Some of the first chilly autumn air blanketed more than 130 acres of RedGate Park in Rockville on a recent Wednesday morning. The sprawling site showed signs of its past life as a golf course, such as bunkers where grass had reclaimed the land from sand.

Cintia Cabib was strolling around paved walkways, dirt trails and grassy clearings. She was armed with her trusty Panasonic camera that was equipped with a microphone. And she directed her eyes and lens skyward.

Cabib, 64, captured bursts of still photos — just a few seconds’ worth, tops. But each frame offered the possibility of seeing a vibrant burst of color soaring through the air.

“Oh, oh, oh,” Cabib said nearly halfway through a two-hour walk, hoping she had just spotted a yellow warbler through the patch of tall trees. As the bird flew more in focus across the clear blue sky, she realized it was merely a ruby-crowned kinglet.

“I’m leading a bird walk on Saturday, so I better know what I’m talking about,” she said.

She had gone on similar walks about a hundred times at the park since December 2021, Cabib said. She was captivated by the birds, as well as the community of neighbors that rallied around RedGate Park after the golf course shuttered in 2018 to preserve it as a public space for recreation.

Cabib captured much of the saga in “Bird Walk,” a 25-minute documentary that she directed and has screened worldwide.

The next screening will take place on Oct. 5 at 2 p.m. at Rockville Memorial Library. And those who want to join Cabib and other bird enthusiasts can head to the park on Oct. 4 from 9 a.m. to noon for bird walks, native plant giveaways and, for a more intensive activity, invasive plant removal. (Asian bittersweet, a vine that wraps and smothers trees, is among a few other vines and ivies that are pervasive at RedGate.)

“Producing this type of documentary, like all the other documentaries I produced, just connects me more to the community where I live,” Cabib says of RedGate, which is about a 15-minute drive from her Potomac residence. “It introduces me to people and to neighborhoods and to places that I would have never gone to otherwise.”

Vocal allies

Cabib admitted she was using the Wednesday morning walk as a refresher to the park, where more seasoned bird-watchers have spotted more than 160 species on the premises. Before she started filming this documentary, Cabib said she hadn’t really thought too deeply about birds beyond casually appreciating them.

“I feel how vulnerable they are — how important these places are for them,” Cabib says. “They’re not just vulnerable but resilient. These tiny little birds, that I didn’t realize, they were migrating so many thousands of miles.”

Even the founder of Friends of RedGate Park, the community organization that fought against efforts to commercially develop the property, didn’t know how birds and their fans would be so vital to the preservation push.

Wayne Breslyn, who resides in the Twinbrook neighborhood of Rockville, first posted a rallying call to his neighbors on Nextdoor because he liked the idea of using RedGate for his long-distance training runs.

But some of his most vocal allies were bird-watchers after he met a few — including Cabib — at a nature walk at RedGate.

Breslyn and his organization have been collaborating with the City of Rockville on a master plan for the park that includes building a new visitor center and community gardens. He appears in “Bird Walk” and is hosting the day of activities at RedGate as part of efforts to increase awareness of the preservation work still needed.

“I think my understanding of birds has gotten much deeper,” Breslyn, 57, says. “I know where to look, what time and all that, and I truly enjoy that. I mean, to be honest, I spend a lot of time on Friends of RedGate. So, sometimes it gets to be like that’s more what I’m doing than enjoying the park.”

A chance to disconnect

Cabib has fully bought-in on birds, she says. And while walking around RedGate, she was hoping to reacquaint herself with some species, such as a kingfisher that lurked around two small ponds.

It was a perfect morning to spend a couple of hours prowling the grounds. But some of the distant sounds of dogs barking and road traffic reminded her of the difficulties she dealt with while filming “Bird Walk.” Any chance to unplug and immerse herself in nature was worthwhile.

“When I go out just for a walk around my neighborhood, everybody is talking on their phones, even if they’re walking their dogs,” Cabib says. “I’ll see a bird or I’ll hear something, and I want to point it out to them, but they’re so engrossed in what they’re doing.”

“I hope they disconnect from their smartphones and just look and hear at what’s around them — just right in front of them.”