Chances are good during the next few weeks that you’ll come across groups of folks peering intently through binoculars at trees, bushes, ponds, lakes — even backyards.
They (including me) will be birders looking for birds of every stripe and feather during the National Audubon Society’s 116th annual Christmas Bird Counts. It starts Monday and runs through Jan. 5, as specified by Audubon guidelines.
During that time you’re apt to see us binoculars-toting bird counters on city sidewalks, wooded trails, grassy paths — and, if necessary, in muddy bogs and waterlogged swamps. We’ll be out from sunrise ‘til sunset, rain or shine, warm or freezing.
In Georgia, 28 individual Christmas bird counts will cover nearly every part of the state, from remote St. Catherines Island on the coast (Dec. 19) to the Chattahoochee National Forest’s Songbird Management Area near Chatsworth in mountainous Murray County in North Georgia (Dec. 15).
Four counts are scheduled in the metro Atlanta area: Roswell (Dec. 14); Marietta (Dec. 19); Intown Atlanta (Jan. 2); and Amicalola Falls State Park (Jan. 3).
For a complete lineup and information about participating, visit: http://www.gos.org/christmas-bird-counts-116.
In each count, birders will try to identify and count every feathered creature they see and hear during a 24-hour period in a pre-set 15-mile-diameter circle, then report the results to Audubon. Some of the birders will be out in the wee, dark hours of morning to try to tally owls and other night-loving species.
For birders, the Christmas Bird Count is the birding event of the year, our Super Bowl, if you will — the nation‘s longest-running “citizen-science“ project. For many of us, it’s a fun and social occasion. Even more important, however, is that it generates valuable data on bird populations to help scientists gauge the health and vitality of our planet.
IN THE SKY: From David Dundee, Tellus Science Museum astronomer: One of the year’s best meteor showers, the Geminid, is visible this weekend and most of next week, reaching a peak on Monday night of 50 meteors per hour. Look to the east from midnight until dawn. The moon will be first quarter on Friday (Dec. 18). Mercury is low in the west around dusk. Brightly shining Venus rises in the east about two hours before sunrise. Mars rises in the east about four hours before sunrise. Jupiter comes up in the east around midnight.
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