by Lori Turner, President

Another year has passed and we can now celebrate the new year. We have so many things to be thankful for – one is being able to assemble for the Chili Supper after a very cold, windy Christmas Bird Count. This year’s CBC fell on December 17^th. There are so many people that make the CBC and Chili Supper a success and I want to give a shout out to a few. Lottie Bushmann and Allison Vaughn are the co-chairs for our CBC on top of all the other things they do to help CAS – thank you! Judy Lincoln was in charge of the Chili Supper and I want to thank her for organizing the pot luck that we haven’t been able to partake in since 2019 – it was nice to have a warm dinner after spending a day outside in the frigid 20 + MPH winds. I have to admit, I wasn’t able to bird during the CBC so I wasn’t a person out there working hard to identify every bird that they could see in the name of science.

Here’s the stats from the CBC:

Total Species seen: 85

Count week species: 3

Total birds seen: 19,602

Top 5 total species counted:

2,521 – Canada Goose

2,215 – Red-winged Blackbird

1,995—European Starling

1,896 – Mallard

1,203 – Dark-eyed Junco

The Christmas Bird Count couldn’t happen without the over 40 birders that went afield during a cold, wintery day to count as many birds as they could and for that we thank you! Thanks for making Columbia Missouri’s 60^th annual CBC a successful count!