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SIERRA VISTA — They say the early bird catches the worm, but what if you want to catch the early bird?
The answer is, of course, to get up even earlier, which is exactly what a group of about 60 mostly-amateur bird watchers did Saturday morning.
The Annual Ramsey Canyon Christmas Bird Count sees people travel from far and wide to participate, said Ted Mouras, vice president of Friends of the San Pedro River and organizer of the count.
“I’ve had folks from Canada on this,” Mouras said. “And we regularly have folks from Phoenix.”
  
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A group of about 60 volunteers gathered at the Lone Star Cafe in Hereford just after 6 a.m. for warm breakfast and coffee before setting out in teams of up to eight people to cover an area with a 7 1/2-mile radius.
The large number of different species that can be found in the area makes the Ramsey Canyon Christmas Bird Count one of the most popular of the National Audubon Society’s Christmas bird counts that occur across the Americas from mid-December to the first week of January.
“Typically, our Christmas bird count is one of the top 50 bird counts north of Mexico,” Mouras said. “Our bird count averages about 150 bird species a year.”
Bill Stocku, an avid bird watcher for more than 30 years, lead a team near the San Pedro River.
“When I was working, this was my way to unwind,” Stocku said.
Since his retirement in 1995, Stocku has remained active in his favorite outdoor activity, guiding local bird watching tours for Elderhostel, a company that specializes in educational trips for adults.
Walking down the dirt path that leads from the San Pedro House, Stocku and the group take a few steps before pausing and peering through their binoculars at various birds perched on Mesquite trees or in the thick shrubbery.
“There’s always a lot more than what your eyes see,” he said as the group tried to calculate the numbers of a large group of yellow-headed and red-winged blackbirds.
The area surrounding the San Pedro House was so rich with avian life that the group spent nearly half an hour identifying a number of birds without stepping foot out of the parking lot.
“This Christmas count is used by researchers all over the hemisphere,” said Sandy Kunzer, who, along with his wife Betsy, accompanied Stocku for the bird count.
The National Audubon started the Christmas counts, Kunzer said, as a response to what he called the “old paradigm of the Christmas hunt,” where hunters would go out and catch as many birds as they could.
Betsy Kunzer was not only helping to spot the birds on Saturday morning, but she also held the two-page checklist that the group used to tally their findings. Every time a Gila woodpecker or house finch was identified, she dutifully recorded it.
With four people in the group, they had to be careful to not count anything twice.
“That’s why we try to keep an eye on them and see where they move,” Betsy said.
Mouras said 14 teams are dispersed to different areas to reduce the possibility of overlapping.
“We keep them all pretty isolated, geographically,” he said. “Generally speaking, I can usually determine, especially if it’s rare, if we’ve got a bird that’s double counted.”
Phil Tucker, owner of Wild Birds Unlimited and a bird watcher for 10 years, said he enjoys the activity because it gets him out of the house.
“A lot of it is just getting out,” he said. “Out in the crisp, cool air.”
Volunteers with the bird count braved sub-freezing temperatures Saturday, with some areas still dusted with the light snowfall from Friday evening.
“This has got to be one of the coldest mornings out here,” Stocku said.
Undeterred by the cold, the group pressed on, spotting a red tailed hawk, white crown sparrows (“They look like a Michigan Wolverine’s helmet.”) and green tailed towhees before most people woke up to start their weekend.
Traces of other wildlife not on the checklist were evident throughout the trek, including fresh javelina tracks and the yipping of coyotes in the distant brush.
Many of the volunteers have been participating in the bird count for years, allowing Mouras to compose teams consisting of experienced watchers and those that are new to the hobby.
“Some of them are very, very good birders,” he said. “So it’s kind of a learning opportunity.”
Though no amateur himself, Tucker said he was still learning.
“That’s why I go with Bill,” he said. “He’s quite the birder. You won’t find much better than him.”
Herald/Review reporter Derek Jordan can be reached at 515-4680 or by e-mail at derek.jordan@svherald.com.
ON THE NET
For more on the Audubon’s 109th Christmas Bird Count, log onto www.audubon.org/Bird/cbc/.
