The City of Opelika, the Wood Duck Nature Preserve of Opelika, AO Tourism and Red Clay Brewing Company will host a watch party on July 22 from 4 p.m. – 6 p.m. at Red Clay. The Opelika Wood Duck Nature Preserve is going to be featured on National Geographic’s "Extraordinary Birder with Christian Cooper" – the Alabama episode. The episode airs July 22 at 7 p.m. but can also be streamed on Hulu and Disney+.
Barry Fleming, President of the Alabama Ornithological Society and Opelika resident says, “It was a pleasure for us to share Alabama's wide variety of birds and habitats with Christian Cooper and the National Geographic film crew. I think the episode represents well the state, the state's wonderous birds, and the happy people here that work on behalf of the birds."
Several of the co-hosts from the episode will be in attendance at the watch party. The event is open to the public. The first hour will be a Meet & Greet, while the second hour will be the viewing of the episode (it runs for 60 minutes).
The National Geographic TV series ‘Extraordinary Birder with Christian Cooper’ features the bountiful birding of Alabama. The show features several experts from east Alabama and one section was filmed in Opelika’s Wood Duck Nature Preserve. In fact, the whole TV crew stayed in Opelika during the filming.
From swallow-tailed kites in Alabama’s Black Belt to the loggerhead shrikes, called butcher birds locally, and endangered red-cockaded woodpeckers of the Coastal Plain, to the wood duck, a secretive and extraordinarily beautiful bird in the Piedmont, Christian Cooper immersed himself deep in Alabama’s rich and biologically diverse ecosystem, and experiences the work Alabamians are doing to assist the continuing richness of our avian abundance and diversity.
There will be light refreshments; however, attendees will be responsible for purchasing their own beverages from Red Clay.