Edward C. (Ted) Beedy passed away unexpectedly on March 28, 2025.  Ted was a devoted father and husband and dedicated much of his adult life to the study and conservation of tricolored blackbirds.

Ted received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees from the University of California, Davis. He studied Tricolored Blackbirds for more than 40 years and was active in efforts to conserve wetland and upland habitats in the Central Valley and foothills of the Sierra Nevada for tricolors and other native bird species. It was Ted who conceived of the idea of the Statewide Survey in the late 1980s as a means to estimate the population of tricolored blackbirds in California.

Ted was the senior author of the Birds of the World treatment of tricolored blackbird, and the co-author of Birds of the Sierra Nevada, Discovering Sierra Birds, and Hansen’s Field Guide to the Birds of the Sierra Nevada. Ted started his own biological consulting firm in Nevada City, California, in 2006, following a more than 20 year career as senior biologist at Jones & Stokes in Sacramento.

The 2025 Tricolored Blackbird Statewide Survey is dedicated to the life and work of Ted Beedy.