The Hartford Audubon Society (HAS) is pleased to announce our fourth annual Hartford County Big January of Birding bird watching challenge.  The purpose of the activity is to encourage folks to get outside during the month of January and see as many species of wild birds in Hartford County as possible!  The competition is free to people of all ages.

Bird watching is a delightful, free activity that can be enjoyed by people of all ages, in any setting.  Birds can be seen anywhere – you can watch pigeons, peregrine falcons and snowy owls in Hartford; count the birds on your feeders from your windows; identify ducks and geese on a local river; or seek rare woodland birds on land trust reserves.  Anywhere you go, birding is just plain fun.  Thus far, in early December, we still have some summer migrants lingering, and some rare visitors – a Pacific loon on the shore, catbirds in Canton, a Western tanager in Torrington.   January, 2020 may be a very interesting month.

To participate, birders should enter their daily or periodic observations onto ebird.org, the free bird watching site maintained by the Cornell University of Ornithology. At the end of the month, please create a month-long record of your observations in ebird and share this list with HAS President, Sarah Faulkner.

To enter, there are four categories:

• Youth (ages 4-10) who must see at least 25 species to enter;
• Teen (ages 11-17) who must see at least 35 species to enter;
• Weekend Warrior (adults ages 18 -? who can’t get outdoors during the week) who must see at least 50 species to enter;
• Adults (ages 18 – ? who can get outdoors during the week) who must see at least 60 species to enter.

All entries that meet the minimum number of species for each challenge group will receive a certificate of achievement.  A special prize will be awarded for the highest species count for each challenge group.

For more information – contact Sarah Faulkner at 860-543-1280 or sffaulkner@comcast.net