Since the early 1900s, the Audubon Society has sponsored a nation-wide bird count in the week before Christmas, and Beach Watchers from San Juan, Orcas, and Lopez all participated in the 2010 count held last Saturday. The Friday Harbor Labs were the center of a 15-mile circle radiating out to all the islands, and the count took place within this circle. Small groups of volunteers, led by local ornithologists or experienced birders, scanned roadsides, fields, and public parks throughout the day on Saturday, tallying every bird and species they heard or saw. Although it was a blustery, cold and occasionally damp day, it didn’t dampen the enthusiasm of the volunteers, as they peered through binoculars and scopes and called out the number of eagles, mergansers, towhees, kinglets, and dozens of other species they were seeing. Occasional pauses for cocoa and cookies, and a lunch break to warm everyone up, kept the group going from 8:30 in the morning till mid-afternoon. The results were then tallied on each island, and Barb Jensen, birding expert and President of the San Juan Audubon chapter, will publish the results for all the islands early in January. If you haven’t ever participated in this event, make a note to sign up for it next year. It’s a lot of fun, a good way to see some areas of your island that are not normally accessible to the public, and it is very gratifying to observe the quantity and variety of birds that share our islands and are such a vital part of our eco-system.
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