etiawen ee ON BU ls kT oL Nn 13 
Anti-Inflationary Summer Vacation Idea: 
Volunteer for the 1970 Breeding Bird Survey. 
by MARYANN GOSSMANN 
resident, Fox Valley Chapter, IAS 
s my life list grew to the stage 
here adding a new species meant 
) expensive vacation trip, I began 
feel a need to justify my frequent 
rding jaunts. The exercise and re- 
xation, etc., really amounted to 
selfish pleasure trip. The idea of 
itting this enjoyable hobby to some 
ientific use therefore was appeal- 
g. 
When an article in the AUDUBON 
ULLETIN mentioned the need for 
jlunteer observers to take part in 
ie United States Department of 
e Interior’s Breeding Bird Survey, 
re seemed the perfect answer last 
ar to my dilemma. 
A letter of inquiry was promptly 
iswered with a copy of previous 
rvey results and a list of routes 
failable in my general area. As 
me observers managed to run as 
any as seven routes, and I rarely 
ok before leaping, I immediately 
rote to request two routes. (The 
utes are selected at random and 
rely seem to start near the ob- 
rver’s home.) My first route start- 
| about 25 miles from home—The 
cond was more than 50 miles 
vay. The requirement that each 
ute be started exactly one half 
ur before dawn really got me up 
id moving earlier than usual. 
All species seen or heard during 
three-minute period, at each of 
stops, is recorded. (My bad habit 
of birding by sight rather than by 
sound was severely jolted and I was 
forced to finally learn the various 
sparrow songs.) A three minute 
timer “borrowed” from the x-ray 
darkroom proved invaluable. Al- 
though an assistant is a great help 
in keeping track of the time and 
handling the paper work, only spe- 
cies seen or heard by the observer 
himself can be counted. 
Although both my routes covered 
mainly farmland they did vary 
somewhat in habitat. The “Newark” 
route had more variety while the 
“Essex” route was almost entirely 
through row crops. The Newark 
route yield 44 species and more than 
1,000 individuals while the other 
route revealed only 22 species and 
about 850 individual birds. 
When my routes have been com- 
pared to others throughout the 
country and Canada I will receive 
a copy of the survey summary. This 
survey system was developed after 
some 15 years of planning. Field 
tests were held in 1965 in Delaware 
and Maryland with expansion to the 
eastern states and eastern Canada 
in 1966, to the Great Plains in 1967, 
and in 1968 to include all of the 
United States and Canada. Informa- 
tion gathered by these yearly sur- 
veys gives an index of the abun- 
dance of breeding birds and serves 
as a basis for studies of population 
changes caused by factors like 
changing land use, urbanization, 
widespread pesticide use, etc. Al- 
though the early hour and exact 
