With the new year upon us, I thought it might be fun to see if anyone is interested in doing a Celery Farm Big Year.

I found an old unused checklist and scanned it,  The only trouble is that the checklist is a very weird size and impossible to scan on my printer.

What you see here is the best I could do -- the two sheets have all the birds, just not all the seasons or abbreviations.

The rules are simple -- keep track of every bird species you see or hear in the Celery Farm in 2023, and then add 'em up on Dec. 31.

I can probably do a two-sided printout for anyone who wants one. Just let me know. Or use eBird.

Want to do it as a team? Knock yourself out.

I hope to post some of the incredible Big Years done by Fred Weber, Ron Fanning, John Workman and Stiles Thomas.

Legends all.

Holler if you have any questions.

The results of the annual Christmas Bird Count competition between Fyke and the BCAS are in.

The bad news is that the BCAS had 93 species and Fyke had 77. With a14-bird handicap, Fyke still lost by two.

The good news is that Fyke has a 16-bird handicap next December.

Congrats, BCAS! Please take care of the beloved Crowphy (above) until Fyke takes possession of it someday.

Stiles Thomas had an incredible 175 species in 2006.

You can see the list -- and read about how Fred Weber was DQ'd -- here.

Below, Stiles birding with his buddy Seymour Drakes. Stiles is on the right.

Rob Fanning was the Babe Ruth of Celery Farm Big Years, even without the Yankee garb.

A blog post that lists his annual Celery Farm tallies for an entire decade is here.

The photo above is from 2008.

John Workman saw or heard 172 species at the CF in 2006.

You can see his list -- it's even illustrated -- and read more here.