Pictured above: Festival-goers enjoy the wonderful Fields of Flight Council Bluffs annual Hot Air Balloon Rally. Environment FLORA & FAUNA Wildlife: Council Bluffs enjoys a pleasant temperate climate. The city sits alongside a large river, natural lakes, and forested bluffs. This environmentally-rich setting brings an array of wildlife. Falcons, turkey vultures, and hawks soar on the thermals above the bluffs. At times, over a hundred of these giant noble birds of prey dance upon the summer air - a magnificent sight indeed. Mourning doves, cardinals, bluejays, redwing blackbirds, weaver finches, bright-orange orioles, and numerous other songbirds greet the coming day with lively tunes, while hummingbirds and hovering hawk-moths (which appear at first glance to be hummingbirds) dart to and fro as they feed from flower to flower. Raccoons, possums, rabbits, turtles, and white-tailed deer wander the forests of the city. Two kinds of squirrels race along the branches - the well-known gray variety and the indigenous black variety, rare in the world but so abundant in Council Bluffs as to be the official city animal mascot (dubbed Chipper). Sea gulls, having travelled far up the river from the Gulf, swoop over the lakes while swans and ducks with ducklings swim and wander the shores. In fall and spring, flocks of migrating Canadian geese honk overhead as if to greet Council Bluffians far below, while bald eagles visit the lakes and river banks. In summer, butterflies are plentiful; some as large as your hand, and an orchestra of crickets and cicadids sing their ancient lullaby at twilight, joined by the occasional hooting of owls. There are also many "storybook" creatures such as carefree ladybugs, nimble dragonflies, dignified walkingsticks, harmless praying mantises, and the playful glow of friendly fireflies that appear like rising embers from a magic green fire set adrift at nightfall. PROTECTION Conservation: Council Bluffs Trees Forever helps provide low-cost trees to area residents and municipal beautification projects, while Pottawattamie County Pheasants Forever and Pottawattamie Bowhunters work on habitat and wildlife conservation, as does the Council Bluffs Fish and Game Club. Recycling: Council Bluffs has environmentally-friendly recycling with six collection sites distributed around town as well as regularly-scheduled curbside recycling done in city-supplied containers. The fantastic Council Bluffs Recycling Center is the only facility of its kind in the region.