
The event feature a 12 km trek around William Lake.
As Christmas draws near, each and every state is beginning their preparations for the holidays. In another article, we stated that it is both a joy and a relief to witness a celebration that doesn’t involve slaughtering birds for the Christmas table. William Lake Organizes annual Christmas bird count and everyone is invited to participate.
As officially announced on their website, the WLFN or the Willam Lake Field Naturalist are organizing the annual Christmas bird count, an event that reached the lucky number 48 this year. The event is set to start on the 20th of December and will last for several days.
Waxing a little on history, it would seem that there is quite a bit of a tradition behind this peaceful event. According to several ledgers, the tradition started out in the early 1900’s. Unfortunately, it seems that this even has caught the local’s attention much later than predicted, more specifically in 1997.
For those of you who are interested in taking part of the annual bird count and walk, you are requested to call Phil Ranson, the organizer of this event, at 250-398-7110. You can also reach mister Ranson by sending an email to [email protected] Net.
William Lake organizes annual Christmas bird count in order to familiarize the local population with the species of birds found in the surrounding area and to the sea how the little-winged creatures have fared during the year.
Let’s take a look at some number from the previous bird counts. In 1967, being the first year when the local folks first adopted this tradition, approximately 414 birds were counted. At that time, the specialists attending the event said that a total number of 21 species of bird were identified during the count.
Moreover, if we take into account a 10-year timeframe, it would seem that both the number of birds and species tend to go over the roof. Over the last 10 years, bird enthusiasts have identified no more than 4000 birds belonging to 52 different species.
But it would seem that the count did not go well last year. In 2014, bird watcher managed to identify only 3000 birds belonging to 46 species. The specialists explained that any number of factors such as weather conditions could impact the total number of birds observed during a year. The birds have also the habit of supplementing their winter food supply from the nearby feeder.
So, if you perchance observed birds coming to your feeder, then you are requested to contact Phil Ranson, either by phone number or email.
Photo credits:www.wikipedia.org