For four days in February every year, birdwatchers from across the world participate in The Great Backyard Bird Count. This year, the Great Backyard Bird Count(GBBC) will be held from February 14 to 17 in India, and will be coordinated by the Bird Count India collective.
India has been participating in this global bird count since 2013 and this annual exercise helps study how birds are distributed across the country, how they are affected by changes in habitat and weather and if there have been changes in populations and distributions.
Birdwatchers as well as the general public who wish to participate are encouraged to go birding for 15 minutes and count all the species they spot. Whatever they are able to identify, they can log onto www.ebird.org/india and submit the species list.
The Campus Bird Count (CBC) 2020 which is a coordinated effort to document birds in campuses across the country including educational institutions, training and government institutions as well as research and corporate institutions will also take place during the same time. The participants similarly, have been asked to log onto the same website to record the species list as has been specified for the backyard bird count.
“There should be an awareness of what birds there are around us and the GBBC as well as the Campus bird count aims to do this. Several campuses even within the city limits have many birds which are yet to be documented and participating in this exercise would be a good starting point for students who wish to explore birding,” said A.M. Aravind, an avid birder from the city. He said that while most institutions have eco-clubs which have been carrying out bird walks, the newer campuses which don’t have clubs yet or haven’t carried out a bird count can approach birders from the city to guide them.
For more details about the GBBC and the campus bird count, persons can log onto https://birdcount.in/events/gbbc/ .
