It was a foggy Saturday morning when organisers and volunteers, parents, and two dozen children gathered in our wide-windowed Salmonberry Room for another Christmas Bird Count for Kids (CBC4Kids) in Stanley Park. After a quick tutorial on bird ID and binocular use, four teams set out on four routes around birding hotspots in Stanley Park: Brockton area, Beaver Lake, the stretch between Second and Third Beach, and Lost Lagoon, and the fog did not get in the way!
Here are the highlights of our findings (click each link for more details):
- Brockton area
- Besides a count of 114 for the all-too-common Canada Goose, an impressive 58 American wigeons and several gulls were recorded in this area!
- This group found a total of 16 species and the most number of individual birds at 265, even with the smallest party of 5 counters!
- Beaver Lake
- The most abundant birds recorded in this area were mallards (56), chestnut-backed chickadees (27), and black-capped chickadees (25).
- A common raven and one hummingbird were also found, besides several songbirds by the edges of the forest, totalling 15 species and 164 birds.
- Second to Third Beach
- This was a hotspot for seabirds with 90 surf scoters taking the lead. Other findings of note were American wigeons, cormorants, goldeneyes, and one Wilson’s warbler caught quite out-of-season.
- This group found 18 species and 3 additional taxa, totalling 261 individuals.
- Lost Lagoon
- Lost Lagoon had a fine balance of water-loving and forest-dwelling birds, from cormorants and mergansers to bald eagles and kinglets.
- Garnering the most numerous record of species found in the Park, this group counted 27 species and 192 individuals.
All in all, the CBC4Kids 2017 in Stanley Park counted 882 individual birds among 53 species! As with 45 other CBC4Kids events around Canada, our young naturalists and their families became citizen scientists for the day, observing and recording their sightings on eBird, and finishing off with treats and hot chocolate. This data is used in scientific research for the conservation of our resident and migratory birds.
By Dannie Piezas, Environmental Educator