Important and Exciting news for the Christmas Bird Count program
After nearly two years of internal discussions, budget modeling, head-scratching, and intense decision-making, two major changes will come to the Christmas Bird Count program effective with the upcoming 113th Count in December, 2012.
First, the CBC is now a free program. Audubon will no longer charge the $5.00 fee of field participants.
Second, to minimize the effects of the loss of fee income, American Birds will no longer be printed on paper and mailed to participants, and Audubon will move to an online delivery of the summary results of the CBC.
To help Audubon make these important decisions regarding the Christmas Bird Count program, we invited people involved with the count to participate in an online survey earlier this year. The results of the online survey last spring were very enlightening, and are summarized in the upcoming 112th CBC summary issue of American Birds—the last one to appear in print. The 130 pages of written comments were the most telling aspects of the survey feedback. Some people understand the fee and don’t mind paying it, but the main thrust of written comments was that the fee is a major obstacle to the program, and the strong message was that more people would be involved, more counts would be included in the CBC database, and more accurate effort data would be collected if the fee was dropped.
Also highly informative were peoples’ comments regarding American Birds. While a few folks commented that they enjoyed the information it contains and enjoy reading at least parts of it each year, the primary sentiment expressed was that recipients do not value American Birds in its current format, that they do not read most of it. Many survey respondents felt that an interactive, online version of the magazine would better suit their needs—especially if the participation fee was dropped.
In order to continue to fund the Christmas Bird Count program in the long term, Audubon will be moving to a voluntary donation model for the CBC.
With the online delivery of American Birds via a new interactive web presence including photos, summaries, and features, content can now be presented online as they are completed. Most critically, a new Citizen Science gateway will enable Audubon to be in touch directly with those participants who elect to take part and directly service the needs of participants as well as compilers.
While the integrity of the CBC is crucial to maintain for its bird trend data, it has become equally important for the ability to engage people in other citizen science projects. Toward that end Audubon will be expanding its Citizen Science projects, and the CBC will, of course, be a cornerstone program.
The Audubon Science team looks forward to working with chapters to increase participation both by including more participants on existing Christmas Bird Counts and by creating new counts in areas where coverage is lacking. We also look forward to further engaging CBC participants and other chapter members in the other seasonal citizen science programs that will be available in the future.
We thank you for your work in making the CBC the continued success that it is.
Thanks very much, and have a wonderful …FREE … Christmas Bird Count season.
Good birding!
Geoff LeBaron
Director, Christmas Bird Count
National Audubon Society
Gary Langham
Vice-President & Chief Scientist
National Audubon Society
