The Great Backyard Bird Count

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The Great Backyard Bird Count! February 15 - 18th 

 
For four days each year in February, Audubon and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology jointly sponsor the Great Backyard Bird Count—and they need your help! It's easy to participate and the information you provide helps scientists determine how weather and disease may affect bird populations, where "irruptive" species (increasing rapidly and suddenly in number) are appearing, and how migration timing compares with previous years as well as lots of other data.
 
Here's how you can join in the effort: plan to count birds for at least 15 minutes during February 15–18, 2008. Count birds at as many places and on as many days as you like—just keep a separate list of counts for each day and/or location. Count the greatest number of individuals of each species that you see together at any one time, and write it down. Then, enter your results on the Great Backyard Bird Count website.
 
Don't forget that the Count is for all birds, from songbirds to waterfowl and birds of prey.  So, if you don't have a backyard, make a trip to the lake, beach or woods and count the birds you see there.  All the information you can gather is important. And its fun to explore the website for information collected over past years. For instance, if you want to see how a certain bird population has changed in your area, you can go to the Map room, select the bird, select your region, and compare bird populations by year. In addition, you can take a survey, learn how snow depth affects bird distribution, view the photo gallery, and learn lots of other interesting facts about the birds in your area. And this wealth of information comes from participants in the count, just like you. Be a part of it! 
 
Last year, 2007, was a record breaking year for the count.  Over 81 thousand checklists were submitted and 11,082,387 birds of 613 species were counted.  John Fitzpatrick, Director of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology stated, "Literally, there has never been a more detailed snapshot of a continental bird-distribution profile in history."
 
This year everyone would love for the numbers to be higher, as we all want to make sure our bird populations are not decreasing with the loss of habitat and pollution. Please invite your friends and family to participate and make this a stellar counting year! For more information and a downloadable checklist, visit http://www.birdsource.org/gbbc
Happy counting!

What can anyone do to keep hawks from scaring all the little birds away. Ordinarily we have lots of goldfinches, juncos, chickadees blue jays and mourning doves,etc. but the hawks have invaded our neighborhood and we see very few small birds now. Help, please.

Posted by Ginny on Saturday, February 16, 2008 08:46 AM

Ginny,

The smaller birds are most likely taking refuge in dense brush or shrubbery to protect themselves from the hawks and that's why you're not seeing them. The hawks are probably there because your feeders, and your neighbors feeders have set up a perfect ambush situation where they can find easy kills. The best thing to do is to take down your feeders; the smaller birds will be fine and not tempted to come out in the open to feed. If you must feed them, sprinkle seed under your shrubs or under brush around the perimeter of your yard where the birds can eat without being exposed to the hawks. Also, it's helpful to understand that all animals have their place in nature. Hawks serve an important service by eliminating sick or diseased birds and small rodents and keeping populations down. Once their easy food supply has been removed, the hawks will probably move on to better feeding grounds and you can put your feeders back up. It may take several weeks for this to happen.

Posted by Ocean on Tuesday, February 19, 2008 09:48 AM

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