A garden isn’t a garden without birds. From the black and white mountain chickadee to my favorite, the Northern flicker, we are blessed in the Sierra foothills by their visitations. If you’re a bird lover, winter is a special season, because there are two opportunities to participate in bird counts for fun and to help advance bird science: Audubon’s Christmas Bird Count and Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Great Backyard Bird Count.
Audubon’s 126th Christmas Bird Count (CBC), which includes participants from around the world, will occur between December 14, 2024 and January 5, 2025. The data gathered from this long-running count is used by Audubon and other organizations to assess the health of bird populations, so it is a highly structured process. To learn more about Audubon’s Christmas Bird Count, visit https://www.audubon.org/conservation/join-christmas-bird-count.
If you want to participate, you must sign up in advance with an Audubon-designated, regional CBC group and receive instruction from the group leader. Audubon’s Central Sierra Chapter sponsors three CBC groups in Tuolumne and Calaveras Counties. Each group is assigned one day during the count period on which they tally bird sightings within a specified 15-mile circle. If participants live within the boundaries of the circle but can’t join the group, they can cozy up at home and count birds that visit their yard, as long as they have made prior arrangements with a group leader. Check out the details and join the count here.
The Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Audubon, and Birds Canada sponsor the annual Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC) in February of each year. For 2026 the count will occur between February 13 and 16. It is much less structured than the Christmas count, in that anyone can conduct a bird tally for as little as 15 minutes anytime during the four-day GBBC event, then enter their sightings online at www.birdcount.org. Here are some inspiring stats from this year’s count: an estimated 838,113 global participants from 217 countries or subregions; 8,078 species of birds identified; 189,741 photos, videos, and recorded sounds added to Cornell’s Macaulay Library of bird research archives.
Both the national and local-chapter Audubon websites are rich with information and resources for bird lovers. During the Great Backyard Bird Count, you can get a sneak peak at the kinds of birds you can expect to see in our area. You can also see what others are reporting via real-time maps during and after the formal count.
Any time of year, the Audubon site offers endless information about birds, like: how to tell the difference between a raven and a crow; how to find the best native plants for birds in your area; and of course, how you can help save species that are endangered.
Another wonderful resource for birders is eBird.org, managed by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. According to eBird, which says it is “one of the world’s largest biodiversity-related citizen science project,” their goal is to be a valuable data source. “From being able to manage lists, photos and audio recordings, to seeing real-time maps of species distribution, to alerts that let you know when species have been seen, we strive to provide the most current and useful information to the birding community.”
Happy birding!
Rachel Oppedahl is a University of California Cooperative Extension Master Gardener of Tuolumne County.
