Quite a few birders spend part of the count day dutifully covering their territory, and another part poaching on other territories. That's what I did, but I spent so much time on my own area that it was getting dark by the time I got to the lake. I wasn't able to find as much as I hoped, but I did find a couple species and numbers that the assigned group earlier had missed. This is not to fault the assigned birders. Some areas are worth covering multiple times, such as the lake where birds move around a lot, and weather can change, and hunting stirs them up or let's them return after cease-fire. One question is how to count effort by additional non-oreganized observers, especially if they are not counting common birds, but only seeking the unusual ones? Does time spent in a hot tub count as owling? Another question is how to keep envy in check so that everyone does cover their territory before or after chasing rarities.
--Dave Nutter
Hi all,
Thank you Donna for correctly surmising that my quick late night email did not convey the message I had intended. I indeed was one of the counters who slogged through the day counting common birds (and looking for unusual species) -- albeit in the howling winds on the lakeshore rather than in the snowy woods (I had only 9 chickadees for the day!). So of course the real value of the CBC is in the numbers of common birds and how they vary from year to year, and this requires the hard work of all the counters. But I do believe another aspect of the CBC is the quest for variety, and I think a valuable strategy on any CBC might be to have a "floater" spot-checking important areas throughout the day to pick up species that could otherwise be missed (I'm the one, after all, who missed all of Chris's rare water birds).
My real intent was just to alert people that these birds were around and that the CBC total was even higher than we had thought and indeed probably set a count record -- I do think that is pretty cool.
KEN
Ken Rosenberg
Conservation Science Program
Cornell Lab of Ornithology
607-254-2412
607-342-4594 (cell)
[email protected]
On Jan 3, 2013, at 10:56 AM, Donna Scott wrote:
> I am sure Ken did not mean to dismiss the efforts of the regular counters on New Year's Day. Email can be too terse & quick, sometimes, & may not say quite what we want it to.
> Chris's sightings WERE pretty neat to read about.
> Donna
>
> Sent from my iPhone
> Donna Scott
>
> On Jan 3, 2013, at 10:37 AM, Marie P Read <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> I agree with Kevin and Donna...and especially so since my first Mt Pleasant bird on Jan 1st was a decidedly not-commonplace Common Raven!!
>>
>> All our counters are important.
>>
>> Marie
>>
>> Marie Read Wildlife Photography
>> 452 Ringwood Road
>> Freeville NY 13068 USA
>>
>> Phone 607-539-6608
>> e-mail [email protected]
>>
>> http://www.marieread.com
>>
>> ***NEW*** Music of the Birds Vol 1 ebook for Apple iPad now available from iTunes
>>
>> http://itunes.apple.com/us/book/music-of-the-birds-v1/id529347014?mt=11
>> ________________________________________
>> From: [email protected] [[email protected]] on behalf of Donna Scott [[email protected]]
>> Sent: Thursday, January 03, 2013 9:43 AM
>> To: Kevin J. McGowan; CAYUGABIRDS-L
>> Subject: Re: [cayugabirds-l] More CBC birds for 2013
>>
>> I agree with your reply to Ken.
>> Also, our so-called boring areas sometimes give us quite a thrill, as when I found the Barred Owl first thing January 1!
>> Donna
>>
>> Sent from my iPhone
>> Donna Scott
>>
>> On Jan 3, 2013, at 7:35 AM, "Kevin J. McGowan" <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>
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