019 Volunteers of the Year at the annual Audubon Assembly awards held October 25 in Gainesville.
Here is the text of the nomination letter:
Staff, fellow volunteers and visitors to Corkscrew consider it a joy to be around Sharon and Dick. There may be better birders – but if there are, we haven’t come across them yet.
Sharon and Dick have been active volunteers at Corkscrew since March 2006. Although they are seasonal, splitting time between West Des Moines, Iowa and Bonita Springs, together they have amassed more than 4,700 career service hours. Both have plates on the Sanctuary’s Career Service Hours recognition plaque inside the Blair Audubon Visitor Center.
Both serve as:
- Boardwalk Naturalists on Sundays.
- Guides on the specialty Early Birding Walks, a three-hour birding tour for beginners and experts alike.
- Leaders of the Backcountry Buggy Tours to parts of Corkscrew that aren’t open to the public. These are one of the most popular events for Corkscrew’s donors. (Dick drives, Sharon narrates.)
- Members of the Cypress Council since 2014, the Sanctuary’s highest level of donors.
In addition, Sharon serves on the Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary Sustainability Board. During a planning session in June on the future of Corkscrew with architectural consultants, Dick and Sharon flew in so that Sharon could serve as a board representative.
This is the second year in a row that a Corkscrew volunteer has been named Audubon Florida Volunteer of the Year. In 2018, Jean McCollom was honored. Read about her award here.
