Want to be a part of an international project? Look no further than your own backyard! Tomorrow is the start of the 13th annual Great Backyard Bird Count, when beginning bird watchers and experts alike across North America count the wild birds they see in their backyards, parks, or wildlife refuges.

The event, which is a joint project of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, The Audubon Society, and Bird Studies Canada, is cosponsored by the National Resources Conservation Service and the National Science Foundation.

During the four-day event, which runs through President’s Day, participants use checklists to count birds for 15 or more minutes a day and then enter the results online. You can explore real-time maps and charts to see what other people are reporting in your state or anywhere in North America, and you can tweet about your findings, too. If you took some great snapshots of our fine feathered friends during the count, consider entering them in the photo contest.

Results from the count help researchers compare the timing of birds’ migrations with past years, and determine if populations of individual species are increasing or declining, among other things. Additionally, information from the Great Backyard Bird Count and other citizen-science surveys go into a bird database that is used by scientists around the world.

Can’t participate in the count every day? You can submit surveys for fewer days. Don’t think you can tell a flicker from a sapsucker? See these resources for identifying birds and learning more about them. Don’t have enough birds to count in your yard? Visit these resources for attracting, feeding, and housing birds to prepare for next year’s count.

Are you participating in this year’s count? If so, what birds have you seen?

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