Looking for a great winter or family nature activity? Join the Audubon Society and Cornell Lab of Ornithology‘s Great Backyard Bird Count Friday-Monday, February 13-16, anywhere in the world. Anyone can participate, even if you only have 15 minutes and are completely new to birding.
Here’s how it works: You can pick a spot to go watch birds (a backyard, a park, a trail, a marsh, or anywhere you think birds might be) or you can join an organized event. You can download a very thorough check list of birds that are likely to be seen in your area. You record the birds that you see and then go home and either send in your checklist or enter the names and numbers in online.
There are lots more tips about counting and recording birds, tricky identifications, binoculars, and much more on BirdSource’s Great Backyard Bird Count page. The site also features recordings of bird sounds and more activities for kids.
The All About Birds site has beautiful photos and information that can help you identify birds. These are the top birds that were reported during the count last year.
So, why count birds in the first place, and why now? The Cornell Ornithology Lab, the Audubon Society and others use the information from the annual February count to track the health of various bird species over time and, in some cases, take steps to protect them. Mid-February has proven a good time to count, as it occurs just before the major Spring migrations. If you find you like counting, you can actually help year-round on various projects.
Last year 142,000 bird watchers from 135 countries documented nearly 4,300 species–or about 43% of all the bird species in the world! This year you could be part of the Great Backyard Bird Count.
Read about and see pictures of the 2010 Great Backyard Bird Count.
Make a valentine feeder for the birds.
Get ideas for other great citizen science projects like Project Feeder Watch.
Photos: Painted Bunting and Green Honeycreeper by Doug Janson, Flame Colored Tanager by Jerry Oldenettel, Blue Jay: Creative Commons, Northern Spotted Owl by Susan Sachs Lipman
