ate niet) PU Lea COMING tat) ee onlg SDS 27 
Verification of Unusual Birds on 
Christmas Counts Taken in Illinois 
I have taken the job, for the Na- 
tional Audubon Society, of regional 
editor for the Christmas. Bird 
Counts of Illinois and Wisconsin. 
There has been much concern 
about questionable and undocu- 
mented records as shown in the 
following quote from AMERICAN 
BIRDS, April, 1973: 
“Next year, things will be much 
tougher ... observers, compilers, 
and editors alike now look upon 
CBCs as demanding of the strictest 
accuracy standards. From now on, 
compilers and count organizers 
must insist on reliability, on com- 
plete documentation of rarities, 
and a willingness to cast out rec- 
ords honestly ... We want to be 
able, from now on, to defend their 
reliability.” 
I wish that every participant in 
Christmas Bird Counts could read 
Ludlow Griscom’s paper entitled 
“Problems of Field Identification” 
published in the AUK, (Vol. 39, 
p. 31-41, 1922). Griscom lists the 
following necessary qualifications 
to make a competent field ornithol- 
ogist: 
“(1) First and most important, 
the student should learn by heart 
the published information on the 
birds of his locality. (Illinois has 
many such publications.) 
“(2) Next, commit the diagnostic 
characters of every species in the 
local list to memory. If possible, a 
museum should be visited and bird 
skins examined. 
“(3) Next, get out in the field 
and learn to know the birds of your 
locality well. The length of time 
this will take is naturally a ques- 
tion of the amount of time avail- 
able for field ‘work, but ten years 
is a safe estimate. 
“(4) Above all, the student should 
cultivate the scientific attitude of 
mind, and he should believe in his 
infallibility.” 
I would like to quote one other 
sentence from Griscom: “One of 
the greatest advantages of field 
ornithology is that the more we 
know about it, the more we enjoy 
it, and the more we can benefit 
others.” 
Frankly, some of the counts I 
edited from Illinois last winter had 
very little documentation, and the 
necessary qualifications Griscom 
mentioned were, in some instances, 
obviously lacking. The editor of 
the ‘“Middlewestern Prairie Re- 
gion,” Vernon Kleen, requires a 
verifying sheet for all unusual 
finds. We will adopt this for future 
Christmas Bird Counts. 
The Documentation Form is self- 
explanatory, and many of you have 
used it before. It can be completed 
by simply listing the numbers on 
a sheet of paper and writing in the 
information. Don’t forget to docu- 
ment high individual counts and 
birds seen in count periods. 
It is advisable to take notes on 
the spot when a rarity is observed, 
even before looking at a field guide. 
If possible, get photographs (if 
clear enough these could be pub- 
lished in AMERICAN BIRDS) and, 
if need be, return the following day 
with other observers to try to sub- 
stantiate the observation. 
There are a number of species 
that are either birds that are diffi- 
cult to identify or birds that are 
considered to winter by some peo- 
ple who obviously do not realize 
the winter range of those particular 
species. The following birds are 
examples of these categories: 
