Kathy Brooks
904-277-4507
[email protected]
May 20, 2016 9:00 a.m.
The 10th annual Wild Amelia Nature Festival will provide island residents and visitors of all ages many opportunities to get up close and personal with the critters that call Amelia Island and its waters their home. The Festival will be held from Friday, May 20 through Sunday, May 22 at venues on and around Amelia Island. Ecotours, special events, and the Expo at the Atlantic Recreation Center from 10-4 on
Saturday, May 21 will bring festival-goers opportunities to see and even touch some wild things. These opportunities include—but are not limited to—a sea turtle release, programs on bats, and multiple exhibits of live animals at the Expo.
Kicking off the Festival will be the release of a rehabilitated sea turtle at 11:30 a.m. on Friday, May 20th, at Main Beach. The Georgia Sea Turtle Center, a partner of Wild Amelia, will send a now healthy sea turtle back to its ocean home. The public is invited to attend this heartwarming event and wish the turtle well.
As part of the Festival celebration, Shari Clark of Bat Belfrys will present multiple programs on bats. In addition to visiting area schools throughout Festival week, Shari will conduct a “Bat Chat” open to the public on Monday, May 16, from 7-9 p.m. at the Fort Clinch Visitor Center meeting room. There will be complimentary gate access after 6:30 p.m. Shari will give insight into the lifestyles, benefits, and perils of our native bat populations. Ms. Clark will have live bats with her for this program. Also, as part of the Festival ecotours, Shari will lead a “Bat Trek” on Saturday, May 21, from 7-9 p.m. at Egans Creek Greenway behind the Atlantic Avenue Recreation Center and will have sonar detectors to help locate bats on the walk. Call 904-310-3350 x1 to pre-register. Fees of $10 per person/$15 per couple/$20 per family will be donated to bat conservation.
The May 21 Wild Amelia Nature Festival Expo will also have many live animals for guests to see. Thisyear, Sea Mobile—or more properly, the Gulf Specimen Marine Lab Sea Mobile—an educational traveling exhibit– will be part of Wild Amelia’s Kid’s Niche on the lawn on the Atlantic Recreation Center. This Sea Mobile includes 5 large touch tanks with starfish, sea urchins, conchs, crabs, sponges, and a variety of other sealife that children can touch. Other aquariums are filled with other sealife as well, and there are educational videos that accompany the critters in Sea Mobile, too.
Don’t miss out on these opportunities to get up close and personal with the wild things: come to the 10th annual Wild Amelia Nature Festival from May 20-22, 2016. For more specific information about the Festival programs, please visit www.wildamelia.com and Wild Amelia on Facebook.
Wild Amelia is an all-volunteer nonprofit organization whose mission is to educate residents of and visitors to Amelia Island about the wild places and wildlife of the island.