Do you feed birds in your backyard? If so, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's Project FeederWatch needs your help:
FeederWatchers count the birds at their feeders each week and send the information to the Lab of Ornithology. They've helped document unusual bird sightings, winter movements, and shifting ranges of some bird species over the past 20 years. To see the effects of global climate change, scientists say they need new and veteran participants alike to keep counting birds now and well into the future.
“Being a FeederWatcher is easy and fun, and at the same time it helps generate the world’s largest database on feeder-bird populations,” says project leader David Bonter. “Since we started in 1987, nearly 40,000 people have submitted observations, adding up to well over 1.5 million checklists.”
Some of the most dramatic changes revealed by data collected during two decades of Project FeederWatch may be related to changes in climate. “We’re seeing hummingbirds turning up much farther north than usual during the winter,” says Bonter. “Warblers and other insect-eaters are also lingering longer into the northern winter, possibly because of warmer temperatures. Bird count data gathered in the coming years will really help us focus on these trends and what might be causing them.”
The projects's 21st season begins in November and runs until April 2008. FeederWatch participants send weekly observations of feeder birds to the Lab of Ornithology, helping to document long-term shifts in bird population and distribution.
Interested participants can sign up on the Project FeederWatch web site at http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw or call the Lab toll-free at (800) 843-2473. In return for the $15 fee ($12 for Lab members) participants receive the FeederWatcher's Handbook, a poster of the most common feeder birds, a calendar, complete instructions, and the FeederWatch "Winter Bird Highlights" publication.
For those interested in watching wild birds, here are two very interesting forums:
BirdForum.Net
http://www.birdforum.net/
IBWO.Net
http://www.ibwo.net/forum/
Posted by: MarySmith | 15 September 2007 at 08:00 PM