Welcome to the final tally of the 2015 Daily Kos Backyard Science Yardbird Race and the start of the 2016 Race! This is the final tally of the 2015, with Grand Bragging Rights to be determined as sightings up to midnight Dec 31, 2015 trickle in. We’re also looking forward to hearing about everyone’s first birds of the 2016 Race.
I need to send huge thanks to our official tally keepers: aaroninsandiego, matching mole, Milly Watt, and Ocean Diver. Their careful data wrangling has been so important in keeping the race going. Thank you all!
Here's what the race is all about:
The Daily Kos Backyard Science Yardbird Race is a birding competition where, over the course of one year, participants strive to identify the most bird species - by sight and/or by sound - from the confines of their yards.
Everyone is welcome - new birders, experienced birders, and anyone in between. We're a very supportive group and will help as much as we can. If you're not sure about an ID, just do your best to give us a good written description. Images, even mediocre ones, can be a great help, too. There are a number of categories, so that people who live in urban centers don't have to compete against others who have a lot of open space or waterfront views.
The Categories:
- ~Small Town
- ~College Campus
- ~Urban apartment or condo
- ~Urban attached (townhouse, rowhouse)
- ~Urban detached
- ~Suburban
- ~Rural <5 acres
- ~Rural >5 acres
- ~Waterfront (trumps any of the above...)
- ~Classroom Project
Here's where we stand after the last December tally. Three new racers jumped in last month. Please welcome Daenerys, welso, and Peregrine Kate! Congratulations to nom de plume, who was the only participant to score a new personal record last time! A number of other participants edged closer last month, and could meet or match their records this tally.
As always, do let me know if I've missed something or if anything needs correcting. More details and fine print can be found on the other side of the invisible splat of orange bird poop way below.
1. not4morewars (new) ... central IA ... 7
1. jforests (new) ... Berkeley CA ... 32
2. Benny Toothpick (25) ... Hamilton, NY... 29 (New personal record)
3. aaroninsandiego (21, 20) ... San Diego CA ... 22 (New personal record)
4. Daenerys (new) … Salt Lake City UT … 9 (Welcome Daenerys)
5. Meteor Blades (new) ... South of San Fransisco, CA ... 5
1. cany (new) ... Orange County CA ... 67
2. PHScott ... (32, 38, 48) ... west of Tallahassee ... 46
3. besame (new) … NW Sierras CA … 45
4. Attack Gardener (49) ... Saratoga County NY ... 44
5. birdfeeder (new) ... Shutesbury MA ... 40
6. jerseyblue (new) ... Howell NJ ... 36
7. most awesome nana (48, 57)... NE PA ... 12
1. burnt out (73, 75, 78) ... mid MO ... 97 (New personal record)
2. purple cones (new) … VA … 35
3. ninety wt (25) ... central MS ... 24
1. Economaniac (new) … location? … 91
2. bwren (50, 41, 55) ... Seattle WA ... 45
3. welso (new) ...Cleveland, OH … 34 (Welcome welso)
3. gulfgal98 (new) ... NC ... 23
4. mission419 (new) ... Seattle WA ... 19
5. KenBee (new) ... SB CA ... 18
6. billybush (35, 19) ... Omaha NE ... 17
7. matching mole (new location)... Seattle WA ... 12
8. DemBeans (new) ... Kansas City MO ... 7
1. AZ Sphinxmoth (43, 73)... Baja, AZ ... 65
2. chantedor (46, 56) ... Paradise, CA ... 54
3. LICenter (new) ... Suffolk County, LI ... 51
4. (tie). enhydra lutris (40, 47, 40) ... Castro Valley NOCA ... 44
4 (tie). lorell (36, 47) ... Sugarland, TX ... 44
5. profewalt (76) ... South NJ ... 25
6. gulfgal98 (new) ... Tallahassee, FL ... 16 (final 2015 tally in this category)
7. 6412093 (20, 30) ... NW Oregon ... 15
8. Peregrine Kate (new) … SE MI … 14 (Welcome Peregrine Kate)
9. barbwires (new) ...Alexandria VA ... 6
1. Polly Syllabic (100, 102, 83) ... Gooseville WI ... 96
2. Dr. Arcadia (78, 87) ... thumb of MI ... 85
3. matching mole (78, 79, 76) ... Tallahassee FL ... 80 (New personal record)
4. OceanDiver (71, 72) ... Lopez IS WA ... 74 (New personal record)
5. Milly Watt (67, 75, 72) ... Olympic Peninsula WA ... 67
6. nom de plume (64) ... Upper Kitsap Peninsula WA ... 66 (New personal record)
7. Mark Sumner (69, 80) ... Hillsboro MO ... 34
8. political mutt (53, 65, 91) ... Sandhills NC ... 22
Tally Updates. Here's what you need to report - Your location, as close as you are comfortable revealing. Your yard category. Number of species seen so far, including your other tallies if you have any. List of birds seen, dated if you wish. Any comments you have about your sightings.
The Final Official Tally of the 2015 Backyard Science Yardbird Race and the first tally of the 2016 Race are now open! Newcomers and returnees are always welcome. Have fun!
"Green Diary Rescue" is posted every Saturday and Wednesday at 1:00 pm Pacific Time on the Daily Kos front page. Green Diary Rescue has been good to Backyard Science, so take a minute to recommend, comment, and then link to your other off-dKos groups.
Details and fine print. You'll be listing the number of bird species that you see from the confines of your yard between January 1 and December 31 of the year. You can list a bird if you see or hear it while you are somewhere in your yard. Your "yard" includes the property on which your domicile is located, and includes your living quarters. So, you can list the Killdeer that wakes you at 2am, but you can't list the Penguin you think you see in your neighbor's side yard while driving home if you cannot see it from any place in your yard after you get out of your car. You can, however, walk around to your neighbor's yard to visually ID a bird that you have initially glimpsed or heard from the confines of your own yard. Pet birds and birds kept for hunting don't count, but domestic chickens, ducks, peafowl, guinea hens, geese etc are fair game. With the exception of utilizing recorded bird calls, which is strongly discouraged, there are no rules about making your yard more bird-attractive than the competition's. There are also no rules about ladders and fences. Once again, here are the yard categories:
- ~Small Town
- ~College Campus
- ~Urban apartment or condo
- ~Urban attached (townhouse, rowhouse)
- ~Urban detached
- ~Suburban
- ~Rural <5 acres
- ~Rural >5 acres
- ~Waterfront (trumps any of the above...)
- ~Classroom Project
Please let us know if your back yard doesn't seem to fit in any of these categories. We'll work out a new one for you.