The Audubon annual Christmas Bird Count is a great excuse to brave the cold and listen to the winter woods. Between social media groups and bird identification apps, birding has never been more accessible. But as our city continues to both sprawl and fill in the remaining natural places, avian soundscapes give way to cars and the sounds of human flight.
Cody Little pushed through some brush and peered through his binoculars this past weekend in south Charlotte.
"Just checking for some roosting ducks," he said.
It’s the annual Audubon Christmas Bird Count in south Charlotte. For one day, birders come from all over the area to survey a 7.5-mile radius centered on South Boulevard and East Woodlawn — birders like twins Cody and Garrett Little.
"In the birding community, we have what’s called a spark bird," Garrett Little said. "That describes a bird that a birder saw that just made them say, 'Oh my god, look at that.' For me, that was a Northern Flicker."
A Northern Flicker is a type of woodpecker. For Cody Little, his brother was that spark.
"I showed you my spark bird. I was like, ‘Look at this bird!’" Garrett Little said.
Cody Little replies: "I was like, ‘Yeah, that’s pretty cool actually. I think I’ll devote pretty much every bit of free time to that.’"
But this cold winter morning, the only sounds they heard before dawn came from the birders making a subtle pshpshpsh sound to attract songbirds and a chorus of squealing coyotes.
Birdwatching is a bit of a misnomer, especially before sunrise, according to Garrett Little:
"For every 10 species I’m identifying by ear, I’m seeing one," he said.
Noise pollution has made it that much harder, between traffic on the road and in the air. Planes rushed overhead, along with cars nearby, roaring in the predawn stillness.
The twins will never know what birds they might have missed — but odds are, there are fewer birds around them now than there were several decades ago. The annual bird count helps keep track of overall bird decline — since 1970, the U.S. has lost nearly 30% of its bird abundance.
One reason: habitat loss. When Cody took over this 10-mile route, it had been a few years since his predecessor had visited some spots.
"He had described it as conducive habitat, and I was like, ‘Nah, man. This is like … a Starbucks,’" he said.
Suburban sprawl has erased some of the woods and wetlands birds once called home. As ballfields supplant natural grasslands, modern birding sometimes means shining a light over a retention pond in the back of a subdivision. Garrett Little said this can lead to some interesting encounters with the local human population:
"We need everyone to know our intentions are good, and if we accidentally step on your land for a second, we were just looking for birds," he said.
Garrett Little clicked on the light and scanned the pond. No ducks. But as color slowly crept over the horizon, the white-throated sparrows began to chirp. Cody Little played a recording of the sparrow’s song from the Merlin app.
"Bird vocalizations are what interests me the most out of the whole thing," he said. "Just seeing and hearing how they communicate. It’s really interesting. I just like it a lot."
The Christmas Bird Count is what's known as citizen science, where amateur researchers and the general public participate in data collection. Thanks to citizen scientists around the world, the Merlin app has identified over 10,000 birds.
Humans aren’t the only ones listening to this library of bird songs. Sometimes, other birds are listening back. A warbler chirped back to Ava Kornfeld's call played on her phone.
A few hours after dawn and 10 miles from where the Little twins started, Kornfeld spotted an orange-crowned Warbler. She’s been birding for a little over two years now.
"In December, I went on a Christmas Bird Count with Judy, and I was like, ‘I love this,'" she said.
"You have to realize it was 18 degrees out," replies Judy Walker, who is leading this group through Latta Park in Dilworth.
With a laugh, Walker recalls the dark ages of birding — a few decades ago.
"I cannot even begin to tell you how wonderful it is to bird now. I mean I had to learn birdsongs from an LP," she said.
A long-playing record, or LP, was a vinyl disc, about a foot in diameter, that could store about 25 minutes of music. Walker led her first bird count in the 1980s. The tools of the trade aren’t the only things that has changed.
"In the spring, it's gotten even quieter. And it’s quiet now. The birds are just not singing as much as they used to," she said. "Even in the winter, you usually have birds as they feed, chirping at each other and making sounds. But they’re really pretty quiet, I’ve noticed in the last few years."
Research has shown that birdsong reduces stress and relieves anxiety, while urban noises, like traffic, can contribute to depression. The city amended its noise ordinance in 2019 to restrict noise pollution. But it does little to relieve the ambient sounds of everyday life — or restore the natural sounds we’ve lost.
Still, Charlotte has made some progress where habitat restoration is concerned. Walker passed a debris pile on the trail. She said Mecklenburg Park and Rec has started leaving habitat, like fallen branches and dead trees.
"They let it go a little wilder — and natural," she said.
In total, the birders identified 88 species in Charlotte this Christmas Count — not bad considering the record is 100. And the count’s not over — in two weeks, Walker’s leading a count in the Pee Dee National Wildlife Refuge.
