[obol] Disappearing CBCs

[Don Albright]

OBOL,

Since I compiled the dates of Oregon's CBCs for this winter, a couple people
have asked me about one CBC that is not on the schedule this time around:
The Silverton CBC is not taking place this winter.  The compiler told me
that declining turnout in recent years had made the count more difficult to
run effectively, so it's been dropped, at least for now.  By my count, this
makes four CBCs that have disappeared over the last three or four years,
joining the Coquille Valley, Vale and Lower Owyhee counts.  No new counts
have appeared in Oregon in the same time period.  I don't know if this is
something that the Oregon birding community should be concerned about, but I
do find it interesting.

Looking at the map of CBC coverage in the recent CBC edition of American
Birds, it's those two lost Malheur County counts that create the biggest
hole in CBC coverage for Oregon, though there are counts not too far distant
in Nampa and Boise, Idaho.  For the sake of creating more even geographic
coverage of CBCs in Oregon, I've always thought a count in McDermitt, on the
Oregon/Nevada border, would fill a big hole on the map, but how many people
would go to count birds in winter?

As for this year's CBC schedule, it's posted on the Oregon Field
Ornithologists website:  www.oregonbirds.org.  But please note that, due to
MY error, the date of the Florence count is incorrect on that schedule.  The
correct date for Florence is Saturday, December 16.

Don Albright
Newberg, Oregon
donalbri at teleport.com