by Lottie Bushmann and John Besser

With all our section leaders in place for this year, the Christmas Bird Count is a go! Thankfully, birding is a safe, outdoor activity and we have plenty of birders in Columbia that plan to do just that. We will plan to send out our teams on Saturday Dec. 18^th. Please contact your section leader if you have worked with someone in the past to get details for your job. If you haven’t participated recently (or are a newbie!) please email me at bushmann@gmail.com and we’ll get you on a team.  All experience levels are welcome.

• Columbia Audubon has a strong tradition with participation in this amazing citizen scientist project. Please read Bill Clark’s article in this month’s Chat found below to learn more about this historic event. Plan to use safe practices if riding in a car. Consider wearing masks and having open windows—all the better to see the birds if you’re car birding.
• We’ll use ebird to compile our data. Please refer to the notes below from John Besser about how this system works. Any questions or concerns, please let me know.
• Not interested in going out to bird but would like your feeder birds included in the count? If your home is within our 16 mile count circle, you can submit an ebird list and share it with CAS (using John’s instructions below). If you’re not sure if your home is in the area, email me and I’ll help you figure it out. Not an ebird user? You can still participate by emailing me a list of your yardbirds and I can submit an ebird list on your behalf. This is another fun way to become involved and make your birds count.
• We’ll top off the day with a 6:30 pm Zoom session Saturday, Dec. 18^th where participants can chat about their day and share stories. We’ll look at species totals and see how this year stacks up against previous years.

How to eBird your results:

HOW TO ‘e-BIRD’ THE CHRISTMAS BIRD COUNT 

2. COUNT AND IDENTIFY BIRDS: This is the fun part!
3. PREPARE ONE OR MORE EBIRD CHECKLISTS, using the Mobile eBird app (e.g., on your smartphone) or eBird website (eBird.org) or
4. Ask someone in your group for help with eBird data entry.
5. DATA ENTRY DETAILS:
6. Select an existing eBird hotspot or personal location or click on your location on the map to set up a new personal location.
   • DON’T use your CBC area as a location.
7. DATE AND EFFORT. (Important for the CBC compiler)

• Date / Start time / Duration /Party size
• Observation type [Traveling or Stationary]
• Distance [Use one-way distance if you re-trace your route]

3. CHECKLIST COMMENTS:

• Write in ‘Columbia CBC’ and your Area number here.
• Record names of group leader and party members
• Add notes on weather

1. ENTER SPECIES, COUNTS and species comments
2. SUBMIT YOUR CHECKLISTS using one of the following methods:
3. Enter your checklist(s) into your personal eBird account and share it with the CAS group eBird account using ID, ‘casbirddata’ (and with your Area leader).
4. Enter your list directly into CAS shared account by logging into the CAS account (ID=casbirddata; password=wildhaven).
5. Email your data to your area leader or to casbirddata@gmail.com

COMPILERS WILL FORMAT AND SUBMIT DATA to the National Audubon database

1. Harmonize species names and sequence with national species list.
2. Upload data to national CBC data entry portal.
3. LOOK FOR CBC RESULTS in the January CHAT newsletter
4. QUESTIONS? Ask John Besser (jbesser1@gmail.com) or Lottie Bushmann (lottie.bushmann@gmail.com)