Science and Natural History discussion

Budgets for scientific research are always tight, but even more so today when there is so much more to study with expensive tools. (No, the political scene isn't helping, but perhaps we should avoid that.) However, there is a new tool available & that is with citizens pitching in, using Internet & mobile technology. Do you know of or participate in any such projects?

I participated in the Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC) this year for the first time. I've heard about it for years & meant to, but somehow always managed to miss it. I'm glad I didn't this year. It was fantastic & easy.

My wife & I have a small farm with a lot of stuff out for the birds. I built & maintain a couple of dozen bluebird houses. I have a couple of Purple Martin houses & we have a dozen different types of feeders around. We really don't know much about birds, though. We just think they're pretty & we get to see some fun shows. We have everything from hummingbirds to hawks around & a LOT of woodpeckers.

The GBBC worried me a bit. Figuring out species, the amount of time, location... I figured it would be tough. Wrong. They made it simple, easy & fun.

I didn't think I'd be able to sort out all the species properly, but once I signed up, they gave me a form with the most common bird types to check off. Sparrows! The GBBC check list had several types listed. What do I know about sparrows? Pests & they all look alike. Wrong. They provided links to pictures & I managed to sort them out just fine.

The minimum recommended time for recording a count is just 15 minutes. Short & easy enough. It turned out to be a much longer time than I thought. I don't suppose I ever really looked at them for more than a few minutes straight before, so I wound up seeing far more than I expected.

It wasn't a nice day, so I set my camera, checklist, & binoculars on the dining room table & watched half our backyard out the patio doors. It's a pretty good view of half a dozen bird feeders with a corner of the woods, the barn field, & the horse barn in plain view. I started counting & it wasn't too hard. When I found a bird I wasn't sure of, I took a picture of it.

I did it 4 times over the 2 days of the bird count. One time, the backyard was empty of birds, but I kept watching. Although I never saw it, I'm guessing the Cooper's hawks that live in the woods were hunting overhead. The yard always empties then. They'll sometimes sit on our front porch railing or the back gate, too.

After a couple of minutes, birds started to come back. Then I saw a Pileated woodpecker fly past & land in a dead tree on the edge of the woods. A few seconds later, a second came in. It's rare that we see 2 of them at the same time. There were 8 cardinals eating around one feeder when the time was up.

Each time I finished my count, I'd go to the computer & fill in my count & check on the latest findings in my area. I learned a lot & saw more of the birds than I had in ages since I wasn't just glancing at them, but really studying them. It was a great experience.

The Global Big Bird Day is coming up soon, the 13th of May. You can find out more about it on Cornell Labs Ebird site:
http://ebird.org/ebird/globalbigday

There's a book describing this event that I've been meaning to get around to reading, The Big Year: A Tale of Man, Nature, and Fowl Obsession. Has anyone read it or do you participate? I never have.