Oh, I'll be counting for the GBBC this weekend. And Project FeederWatch too, which is count you can participate in all winter long, from November-March. Also counted for Focus on Feeders last weekend (Mass Audubon). And the Christmas Bird Count the beginning of January. Yeah, I enjoy counting the birds. :) If it weren't for bird counts and fooling around with seeds, this winter would have sheer drudgery. Here are a couple of my favorite "countees".

As of mid-day Monday the 16th: Statistics from 2009 Total Checklists Submitted: 40,226 Total Species Observed: 560 Total Individual Birds Counted: 4,562,363 Updated: February 16, 2009 11:55:10 AM EST Today is the last day of the count, but data will continue to pour in for a few weeks as people get around to processing their counts. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Besides counting birds at my feeders, I've been out visiting the local salt marsh and other neighborhood bird haunts. I also went down to the Cape Cod Canal to see what was floating and feeding in the canal. There were several Red-breasted Mergansers swimming and diving in the water - a very jaunty looking bird with a huge cowlick on the back of the head. Also a few Common Eiders, the males looking almost like they were spread with marshmallow Fluff. Walking in the neighborhood I ran into the local flock of Helmeted Guineafowl feeding in someone's yard. I wrestled with the idea of trying to submit the count to GBBC, but decided it wouldn't be legitimate. The guineafowl range freely during the day, but I'm sure they're brought into a barn at night. Too many predators around. Claire

I just got a reminder email about the GBBC: "Project FeederWatch Electronic Newsletter February 12, 2007 The tenth annual Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC) is coming up February 16-19. Help create a mid-winter snapshot of where the birds are by counting birds at any location for at least 15 minutes on one or more of the count days. Last year, participants recorded more than 7.5 million birds of 622 species across the United States and Canada and submitted 60,503 checklists, just a few hundred shy of an all-time record! Help put your birds and your community on the map. Enter your tallies on the Great Backyard Bird Count web site to share your results and to be automatically entered in a prize drawing for binoculars, bird books, bird feeders, and more. Visit http://www.birdsource.org/gbbc to see the results, view the photo gallery, or enter your counts. If your Project FeederWatch (PFW) count days fall during the GBBC, you must send your tallies to the GBBC web site in addition to PFW if you want to see your numbers to appear in the GBBC results for your locality and state. The rules for counting for the Great Backyard Bird Count are a little different than for FeederWatch. For the Great Backyard Bird Count you can report any birds you see, even those birds flying overhead that don't count for FeederWatch. You can also submit a separate checklist for each locale on every day that you count. Thanks for your help in letting us know where the birds are during the GBBC weekend! ********************************************************** " Claire

I just started Project FeederWatch this season. I count on Sunday-Mondays, and actually look forward to those days. Although I like to count on a fixed schedule, it can be more flexible if necessary. The maximum frequency for those who submit data online is 2 days/week. For those who submit data on a paper form, it's 2 days every 2 weeks. As for the minimum frequency, the instructions only say "Your data are valuable even if you were only able to count on a few occasions". You can count intermittently throughout the 2 day period, or sit there and watch constantly. You estimate the total cumulative time. This can be less than 1 hour total, or more than 8 hours. If you work full-time, you can count for a bit before and after work. Counting the birds has helped to pass a very cold, snowy and tedious winter. I really enjoy exploring the data that results from these counts too.