Concord CBC is open for enrollment. There is no better time to contact your sector leader and make plans. Go to the clickable links on the right sidebar to find your town. If you do not live in a Concord CBC circle town feel welcome to join any town accepting new volunteers. Sudbury and a small portion of Framingham are understaffed; Sudbury is a big town with vast neighborhoods, hundreds of feeders, and conservation areas that do not get censused every year. Concord is the gravitational center with more than eighty participants. You are welcome to contact the circle compiler–norman.levey AT fastmail.net or phone.
NEWCOMERS should browse from the tabs for the rules of the game. Count day is midnight to midnight–one 24 hour day. Count Week, bracketing the big day, has a distinct protocol. If you are an eBirder please remember to record your car miles and elapsed times because the phone app does not differentiate travel on foot and driving.
GREAT MEADOWS AND ASSABET REFUGES – Special Use Permit renewal applications have been filed for both refuge areas but the Weir Hill Office seems to be unstaffed at this time. We are waiting for phone and email responses.
COUNTDOWN – National Audubon is discouraging large groups in indoor settings. (Outdoors a-ok.) As I write, Wolbach Farmhouse is not open for group events so we may be compiling remotely. . . again. Which reminds me to extend huge thanks to Sudbury Valley Trustees for eleven years of sponsorship and loaning us the farmhouse conference room for our pot luck suppers and countdowns. It is always a big fun time and we hope to restore the tradition. Lisa Vernegaard is retiring from her executive directorship and we are sad to see her move on. Lisa, you will be missed! I will communicate with Lisa and meet her successor next year with the upshot we can restore our collaboration. If you have not yet joined SVT please, please become a member.
TRANSITIONS – Leadership changes are inevitable and I am unhappy to write that the Stow, Maynard, Bolton sector needs a compiler/participant coordinator. Nick Tepper may not be returning since his early June car accident–at least not this year. Norm Levey is willing to compile if we do not have a volunteer by end of December. It is a small group of just a few field parties and feeder counters. Also, our condolences to the family and friends of Nicky Patterson who passed away last July. Nicky loved the CBC and was a long time participant–thirty three years–and leader for the Wayland sector, field partnering with former circle compiler Hank Norwood, and a tireless conservation volunteer at Heard Farm. If there was a winter catbird to be found in the farm thickets Nicky would get it. Waylanders who reported to Nicky, please send your results to Daryl Vanderburgh. The John Andrews team will carry on as usual and data merge with Daryl.
Many thanks to all for your tireless commitment to the Concord CBC and sticking with us for another fun winter birding adventure. I will update the post when I get more information about the SUP, countdown, and leadership changes.
Norm Levey for the Concord CBC.
The Christmas Bird Cou
nt is owned and operated by National Audubon Society in partnership with Bird Studies Canada, the North American Breeding Bird Survey, and the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. Veteran field participants remember when they actually had to pay to participate. Joining the the count is free but it still needs y
our contributions. Please consider a donation to the CBC to support the science and the welfare of our North American birds. Follow the Audubon logo.
Many thanks to our sponsor, Sudbury Valley Trustees, for their support and 
accommodations in years past; We will post information about our countdown in December. Several SVT properties are censused during the count. Please become a member if you have not joined.
Concord Christmas Bird Count 
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