Residents Urged to Participate in the 12th Annual Caribbean Waterbird Census

The Ministry of Agriculture is encouraging residents to join in on the 12th annual Caribbean Waterbird Census (CWC) which starts on Thursday January 14th.

The CWC is a multi-partner region-wide waterbird and wetland monitoring program led by BirdsCaribbean.

The goal of this program is to learn more about the distribution, status, and abundance of waterbirds in the Caribbean in order to better conserve and manage these beautiful birds and their habitats.

The CWC uses a 3-week period from January 14th to February 3rd each to conduct the main count. These dates include World Wetlands Day on February 2nd, and many participants incorporate CWC counts into their World Wetlands Day events.

CWC counts can be conducted in any wetland areas persons can access, ranging from mangroves, salt ponds, bays, to sandy or rocky beaches, coastal areas, mud flats, tidal flats and rivers.

The CWC protocol has been divided into several levels of increasing difficulty with the user choosing the protocol and extent of participation in the program that is best suited to their objectives and available resources.

The three types of Level 1 counts are the Point Count, Traveling Count, and Area Search. Forms for recording your data and more detailed instructions can be found on the CWC website at https://www.birdscaribbean.org or by contacting the Department of Environment.