The best place to go eye-to-eye with a dark-eyed junco or to be eaten out of house and home by a hungry house finch while becoming comfortable with a downy woodpecker could be your backyard, kitchen window or balcony bird feeder.
Statisticians at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, where the world's largest citizen science program, Project FeederWatch, is based, have just released the 1997 Top 10 List of Feeder Birds. The annual list is used by professional ornithologists to track trends in bird populations. Just as interested are the more than 11,000 registered FeederWatchers and thousands of other backyard "birders" who compare their findings with others from across North America.
From the number-crunchers at the Laboratory of Ornithology, who processed 69,785 Project FeederWatch data forms, here are the 10 most widespread feeder species in North America: 10) European Starling; 9) Northern Cardinal; 8) House Sparrow; 7) Black-capped Chickadee; 6) Mourning Dove; 5) Blue Jay; 4) Downy Woodpecker; 3) American Goldfinch; 2) House Finch; 1) Dark-eyed Junco.
"The most noticeable decline was in the numbers of house finches appearing at individual feeders in the East," said Diane L. Tessaglia, Project FeederWatch research coordinator at the Laboratory of Ornithology. "We had the same number of FeederWatchers reporting house finches, but the average flock size dropped 22 percent between the winter of 1995-96 and last winter. Although house finches have been appearing at more feeders continentwide since 1987-88, their numbers in the East have been declining since 1992-93."
Volunteer FeederWatchers keep tabs on visiting birds during the winter feeding season, which begins as early as November each year and continues through April. The latest results are for the winter of 1996-97.
Beginning this winter, FeederWatch will be able to submit their data electronically via the Internet. Interested bird-watchers can visit the FeederWatch data-submission demonstration site via the Laboratory's Web site: http://www.ornith.cornell.edu.
That Web site also has information on joining Project FeederWatch. An annual fee of $15 helps cover costs of data analysis and newsletters sent to FeederWatchers. Information on joining Project FeederWatch is available by calling 1-800-843-BIRD, a toll-free call in the United States, or (519) 586-3531 from Canada. The address in the United States is the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, Project FeederWatch, P.O. Box 11, Ithaca, N.Y. 14851-0011. In Canada write Bird Studies Canada, P.O. Box 160, Port Rowan, Ontario, N0E, 1M0, Canada.