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USA Great Backyard Bird Count Results27/03/2008 15:43:21UK & Ireland Big Garden Birdwatch Results.
March 2008. US Bird watchers broke reporting records during the 2008 Great Backyard Bird Count, the US equivalent of the UK’s Big Garden Birdwatch. Participants submitted more than 85,700 checklists during the four-day event, surpassing last year's record by several thousand. Participants identified a record 635 species and sent in thousands of bird images.  ‘As predicted, there were record numbers of Great Backyard Bird Count reports for pine grosbeak,’ says Rob Fergus, senior scientist with the National Audubon Society. Due to the massive seed production failure in trees across northern Canada it was expected that there would be a huge influx of northern finches going south to look for food. Fergus says it was also a ‘banner year’ for common redpolls and evening grosbeaks, reported in their highest numbers in several years. Bad News But not all species were seen in record numbers. In this year's count, numbers of yellow-billed magpies hit a new low. Magpies, crows, and jays are especially susceptible to the West Nile virus. For the past few years the population of yellow-billed magpies has declined following the spread of the virus to California. American crow and blue jay numbers appear to have stabilized somewhat, but need continued monitoring as the populations of these birds continue to adapt to the presence of this new disease. According to the report, Northern bobwhite have declined by 82 percent over the past 40 years. Northern Pintail are down 77 percent, greater scaup are down 75 percent, and Eastern meadowlarks are down 72 percent over the same time frame. Collared Doves Explosion – Introduced 1980 The Great Backyard Bird Count charts the explosive geographic expansion of Eurasian collared doves. The species has spread quickly since it was introduced in Florida in 1980 and it made new inroads this year. For the first time, Great Backyard Bird Count records of this bird came from British Columbia, Manitoba, and Oregon.
Rare Sightings For a more detailed summary of this year's results, visit the Great Backyard Bird Count website at www.birdcount.org. Explore maps, see photos, prize-drawing winners, and the list of cities and towns that topped their state or province for the number of checklists submitted. Some species showed up in Great Backyard Bird Count reports for the first time, including a masked duck in Texas - a bird that is usually found in the tropics. An Arctic loon, seldom seen outside Alaska, was spotted in California. An ivory gull wandered down from the high Arctic to show up on a checklist in South Dakota, and a scarlet ibis was seen in Florida. The 2008 Great Backyard Bird Count is sponsored annually by the National Audubon Society and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, New York.
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