Christmas Bird count Dec 16, 2012

Spent yesterday on the Christmas Bird count. Beautiful Day at the National Bison Range. Along the short stretch of Mission Creek we flushed more than just a few Mallards. Estimated 5000+ filling the sky with brilliant green and blue along with a cacophony of sounds. Bald Eagles were also flying causing the Mallards to head in all different directions.
This was a first for me. Just glad for digital cameras because I burned through almost 400 pictures during the day. A flock of Bohemian Waxwings were also very cooperative.

nice shots, i'm curious, is there a technique for counting the birds when there are that many? or is just a good guess?

As my Dad would say, "Count the wings and divide by 2".

Fabulous

Now that looks like it was a fun day and a great place to photograph. I'm quite envious.
All the greenheads in the mallard give it a lot of interest.

Thanks for the comments, a great day for birds and other wildlife. Here is another from the day. Yes, estimation takes place but the experts who do these counts become quite good at it. Me, I said just wow there are lots of ducks. But with photos you can do a grid count and get a good estimation.

rick_reno wrote in post #15376915
nice shots, i'm curious, is there a technique for counting the birds when there are that many? or is just a good guess?

The "Proper" method is to count off 10-25 (or sometimes 100s depending on flock size) birds depending on the size of the birds in the flock. And then section off the flock in 25's etc. Once you have done that a few hundred times you get pretty good at just guestimating the number of birds in a flock by looking at them. One mistake that novices make is underestimating the number of birds. It takes quite a bit of practice, but once you have done it a few hundred times you get pretty good at compensating for your underestimate. If you a birdaholic like me, and the flock isn't moving, you can count every single bird to see if you guess was right .

Excellent pictures, and man indeed these are lots and lots of birds! You are so lucky to see witness all of these.

sure is a lot of birds, great, and I love how the fluro heads of the mallards pop.