Princeton NJ Non-Profit Events Calendar

Christmas Bird Count, Kingston Greenway

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Sunday December 16, 2018
7:30 AM

The Kingston segment of this year's Audubon Christmas Bird Count begins at 7:30 AM at the Locktender's House in Kingston and goes until noon. After a break for lunch at Palace of Asia in Kingston, the count continues in the afternoon. Join us for morning, afternoon, or both. Experienced birders and novices are equally welcome to participate. Dress warmly, and bring binoculars if you have them. If interested, give Karen Linder a call (609-683-0483) or register http://kingstongreenways.org/

About the Christmas Bird Count:

Prior to the turn of the century, people engaged in a holiday tradition known as the Christmas "Side Hunt." They would choose sides and go afield with their guns; whoever brought in the biggest pile of feathered (and furred) quarry won.Conservation was in its beginning stages around the turn of the 20th century, and many observers and scientists were becoming concerned about declining bird populations. Beginning on Christmas Day 1900, ornithologist Frank Chapman, an early officer in the then budding Audubon Society, proposed a new holiday tradition--a "Christmas Bird Census"--that would count birds in the holidays, rather than hunt them. So began the Christmas Bird Count.These days, more than 50,000 observers participate in the Annual Christmas Bird Count each year. The results of these efforts are compiled into the longest-running database in ornithology, representing over a century of data on trends of early-winter bird populations across the Americas.