While the chilly, snowy weather is forcing a lot of people to remain inside their homes, many avid bird watchers are ready to brave the harsh weather conditions to participate in the annual Christmas Bird Count in State Forest Park in Walden.

The annual event, organized by the National Audubon Society, is now in its 117th year. Organizers are encouraging people to watch and count birds using binoculars; instead of killing them with guns. Birders will survey fifteen-mile diameter circles for counting birds.

The winter tradition is now a completely different event from what it once used to be. It used to be a hunting event but the National Audubon Society altered it to a Christmas bird census on the Christmas Day of 1900.

Alison Holloran, the regional officer of the National Audubon Society, said, “originally started as a Christmas bird hunt, and it was more of a contest to see how many birds and furry mammals that could be taken in a day on a Christmas day.”

The main purpose of the annual event is to protect birds and collect their population data for use in science, predominantly in conservation biology. However, many people take part in the annual event just for recreation.
The 2015 Christmas Bird Count event set a new record for overall turnout. A total of 76,669 volunteers took part in 2,505 groups across North America, Latin America, Bermuda and the Pacific Islands, and they tallied nearly 58.8 million birds.