A fledgling talent for art.

Byline: LEWIS TAYLOR The Register-Guard

Not so long ago, Noah Strycker picked up a pen and sketched a small bird on the back of a business card.

More bird business cards followed and, soon, miniature caricatures grew into full-page drawings and ball-point gave way to professional artists' pens. He drew white-crowned sparrows and downy woodpeckers and learned how to add life to his bird eyeballs and bring texture to his bird feathers.

"I never really considered myself an artist or anything," Strycker said. "I was never a standout, the kid who could draw anything. I just kind of picked it up and practiced a lot. I never really had any instruction."

What started off as doodling has evolved into a serious hobby for Strycker, whose pen-and-ink drawings of birds have been published by the American Birding Association. The 15-year-old South Eugene High junior is one of 24 Oregon artists featured in Sight & INsight, an exhibit on scientific illustration that runs through Sunday at the University of Oregon Museum of Natural History.

"Part of what I think makes Noah stand out from other young artists is that he has an artist's eye for detail. He's adept at assessing proportion and line," said Barbara Gleason, a natural science illustrator who was on the selection committee for the UO show. "Not only that, but he has a scientist's mind."

Strycker isn't the most accomplished artist in the exhibit, which includes nationally renowned illustrators who have worked for National Geographic, Audubon and other magazines, nor is he the only student artist (UO undergraduate Deanna Dartt is also in the show). But he's the youngest featured artist, and his age makes him a standout in a field that's not exactly dominated by teen-agers.

"There are some very talented and well-known artists in this show, and the idea was to give a scope of what the field was like," said Cindi Budlong, exhibit coordinator. "We liked the idea of showing people that there are new talents coming up in the field."

Elaine Hodges, a scientific illustrator who moved to Eugene in 1997 after retiring from the Smithsonian Institution's Department of Entomology, first saw Strycker's drawings two years ago. A featured artist in the UO show, Hodges was among those who encouraged Strycker to submit his drawings for the exhibit.

"I thought he had a lot of talent," Hodges said. "I think it's unusual to have a person his age get involved with the professionals."

Strycker isn't only a bird illustrator, but also a serious birder who takes birding trips halfway across the state, collects birds in his freezer and snaps photographs of birds from inside a camouflage "bird blind."

He wears bird T-shirts and collects bird books, and a bird clock in his bedroom chimes off the calls of an Eastern Bluebird, a Western Meadowlark and 10 other birds. And speaking of calls, Strycker has become so familiar with the chirps and tweets of the birds on his family's property that he can recognize most of them by sound without ever seeing them.

"It's just fun to go out and not know what you're going to find. It's a challenge, and I've always liked challenges," Strycker said. "I like the listing aspect, where you go out and basically just try to see as many different kinds as you can."

Strycker keeps lots of lists, including tallies of the birds he's seen in Lane County (175 species), the birds he's seen in Oregon (250 species) and the birds he's seen throughout his life (297 species). His "life list" should get a lot longer this spring, when he takes a trip to the birding haven of San Blas, Mexico, with his parents, both of whom, by the way, had little to do with sparking their son's initial interest in birds.

In fact, Strycker's propensity for feathered creatures was inspired by a fifth-grade teacher who placed a bird feeder in front of a classroom window.

"Every time a bird came, she would stop class and we'd identify it and I thought that was pretty cool," Strycker recalled. `I don't think anybody got into it like I did. I just thought, `Wow, you can look at these birds and identify them and learn stuff about them.' '

Strycker's father, Bob Keefer (a Register-Guard features reporter), has become somewhat engulfed by his son's hobby and he's been known to accompany him on his birding adventures. When a rare Cassin's Kingbird was spotted several months ago, Keefer drove his son to Portland, and, last summer, he even helped gather road kill to attract turkey vultures.

Strycker's mother, Lisa, a data analyst at the Oregon Research Institute, takes a more hands-off approach. She has yet to become a part of the birding subculture, but she's watched with a mix of amusement and amazement as her son's interest in birds has continued to grow.

"I think it's great. He's one of those really lucky people who find their passion early in their lives," she said. "He never seems to tire of working and working hard on his birding stuff because it's completely his own work, it's completely inside of himself."

If there's a common characteristic to Strycker's bird drawings, it's a sense of liveliness and movement, a result, his mother says, of his careful study of birds. Although he draws mostly in pen and ink, his renderings don't seem to be lacking color, and, even though he sketches mostly from photographs, his drawings appear as glimpses of birds in action instead of moments frozen in time.

Lately, Strycker has been experimenting with watercolor and gouache, an opaque style of watercolor, and he's been submitting more of his bird drawings, photographs and writings for publication.

A story he wrote on backyard birding is expected to be published in Oregon Coast magazine early next year, and three of his drawings will appear on the cover of a resource guide to be published by the American Birding Association in February.

Last year, Strycker applied for the Young Birder of the Year Award, an accolade handed out by the ABA. Although he didn't win, the association placed his drawing of an Eastern Kingbird on the cover of its annual Opportunities For Birders publication, a manual circulated nationwide and sent to the association's 22,000 members.

"He's a very talented young man," said Lina DiGregorio, education and conservation coordinator for the group. "I think he depicts behavior in birds well. There's sort of a feeling of being alive that comes off the page."

This year, Strycker is up for the Young Birder of the Year award again and he should know the results by January. Looking ahead, he sees more bird drawings in his future even though he's not quite ready to call it a profession just yet.

"Who knows, maybe this will become my career, maybe not," Strycker said. "Maybe I'll become a tennis pro. I think it would be really fun though if I could do this."

SIGHT & INSIGHT

What: Exhibit on scientific illustrations

Where: University of Oregon Museum of Natural History, 1680 E. 15th Ave.

Hours: Noon to 5 p.m. through Dec. 23 (closed Monday)

Admission: Suggested donation of $2; UO students and museum members free

CAPTION(S):

BRIAN DAVIES / The Register-Guard "I was never a standout, the kid who could draw anything. I just kind of picked it up and practiced a lot. I never really had any instruction," Strycker says of his illustrations. The Lincoln's sparrow (left), the sage sparrow and the black-backed woodpecker are among Noah Strycker's detailed bird drawings.