Monday, February 16, 2015

Great Backyard Bird Count

(wood duck in back yard retention pond)

Today is the last day for the 2015 Great Backyard Bird Count. This is an annual joint project between Audubon and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. As the website says:

Launched in 1998 by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and National Audubon Society, the Great Backyard Bird Count was the first online citizen-science project to collect data on wild birds and to display results in near real-time.
Since then, more than 100,000 people of all ages and walks of life have joined the four-day count each February to create an annual snapshot of the distribution and abundance of birds.

(Loggerhead shrike at the local shopping center)

All you need is 15 minutes of your time! Anyone can do it - and it needn't be in your yard. You can watch birds at home, at school, at the park, at the local shopping center. Thousands of reports have been submitted already just since this past Friday. Today is the last chance for 2015 so get out and look at birds today. If today doesn't work for you then set your sights on 2016 and we'll do it again.