HILO — For most people, the holidays aren’t a time associated with birds — unless it’s two turtle doves or three French hens.
But for hundreds of citizen scientists around the country, December means one thing: the start of the Audubon Society’s Christmas Bird Count.
Beginning this week and continuing through early January, groups armed with little more than binoculars and notepads will head out into the field with a very simple goal: a bird census. Every bird counts, from myna to amakihi.
East Hawaii’s count takes place today. A Kona count takes place Dec. 26.
According to the Hawaii Audubon Society, 10 counts take place across the state, including one on Kahoolawe. Birds on Midway Island also will be counted.
“It’s part of a nationwide program to keep track of the presence of birds throughout the country, and also to introduce people to birds,” said coordinator Thane Pratt.
Pratt, 65, went on his first count when he was 10 years old, hiking the Manoa Cliff Trail of Oahu.
Counts take place in specified areas called circles, each 15 miles in diameter. East Hawaii’s is located in the Volcano area.
“They are a fixed area,” Pratt said. “There’s talk about adding a Hilo count circle, and that would be great.”
The bird count’s value lies in its longevity: It’s taken place every year since 1900, when an Audubon ornithologist established the count on Christmas Day to counter a very different holiday tradition — going out and shooting as many birds as possible in a day. The count was an early conservation measure.
The sheer amount of data collected over more than a century allows scientists to track bird movements and migration patterns over time.
“The most obvious changes to the (Big Island’s) bird file are the new species,” Pratt said. “They show up, and then they spread around the island.”
The common waxbill, a non-native species, has been in Kona for some time, but last year was spotted during the Volcano count for the first time.
“It’s on other Hawaiian islands; it could have gotten here on its own from Oahu,” Pratt said.
On Kauai, the count has tracked the return of the nene.
“There used to be no wild birds there,” Pratt said. “They’ve been increasing steadily on the Christmas Bird Count.”
Nene also appear often on the Big Island’s count, along with other native species like the Hawaiian hawk.
Last year, Pratt said, an “astonishing number” of ‘akiapola‘au (28) were counted.
For birdwatchers, the count offers a chance to spot migratory species they might not otherwise see.
“We get kolea every year, and we also get rarities,” Pratt said. “That makes it fun.”
For more information, visit www.hawaiiaudubon.org.
Email Ivy Ashe at iashe@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
