Great Backyard Bird Count Reprise

We were looking back at our results from the Great Backyard Bird Count from a few weeks ago. You can have a look too if you want - go to http://www.birdsource.org/gbbc/, and click on "Explore the Results".

Here are the combined results from everyone who submitted information in Oakville:

The "Number of Checklists" refers to the number of people who submitted information for that species. We ended up submitting four checklists, one for each day of the count.

Over the four days of the bird count, we ended up with 23 species. In all of Oakville, there were 27 species counted, so there were only four observed in Oakville that we didn't see at our house (Mallard, Red-tailed Hawk, Rock Pigeon, and Common Grackle). There were five species for which we were the only people in Oakville to report sightings for (Red-bellied Woodpecker, Red-breasted Nuthatch, European Starling, American Tree Sparrow, and Brown-headed Cowbird). It's a little surprising that we were the only ones to report the startlings, given how common they are in urban areas such as Oakville - maybe people were just trying to ignore them....

Also, of the 116 Common Redpoll that were reported, 104 were from our house. And of the 52 Pine Siskin reported, 39 were ours. We were happy to have all three woodpecker species that were seen in Oakville, although we're always hoping that a new woodpecker or two will show up sometime (maybe Red-headed, or Pileated?).

Regardless of the results, we really enjoyed the bird count this year, as we did last year also, and we were happy (and a bit surprised) to be an important contributor to the bird count for the Oakville area. Our highlights this year definitely included: seeing a Sharp-shinned Hawk for the first time, seeing robins in the middle of winter on three of the four days, getting some nice pictures (for once) of a Cooper's Hawk, and seeing both red-breasted and white-breasted nuthatches coming frequently to the feeders.

-posted by Dave-