Christmas Bird Count 12/15/2024

12/15/2024

I had a fellow birder reach out to me by e-mail and ask if Ross and I wanted to participate in the Audubon Christmas Bird Count of Whatcom County. I really appreciated the thought; I do want to work on being more involved in the birding world here. I like to bird with other people, more eyes are better than two! But I also do like my alone time birding. Anyways, I reached out to the Whatcom County coordinator, and he got back to us and added us to a part of zone 6.

We didn’t really know how to do this thing, we asked some questions and read up on the rules and we decided we were going to do our best and count some birds. We were hoping that we would have someone with us to help out on our first time, but we didn’t. Our main area was South Hill Fairhaven to Connelly Creek. We got up earlyish to get out by 7:30 in hopes of seeing an owl, but the last time an owl was seen in this area was like never. Connelly Creek was a cool area just a little annoying because I-5 is right there, and it makes it really hard to hear anything. Ross struggle here for sure, but it was pretty quiet in this area until the sun started to come up. Lots of songbirds and one Merlin. The Merlin ended up being the bird of the day for us. eBird Checklist – 15 Dec 2024 – Connelly Creek Trail

After we hit part of the trail, we went out to the retention pond and counted ducks and moved over to the other side of the trail. This type of birding was interesting to me because I don’t normally count every single bird, for the lists Ross normally does that and we estimate. But here I counted every bird I could, which of course is the point. eBird Checklist – 15 Dec 2024 – Connelly Creek Trail

Next spot was South Hill where the Pigmy Nuthatches were found last year by Kilian. I love this spot to bird, it’s really birdy in some areas and it gets quite a few rarities. Also, the houses are so cool, the old Bellingham. Pretty slow going in this spot. eBird Checklist – 15 Dec 2024 – stakeout Pygmy Nuthatches The last spot we went was the South Hill hot spot; it was getting to the bird witching hour where they’re all napping and not active. We were spent by this time too. So, we made one more list and headed home. eBird Checklist – 15 Dec 2024 – South Hill, Bellingham.

At home Ross (thank you Ross) filled out the checklist and we got it into Alex and that was about it. Unfortunately, a pretty slow day of birding, but I was really happy to be able to help out. We did listen to the zoom meeting later and got to hear all of the things other people saw, they also had a pretty slow day too.