Western New York is truly a beautiful place. I shot this today while doing a test run for the USGS Breeding Bird Survey. I picked up a route that hasn't been done for many years. These surveys are mostly done by volunteers like me, who have advanced bird song identification skills. Visual identification also plays a role, but singing male birds indicate breeding. The counts are very important to track the wellness of bird populations. Looking forward to the official count which starts at 5:06am on a "good weather" day and traverses 25 miles in about 4.5 hours!



Yesterday's photo: