Last year, birdwatchers in Canada and the United States submitted more than 97,200 checklists and saw more than 602 different species of birds. The collected data is used by scientists to track migration patterns and spot trends in bird populations. In 2010, the American Robin was the bird most commonly sighted; the Red-billed Tropicbird made it onto the list for the first time.
Want to participate? It's easy! You need to count birds for at least 15 minutes on one or more days of the survey and then enter your data online. You can download a tally sheet for birds in your geographic area here and look for special GBBC events near your home. There's even a flickr group where you can upload your bird photos taken during the count. And if you are snapping pics, be sure to participate in this year's photo contest (you can win prizes!).
Get ready to identify birds by taking this sound quiz (love the title, "Guess Who's Squawkin'!") and visiting the online bird guide from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, with profiles of over 550 species. And don't worry if, like me, you can't identify every bird that you spot during your count. There's a special box to check on the survey if that's the case. Be sure to download a participation certificate (this is a .pdf file) after you've completed your count!
Years ago, Itinerant Cryptographer purchased this birdhouse for me on one of his many trips to California. For the past several years, we had placed it on a low-hanging branch in front of our house. One year, a bird finally showed interest and filled it with twigs. Unfortunately, said bird also spotted our dog, loud and barking, and fled soon after. I emptied out the twigs, but the birdhouse remained vacant.
After we moved, I hung the birdhouse out back. We don't have any trees in our yard, so a wooden slat was the closest thing that I could find. After hanging outside for a year, I finally noticed a medium-sized songbird taking an interest in the birdhouse. I called to Kerm excitedly.
"Look! Look at that bird! He's checking out our birdhouse."
Kerm and I watched the bird for some time. He went inside the birdhouse and poked his head out, scanning this way and that.
"He's checking out the house, just like we did!" said Kerm.
The bird climbed on top of the birdhouse.
"Look, he climbed the stairs," announced Kerm.
On the roof of the birdhouse, the bird craned its neck to take a good look around and poked his head through the slats of the fence.
"He's checking out the neighbors!" said Kerm, laughing.
I'm not sure if our visitor will be back. I walked back to the birdhouse tonight and peeked inside. The house is still vacant. Like so many other homes today, this one may require several "walk-throughs" before we get a permanent resident. But if we do, I'll follow up with another picture. Next time, I might even manage to identify the type of bird!
This week, I was pleased to find Smell Like Dirt, a blog devoted to helping us reconnect with nature. Along with the great Pileated Woodpecker footage I found for last Wednesday's post, Smell Like Dirt has over 25 short nature videos on topics like birding, composting, and gardening. If you live near Charlotte, North Carolina, be sure to check the blog frequently to find environmental classes taught by Carol Buie-Jackson, a Smell Like Dirt blogger, Habitat Steward, and Master Composter (I didn't even know there was such a thing!).
Here, Ms. Buie-Jackson shares tips for creating a wildlife habitat in your backyard:
I was nursing baby "Princess" the other morning, stuffed into a comfy chair relaxing, when I heard a huge thwack at the window. I was nose to beak with a large bird, a woodpecker with red, white, and black plumage. Since I'm a nature lover, I was thrilled. This is our first spring in our new house and I didn't realize that I would get to observe birds quite this closely. I was so excited about my bird that I just had to tell almost-eight year old Kerm.
"I know," he told me. "I saw it pecking on the fence in our backyard at breakfast."
"What kind of bird do you think it is?" I asked. "Let's get out your bird book and look it up."
Well, this is where our problem started. We opened up Kerm's copy of Bill Thompson III'sThe Young Birder's Guide (which we own courtesy of our friends at 10,000 Birds as per this post, but that's another story), and Kerm and I realized that we disagreed on what the woodpecker looked like. I said that it had a red head and black wings. Kerm said the wings were black mixed with white. So, we couldn't identify which bird we had seen, which was very disappointing since it was a truly striking bird.
However, a line that I read in Thompson's book stayed with me. He suggests that you shouldn't run for your bird identification guide the minute that you spot a cool-looking bird. Rather, you should pay close attention to what you see.
So, I spotted our bird again yesterday and, this time, I took a long, hard look at him. He has a red tufted head, black and white bands on the sides of his face, and solid black wings.
Two fun things came of my close observation. First, I now know that there's a Pileated Woodpecker living in the woods near my backyard. Second, Kerm was adamant that *his* bird had speckled wings and no red tuft. So, I think we will soon have another bird to identify!
