ALLENTOWN, Pa. — Winter bird counting can be a tough activity for children, who might not be as resilient to cold temperatures.
So, local officials created a Christmas Bird Count just for kids.
“Occasionally, we had people who asked, ‘Can I bring my child along?’” said Barbara Malt, vice president of the Lehigh Valley Audubon Society. “But it's really not a good activity, the regular one, for children, because we're out in the cold from dawn or pre-dawn, if we go out for owls, until dusk.
“That's 12 or 14 hours in the cold. And, a lot of times, there's not a lot to look at, and it's just not really an activity that children would enjoy. But, we thought we would make a version that is really geared for kids.”
For 125 years, bird watchers and nature enthusiasts have participated in the National Audubon Society’s Christmas Bird Count, a conservation research project. While that program is ongoing, recording tens of thousands of birds across the Western Hemisphere each year, the Valley’s birders have created an event for kids to enjoy.
The Lehigh Valley Audubon Society, in partnership with the Lehigh Gap Nature Center, on Saturday, Jan. 11, is holding its 10th annual Christmas Bird Count for Kids at Muhlenberg College. Open to children ages 6 to 12 and their families, registration is required.
Why count birds?
The National Audubon Society’s annual Christmas Bird Count, which started Dec. 14 and runs through Sunday, is considered the nation's longest-running community science bird project.
Like other bird counts in the Valley and nearby – like Lehigh Gap Nature Center’s Bake Oven Knob Hawk Watch and Hawk Mountain’s annual fall migration count — the goal of the count is to record the number and species of birds in a given area.
However, the Audubon Society’s count is widespread, with participants across Canada, the U.S., Mexico and more.
Once the data is compiled, researchers can use it to track the health of individual species, fueling conservation work.
Last year’s count was record-breaking when it came to participation, with 2,677 counts completed, according to the society’s website. There were 83,186 individual participants, broken into 72,129 field observers and 11,057 feeder watchers.
“Although we didn’t break any records for species numbers, we still tallied a solid number of species on the 124th count,” officials said. “Participants documented 2380 species, plus 407 identifiable forms and hybrids.
“This is up from last year’s tally (2244 species), but fewer than many recent years (2554 during the 122nd, 2566 during the 120th and 2638 during the 119th).”
In the Lehigh Valley, the local chapter of the Audubon Society also hosts a one-day count. This year, it landed on Dec. 21.
Last year, the one-day count was held on Dec. 16, with 40 counters participating, according to the organization's website. In its 80th year, 86 species and 40,826 individual birds were counted.
“Highlights included the first ever sighting of an orange-crowned warbler in the Topton area, a wintering eastern Phoebe near Fogelsville, cackling geese in Allentown, and a Wilson’s snipe in the western part of the circle,” officials said. “High counts were achieved for green-winged teal and common merganser, with 67 and 73 individuals, respectively.”
Bird-counting for kids
The Christmas Bird Count for Kids runs about three hours, Malt said.
“We start in a classroom at Muhlenberg,” Malt said. “We have some PowerPoints and some learning activities for them as well as introductions and some snacks and things like that.
“Then we go out and we divide up into teams, and we go out to different field sites.”
After learning the basics of binoculars and how to identify common winter birds, each team gets its own location — all near the college — and they count what they see for an hour.
Tally sheets used in previous years reveal the team names like the “Frenzied Finches” or the “Hawks” or the “Laughing Crows.” Participants fill out environmental details, like the weather, temperature and wind, in addition to recording birds.
The sheets also include common birds counters might see, like Canada geese, red-tailed hawks, cardinals, crows and blue jays.
“We see across the three teams what the total number of each species was, and we have the teams report a little bit on what their favorite sightings were, if they saw anything especially exciting or anything else they want to share."Barbara Malt, vice president of the Lehigh Valley Audubon Society
“Then we come back to the classroom and we tally up the results,” Malt said. “We see across the three teams what the total number of each species was, and we have the teams report a little bit on what their favorite sightings were, if they saw anything especially exciting or anything else they want to share.
“And then we have some more snacks. And for the kids, because we are at Muhlenberg, they can go see the Muhlenberg ornithology museum after that.”
Muhlenberg’s Acopian Center for Ornithology, established in 2006, holds a more than 2,000-piece mounted bird collection. The center’s director, Daniel Klem Jr., in November won a statewide conservation award for his research into bird deaths from window strikes.
