Bird Watchers Urgently Needed to Track Rusty Blackbirds
Citizen scientists use eBird to monitor alarming drop in numbers. Populations of Rusty Blackbirds are crashing! Their numbers have plummeted by as much as 88-98% over the last few decades, according to data gathered between 1966 and 2006 for the North American Breeding Bird Survey and Christmas Bird Count. A species that was once considered to be abundant is rapidly disappearing before our eyes. Your observations can help save this species by arming scientists with critical information about this species' ecology during migration. Bird watchers across North America are being asked to help scientists track spring migrant Rusty Blackbirds from April 1-7 using the eBird online checklist program. Your observations of this species can help fill in the important missing pieces of this conservation puzzle!

Scientists at Audubon and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology are appealing
to bird watchers to help fill this information gap by looking for Rusty
Blackbirds migrating north April 1-7. The data collected and reported
through eBird will help identify important migration stopover locations
and habitats for conservation. It will help researchers examine whether
long-term changes to key migration habitats are responsible for the
species' decline. If you are interested in participating, please
collect the following information, then visit eBird to send your observations, taking note of:

Date, time, and location of the observations

Rusty Blackbird flock size, including an estimate of number of males
vs. females.

General behavior: flying, feeding, loafing (day), roosting (dawn, dusk,
night).

Habitat: agricultural field, scrub-shrub wetland, forested wetland,
shores of rivers or creeks, shores of lakes or ponds.

Comments: Please include "Rusty Blackbird Survey" in the comments
section so scientists can determine whether you were specifically
looking for Rusty Blackbirds during your birding expedition.

Read about identifying Rusty Blackbirds at
eBird News