The Great Backyard Bird Count ( GBBC) for 2021 took place on February 12-15. During each of those 4 days people were encouraged to stay in one place, for example their home, and record the species and numbers of birds seen in a period of 15 minutes or more. The results are then sent into a central tallying location and compiled. This takes place all over the world and is sponsored by the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. Please see a previous post, 'Great Backyard Bird Count' from February 19, 2016 for more information. One change should be noted; in that post it says to send your results to gbbc.birdcount.org. That has now been changed to ebird.org.
One of the counts we did this year was at the Mactaquac Dam Site. We checked the fields above the dam where we found no birds and then the dam area proper as well as the area below the dam where access was possible. That being one of the few areas here where there is open water at this time of year, we found that a lot of waterfowl had gathered there to feed.
Following is the list of the birds counted in a 1-hour period beginning at 10:30am.
Black Duck 4, Common Goldeneye 32, Barrow's Goldeneye 7, Hooded Merganser 1, Common Merganser 24, Bald Eagle 5, Rock Pigeon 5, American Crow 5.
The conditions were cold and snowy, with about 15 cm of snow cover. In many years we see Snow Buntings along the road leading to the dam but there were none this year. The numbers of goldeneyes and mergansers was about normal but the number of Barrow's Goldeneyes was the most I have ever seen at that site. Usually there might be 1 or 2 and often none. Seven was exciting. It was nice to have both female Common and Barrow's Goldeneyes present for comparison studies. They are very similar in appearance. I was also surprised that there were no gulls present and very few pigeons. I believe there are more pigeons in the area and they were just not there at that time. The gulls have remained absent since that date so it is valid. It was nice to see 5 Bald Eagles and that is about normal for that area.
The GBBC is a wonderful example of citizen science. Anyone can participate. It does not take a lot of time or expertise. Normally you are tallying familiar birds. The compiled results are huge and represent a great resource for research and management. Please consider participating next year and get your children and grandchildren involved.
Although the entry of results is far from finished at this point, so far there have been 314,400 checklists submitted representing 6351 species from around the world. There are 253 sub-regions from Columbia to India and beyond. These data are very exciting and represent a wonderful tool for further work with our avian species and the environment. This is one of the wonderful applications of our modern technology and environmentally-conscious world citizens. Bravo!
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