The Heard Museum’s
2007 Christmas Bird Count
By Roger Sanderson, Heard Wildlife Biologist
This year’s Christmas Bird Count was not as productive as most in the past due to the inclement weather, but it made for an interesting adventure. As people arrived in the pre-dawn hours it was drizzling rain and 40 degrees. Not only do conditions as these inhibit the birds from activity, they make viewing the birds much more difficult. They also limit participants to only those die-hard rugged individuals dedicated enough to sacrifice a warm bed and time spent with family or friends and endure miserable conditions to make this annual event a success! Dan Smith, who has headed up the event locally for several years, was waiting with a few others when I opened the gate in the dark. Like over 2,000 other sites across the nation, the McKinney count covers a 15 mile diameter area. Participants gather each year at the Heard where they are assigned different parts of the area to survey. The Heard Sanctuary is one of nine areas covered in this count and is the only exclusively walking count, others are at least partly surveyed by car. Karen White and I headed out at first light down the road toward the wetlands. As the rain came and went, we traversed the road around the back of the wetlands, continually wiping the binocular lens in an attempt to see. Not long after making the turn back, it began to rain harder and we realized that not only could we not see through the binoculars, the tally sheets were so wet they could not be turned, much less written upon! We headed back early – about 11. Karen had to leave, but after a hot lunch (Dan and his wife always make chili, a welcome treat after trudging through the cold!) I picked up new partners. Anne Bowman had been keeping a count of birds coming to the feeders outside Laughlin Hall and wanted to get outside and John and Liz Harrod of Wilmington, Delaware who is originally from Plano had just arrived. Dan said he would join us, too, as soon as he handled a few things. This time we went east on the Hoot Owl Trail until it intersected the Sycamore Trail. After connecting with Dan, we attempted to follow the Sycamore Trail for a while, but were forced back by high water. Throughout the rest of the afternoon different people had to leave so eventually just Dan and I were trudging back to the museum just before dark. Since there was little or no rain in the afternoon, the birding was a great deal better and a more respectable total of 52 different species were observed on the sanctuary. The most unusual birds seen here were a couple of Red-Breasted Nuthatches observed at the feeders! See below for the McKinney and Heard Museum count details.
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