The Great Backyard Bird Count 2026, a Valuable and Fun Volunteer Citizen Science Project!

The Great Backyard Bird Count is a long-standing citizen science project run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Audubon, and Birds Canada. It's purpose is to document population and species numbers of birds in their winter migration areas. The GBBC has become a global database for bird populations, useful to researchers and conservationists. For us lay people, it is an opportunity to get outdoors with fellow birders, family, and friends. The counting period lasts for 4 days, but you can count for an hour(s), a day or daily. It's entirely up to you how much effort you wish to put into it. The dates for the count are February 13 - 16.

If you are new to the count and/or new to birding, there is a wealth of information on the Great Backyard Bird Count website https://www.birdcount.org. There are training videos, also.

As a master naturalist, count your travel, birding, and data entry time as a volunteer activity, and learning about the count as advanced training. Learning how to enter your counts into ebird can be considered a skill.