By Andrew Emlen
The 20th annual Wahkiakum Christmas Bird Count was held on December 29, 2017, with 21 participants. Rain fell throughout most of the day, heavily at times. There were also fewer birding parties than usual, particularly kayakers to cover the Columbia River islands, so numbers of species and individual birds were lower than average: 104 species, 27,758 birds.
The most abundant bird was Cackling Goose with 7644, followed by Greater Scaup with 2785, the lowest Greater Scaup total in the history of the count. A large falcon seen by Mike Patterson in Brownsmead was probably the Gyrfalcon identified by other birders in the same area the following week. Great Egrets continue to increase their numbers in the area; this year's total of 35 nearly doubled the previous high count.
Last year was the first year Turkey Vultures had been recorded wintering in the count circle, on Puget Island, and Turkey Vultures were present again during this year's count week. Misses included Horned Lark, as not enough boaters were available to send someone to their year-round colony on White's Island.
Other than that, there was a fair representation of the common species in the circle. Full results can be found on Audubon's website: http://netapp.audubon.org/cbcobservation/
Many thanks to all the volunteers who braved the wet weather.