Photo credit: Dave Menke, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
As we're getting ready for spring here in the northern hemisphere, it is the perfect time to start birding. I found a nice resource today to help you identify the birds in your neighborhood. Lang Elliott's Learn Bird Songs! provides photographs and recordings of nearly 40 birds common to North America. You can listen to birdsong by habitat (click on the bird pictures to find the audio files) -- countrysides, forests, cityscapes, and wetlands -- or pick a species from the main page, like Blue Jay Song and Sounds. Be sure to check out How to Learn Bird Songs for tips on memorizing the sounds made by different birds and enjoy the sounds of spring!
Way to go, Kerm! Mama Joules’ sometimes guest blogger and favorite resident six-year-old has won a copy of The Young Birder’s Guide to Birds of Eastern North America by Bill Thompson, III from our friends at 10,000 Birds. You can read Kerm’s winning essay along with some wonderful tips for engaging young birders at How to Get Kids Excited About Birds.
But if you want to encourage a child’s interest in nature and seem to have hit a brick wall, I have an interesting story for you. This is what actually happened when Kerm and I sat down to write his birding essay:
“Why do you like birding?” I asked, expecting a quick answer.
He looked at me blankly and started to fidget. “I don’t know.”
“Well,” I said, gently. “Why did you start birding?”
“You made me.”
Ouch! Is that true? I felt my stomach lurch. Did I really *make him* go birding? I thought back to when I had purchased his first bird identification guide. He was so small that he could barely write his name inside the cover. Does he even like birding? Maybe he’s been faking it all this time.
I took a deep breath and tried a different tactic. “What’s fun about birding?”
This time his face lit up and a torrent of words rushed out. “I like the sounds that birds make and I like their colorful feathers …” He then proceeded to tell me all about bird calls and different types of plumage.
As I sat back and listened, I was struck by the awesome power of the words that we speak to our children. For me, there was no difference between these two questions about birding. But for Kerm, one sentence led to a brick wall. The other opened the door of communication.
Photo credit: Lee Karney, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Yesterday, I was standing with my family on an elevated wooden pathway, feeding the ducks and Canada geese at a local pond, when I realized that there was a wading bird right beneath us. I believe it was a Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias), although it might possibly have been a Tricolored Heron (Egretta tricolor).
As the diet of the Great Blue Heron is primarily fish, this bird had no interest in our offerings of bread. It was stalking the small fish that were drawn to our crumbs. Every now and then, a duck would venture too close to this bird's hunting grounds. Zap! The heron would unfurl its great neck to peck at it. One time, the heron came away with feathers in its mouth. Otherwise, the heron just stood there calmly, patiently watching the scene unfold. And then, zing! It would thrust its beak into the water and snap a fish. Chomp, chomp! Two bites, and the fish was gone.
The wary interaction between the ducks & geese and the heron's sharp beak led me to think about the intersection of humans and nature, and how our intervention can often "domesticate" a wild species. In general, I try not to disturb wildlife (although I've been known to rescue turtles from the road), but even I feed the ducks sometimes. Watching the contrast between the geese & ducks (so drawn to humans for food and attention) and the heron (ignoring people, annoyed by the ducks, and hunting prey), reminded me that animals make choices too, whether they realize it or not. I suppose that our responsibility as humans -- as minders of the Earth, so to speak -- is to make sure that their available options are good ones.
Photo credit: David Hall, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
I don't normally post on Tuesdays, but I wanted you to know that 10,000 Birds is giving away three free copies of Bill Thompson III's The Young Birder's Guide. (Hey, I just realized that's Bill of the Birds, the guy who wrote about the giant dinosaur of cheese!). Young birders under the age of 16 can write a 100-word essay on the topic of Why Watching Birds is Fun to be entered into the drawing. Adults can enter, too, by writing on the topic of how to get children interested in birding or by helping to promote the contest. But the deadline is tomorrow, May 28th! You can read more about the contest and how to enter at Young Birder's Guide Giveaway and Deadline for Great Giveaways. Good luck!
[Update: 3/5/09 -- There's a new web address for Bill of the Birds.]
Can you spot the bird in this photograph? I think it is a Red- crested Cardinal. I took this photo in Kauai in July 2006. I love how the bird blends in with its surroundings, with the notable exception of its firey red head.
