Winter birds of the Elbow Lake property will now be counted as part of a new Christmas Bird Count (CBC) circle for the Frontenac area.  Novice and experienced bird enthusiasts alike are invited to participate in the Frontenac CBC on Saturday, December 19, to help monitor and conserve North America’s birds!  Concurrent with the official count, the ELEEC is presenting two Christmas Bird Count for Kids workshops for families with young children.

The CBC is the longest-running Citizen Science program in the world, promoting conservation and providing valuable data on winter bird populations since Christmas Day of 1900.  To date, over 200 peer-reviewed articles have resulted from analysis done with CBC data, including recent ground-breaking documentation that 314 species of North American birds are threatened by global warming.  In Canada, the CBC is coordinated by Bird Studies Canada, and includes hundreds of count sites from coast to coast.

With its centre over Deline Lake, the 24-kilometre wide Frontenac CBC count site stretches from the Elbow Lake property in the east to Verona in the west.  Unique among other CBC counts in the area is the relatively high proportion of protected natural areas within the Frontenac circle, which also includes Frontenac Provincial Park, Gould Lake Conservation Area, several properties owned by Nature Conservancy of Canada and a nature reserve owned by the Kingston Field Naturalists.

Volunteer field observers are needed to cover portions of the count circle – particularly the area surrounding the Elbow Lake property: North Shore Road, Leland Road and Opinicon Road – counting all the birds they find.  The ELEEC is also looking for experienced birders to share their expertise at our Christmas Bird Count for Kids workshops.  Contact the Frontenac CBC coordinators, Carolyn Bonta / Michael Johnson, at 613-353-7968 or bonta.johnson@sympatico.ca if you are able to assist.