Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities

Birders ready for Global Big Day

If you happen upon a small group of bleary-eyed individuals sporting binoculars and toting well-worn bird identification guides in Curry County on Saturday, mark it down in your own rare-sighting book.

You will have encountered one of the hundreds of teams who will be out in more than 150 countries around the world participating in a Global Big Day, an attempt to see how many of the earth’s 10,000 species of birds can be identified during a 24-hour period.

Albuquerque resident Christopher Rustay will be heading up this local intrepid group that includes eastern New Mexico bird aficionados Tish McDaniel and Grant Beauprez (and possibly the alarmingly rank amateur who is writing this column).

Rustay explained that the Global Big Day is an effort promoted by eBird, an international online registry used by birdwatchers to record their sightings.

“Many folks don't know this but New Mexico has the fourth highest bird list of any state in the union behind Texas, California and Arizona,” Rustay said. He decided to focus his effort on Curry County this year because it tends to be an “under-birded” area.

“About 300 species have been identified in Curry County over the years,” Rustay said, two-thirds of those during the prime spring migration month of May.

Rustay’s group has cobbled together a time table that will start at 5 a.m. and last until the humans are exhausted.

“If we get over 130 species, I’ll be very happy, but we certainly have the possibility of finding over 150,” Rustay said. “It will all depend on what the weather does. If several playas fill between now and Saturday morning we could do well with waterbirds.”

On the flipside, “if the winds kick up, we could just pack it in,” Rustay said. “It’s no fun birding in high winds and often highly unproductive.”

Locals may be surprised to learn that the Clovis Waste Water Treatment Plant is a highly favored year-round birding location. It will be one of the first stops Saturday. The team also plans to hit Ned Houk Park, Greene Acres Park, Hillcrest Park, and Goodwin Playa, as well as the rugged and biologically diverse Caprock area.

“Many folks believe that birding in the prairie areas of the state is not exciting,” Rustay said, “and yet some species are much easier to find here in New Mexico than anywhere else.”

Besides contributing to an important pool of scientific data, Rustay says Big Day bird counts can have a positive side effect for a community.

“If we have a good day and spread the word on interesting or unusual species, it could put Clovis ‘on the map’ for birders,” Rustay said. “This happened to the town of Fort Sumner for a while when a Glossy Ibis was discovered in 1995 near Fort Sumner.”

Birders flocked in (pun obviously intended) for the unusual sighting, and then slept in area hotels and dined in local restaurants.

“The more birding destinations in an area and rare birds that are discovered,” Rustay confirmed, “the more likely it is that New Mexico birders will put that place on their ‘must visit’ list of destinations every year.”

He jokingly refers to the Big Day efforts as “macho birdwatching,” because it is “a measure of one’s endurance as well as one’s knowledge,” but says that even after a lifetime of birding (he started at the age of 6) the thrill of finding a new bird remains “quite intoxicating” and worth every minute.

Betty Williamson is polishing her binoculars and stockpiling caffeine. You may reach her at:

[email protected]

 
 
Rendered 03/12/2024 20:07