by Norma Friedrich
Since the Christmas Bird Count (CBC) has been identified as an accepted TMN volunteer opportunity I decided to sharehighlights of our January 2, 2021 CBC. This was the 121st CBC for the nation and the 23rd year for Harlingen.
This past CBC saw several active RGVCTMN members participate either as a feeder watcher in their yard or in an Area of the Harlingen Circle designated by the compiler. You know who you are and should enter those hours you spent into the VMS.
Mark Conway began the Harlingen count in 1998 and in 2010 Norma Friedrich joined him as co-compiler. Norma organizes and documents the participants, the teams, and feeder watchers.
Mark compiles the birds after the tally sheets are returned. He makes sure that the rare birds are identified and that proper documents are submitted. The rare bird documents are collected and sent to the State of Texas compiler. Once Mark has completed his spreadsheet of number of species seen and numbers of each species, the spreadsheet is sent to Norma who enters all the data on the birds into the system on the official Audubon Christmas Bird Count website. Also entered is information on the weather, the effort (miles and hours of walking, driving etc.), the start and end time, and the participants are registered with their email.
There were 86 participants in this year’s count. Sixty-two were members of 24 area teams. Twenty-four feeder watchers counted birds in 15 individual yards within the fifteen mile diameter Harlingen circle.
The total miles traveled by the 24 teams within the circle were 804.2 and hours spent on counting totaled 164.0.
There were 60,705 birds reported from the list of 164 species. Red-winged Blackbirds topped the list at 27,553 individuals.
Bragging rights for the Area Team with the highest species count was Area 4A, Stephanie Bilodeau and Justin Le Claire with 104 species. Next up was Area 3C led by Michael Marsden and Michael Miller with 97 species. Third high species count went to Area 5C, Clay Taylor, Greg and Mary Beth Albrechtsen with 94. Donna McCown’s Area 5A receives an honorable mention at 90.
High species count for the feeder watchers was Anita Westervelt with 38 followed by Keith Foeste with 34. Honorable mention goes to Robin Gelston with 20 species.
The highlight species were Anna’s Hummingbird, Sage Thrasher, Black-headed Grosbeak and a Cape May Warbler.
To learn more visit: https://www.audubon.org/conservation/science/christmas-bird-count
Great article, Norma! Loved the statistics — they make it so much more dynamic! That’s a lot of miles! That’s a lot of birds!
Anita