Happy New Year! It’s 2025, which means there’s just one final breeding season to rack up those confirmation codes and birding hours to complete blocks.
But before the breeding season begins in a few months, there’s plenty of work to do. Late winter atlasing started on January 1st and will continue through the end of February. Winter atlasing is one of the easiest ways to contribute to the NCBA—just go birding and submit complete lists from a priority block. In most cases, no coding is required unless you spot something noteworthy, such as raptors displaying breeding behavior. Below is a quick reminder of the winter guidelines for the Atlas.
Non-Breeding (Wintering) Season Block Guidelines
- Minimum of 55 species observed *
- Minimum 5 hours of total Atlasing effort **
- Minimum of 2 visits spread out across early (Nov-Dec) and late (Jan-Feb) winter **
- Checklists in all (accessible) habitat types with particular focus on the following:
- Waterbodies: Inland lakes and ponds, and coastal shorelines, estuaries, and sounds
- High tide roosts
- Early successional and edge habitats
- One nocturnal checklist preferred ***
* Number of species will vary significantly across blocks, see county lists of expected species
** Visits and hours can occur over more than one year, some species breed during winter (see coding guidelines)
*** Nocturnal checklists begin 20 minutes after sunset, 40 minutes before sunrise
A big perk of winter Atlasing is that you’ll spot species that aren’t typically found in your area or in the state at other times of the year. Sparrows may be found in flocks, ducks fill ponds and rivers, and if you’re lucky, you might even catch a rare migrant to add to your eBird checklist.
With the new year underway, here are a few goals to add to your birding resolutions—or simply to keep block busting fun and engaging. One idea is to try a “block big year.” Instead of doing a world, state, or county big year, challenge yourself to a big year in a priority block. Aim to list as many species as possible in that block over the course of the year. If that sounds interesting, explore the block explorer tool to find a block near you! You might be surprised by what you discover throughout the year in a single block. Other fun goals include visiting as many blocks as possible during the year, coding as many species as you can to make it onto the NCBA Top 100 chart, or a combination of these. An open-ended goal could also be simply to get out birding more often and meet fellow local birders—I’m personally looking forward to meeting many more in the coming year!
As for my personal New Year’s birding goals, I’m aiming to reach 100 confirmed species and 220 species in North Carolina (which should be doable with a trip to the coast!).
Wishing you all a Happy New Year and happy Atlasing!