Photo: Birders by Judith White

Saturday, May 13, is the OPAS Birdathon and International Migratory Bird Day, a day to count Clallam County birds and raise money for OPAS projects. The International Migratory Bird Count is different from the Christmas Bird Count, because it includes all birds counted in Clallam County in one day. We learn a huge amount about birds of the Olympic Peninsula through this count.

You can help no matter where you are in Clallam County, whether you count all day, count an hour or two in the morning and evening, or just hang out around your house and count your feeders. Even the sparrows and hummingbirds in your backyard are important.

On May 13, use the tally sheet included here or in the May-June issue of Harlequin Happenings to record birds and keep track of the miles and hours you watch, walk, drive, or boat. Or use eBird to keep your tallies. If you visit several different areas, keep a count for each. To count at a feeder, please enter the high count of birds you see during the day, so, for example, if you see 8 House Finches at 8 a.m. and 5 House Finches at 11 a.m., list 8 House Finches as your count.

After the count, email your scanned tally sheets to me at bboek@olympus.net. Or just type out the species and numbers in the body of your email. You can even be old-fashioned and snail-mail the tally sheet to the address on the back, but email is best.

Alternatively, you may enter your data using eBird on the day of the count, but it’s real important that if you use eBird please send me an email with the web-addresses (URLs) of your eBird lists. Otherwise, I might not find them, because they disappear from eBird after a few days.

Please email bboek@olympus.net to sign up for the Birdathon, or simply do the count and send your tallies right away when finished. Line up sponsors for your count, to help support OPAS and River Center programs. If you're so inclined, please sponsor other counters and we'll represent you as we tally the birds. Thank you very much for your help!