Christmas Bird Count

Audubon’s Christmas Bird Count is the longest-running Citizen Science survey in the world. Since 1905, Christmas Bird Counts have been held every year in Minnesota, involving over 28,000 people.

The 2011 CBC count shattered records. More than 2,100 counts and 60,753 people tallied 2,319 species and 55,951,707 total birds. That’s nearly 56 million birds. Citizen Scientists spotted 200 more species than during the previous year’s CBC.

Counts took place in all 50 states in the U.S., all Canadian provinces, plus several Central and South American countries, Guam, Mariana Islands, Bermuda, Bahamas, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. Colombia, which encompasses some of the most important bird habitat in the hemisphere, now has more CBC circles than any other country outside the US and Canada. Luis Miguel Renjifo reports that in Columbia the census “is becoming the most important monitoring system for biodiversity in the country".

Get Involved! Find a count near you: http://birds.audubon.org/christmas-bird-count