A Presentation by Geoffrey S. LeBaron, Christmas Bird Count Director for National Audubon

Some of the nation’s first bird surveys were conducted in the Connecticut River Valley. In Northampton, the first records date to the 1840s when William Dwight Whitney, who grew up on King Street, began observing birds and collecting specimens. In the decades that followed, the nation’s interest in natural history and conservation soared. In 1889, Florence Merriam published the first field guide to bird identification in the U.S., Birds Through an Opera Glass, which includes profiles of species she observed along the Mill River while she was attending Smith College.
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In this presentation, noted ornithologist Geoff LeBaron will spotlight the last century of birding in the Connecticut River Valley by focusing on the records gathered during the Christmas Bird Count. Started in 1900, Christmas Bird Count is considered one of the world’s largest “citizen science” projects and relies on data collected by thousands of volunteers. LeBaron will share information on how some species of birds in our area are doing on local, regional, and continental scales.