The CELEBRATE URBAN BIRDS project gives you a great wellness tool that can be used at home, in schools, in offices, in institutions, in parks...anywhere, anytime, by anyone.

Why is it healthy? 

• Because it gets you outside for 10 minutes to look for birds!  It's a great break.  Not a cigarette break, but a refreshing, invigorating wellness break.  (Caffeine and calorie free!)

  

• It feels good to look around you, it's fun to notice detail in a space you might otherwise not look at carefully and you might learn something or want to learn something every time you do the 10-minute observation!  Why does that hawk appear in that tree every morning?  Where do those sparrows go at night?  What is that brilliant black and orange bird singing its heart out at the top of the tree?  It's just like that saying,"If you build it...they will come"  Well, if you watch, you will see them.  The picture below was taken taken right from participant Marian Mendez' back yard in Fall, 2008. She didn't have to go far to find beauty, inspiration, and very interesting behavior to watch.  All she had to do was notice what's taking place right in her own back yard!  Thanks for sharing the photos, Marian!  We have lots of suggested art activities that can help you hone your powers of observation! 
   
• When you submit data from your ten precious minutes outside, you're connecting to the wider world of science, and you're taking a positive action to contribute to what we can learn about birds and habitat.  Is there a Black-crowned Night Heron who regularly visits the pond in your park?  Is there a healthy population of European Starlings living in the vines, nooks, and crannies on the side of the museum near where you work?  Maybe they were there last year, but are no longer there this year!  We won't know unless you watch and tell us! 

  

• kids, especially, benefit from more time outside, unplugged, and unstructured.  Well, OK, the CUBs observation is a little bit structured...you are looking for birds and checking them off on a list, but there's so much your kids can do to Celebrate Urban Birds...lots of art activities to help them get to know the focal species, ideas for community activities to get the neighbors involved, things they can do alone or with a club or friends.  This is so important that a fantastic new organization has sprung up, the National Forum on Children and Nature, and guess what?!  Celebrate Urban Birds is one of the 30 projects they chose to highlight and give special recognition to this year.  We are so honored to be recognized as a useful project to get kids outside and connected to nature, which can benefit them in so many ways...reducing stress, increasing attentiveness, creating an interest in conservation...the list of benefits is long and interesting!