Since 1900, New Brunswickers have ventured out over the Christmas period to participate in the world’s longest-running citizen science survey. Don MacPhail of the Saint John Naturalists’ Club recently collated data for the last 70 years of the Saint John Christmas bird count.
Local 107.3FM caught up with MacPhail, who was on Deer Island in the southwest corner of the province, via Zoom. MacPhail spoke about the collection of the substantial amount of data, the variety of birds spotted by Saint John participants over the years, and how residents can get involved in this year’s count.
This year’s count takes place on December 28th in Saint John and January 4th in Quispamsis-Hampton. More information about how to get involved in the count can be found at saintjohnnaturalistsclub.org.
