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We birders have a love/hate relationship with projected numbers of our ranks. We become giddy with the possibility of organizing the estimated tens of millions of us as a powerful political voice, but we also don’t for a minute buy those estimates as anything approaching reality. “Real” birders seem much more rare than these surveys suggest, perhaps tens of thousands is closer than tens of millions.

Nonetheless, the most recent surveys have been completed, and new estimates are just being released. Again, the number of birders in the US is surprisingly high, and this time has hit a new record: 81.4 million! That’s about 1 in 4 Americans, which seems a gross overestimate. Nonetheless, as the article below acknowledges, the trend established for now four slices in time is for an increasing number of birders.

The puzzle? Why, if the number of people interested in birding is consistently on the rise, do we see widespread declines in membership to local Audubon chapters, state ornithological societies, and even national professional societies?

A few things are clear from these data. First, there are indeed a lot of birders in this country, surely more than we appreciate. Second, their numbers appear to be on the rise. Finally, we are no closer to understanding what makes these people tick than we were when the surveys began. Birders are an enigmatic group of largely white, middle class people with enormous purchasing power, and therefore, political influence. But our collective behavior as a unified political entity – even one capable of supporting local Audubon societies defies explanation. Maybe “individualist” describes us better than anything else . . .

Enjoy the article below, first posted by Wayne Peterson and John Baicich of the Birding Community E-Bulletin:

MORE REVEALING BIRDING TRENDS

Last month, we described some of the preliminary findings of the USFWS survey, “2006 National Survey of Fishing, Hunting, and Wildlife-Associated Recreation,” where “wildlife watching” (with birding the lion’s share) reflected an upward trend.

http://www.refugenet.org/birding/julSBC07.html#TOC07

or

http://www.steiner-birding.com/bulletin/july07.html

Some people have also recently had an advance look at the preliminary numbers for the popular Forest-Service’s National Survey on Recreation and the Environment (NSRE), so now we can share these figures with you as well. Again, an upward trend in watching birds is maintained.

The new NSRE numbers put bird watching in the U.S. at 81.4 million participants (2006). The survey asked whether a person did or did not participate in any bird watching activity, and whether it was their primary activity, or was associated with some other activity. (If the interviewee did any loosely associated birding whatsoever, it was counted. The degree of birding “avidity” was not measured.) The NSRE researchers also tracked birding days, with the most recent number standing at an astounding 8.2 billion annual birding days!

Current and previous figures are as follows:
Years Participants Days
1994-1995 54.4 million 4.8 billion days
1999-2000 70.9 million 5.8 billion days
2001-2003 69.6 million 6.5 billion days
2004-2006 81.4 million 8.2 billion days

While one can certainly quibble with the estimates, the overall trends are convincing.

For more information (where these numbers should be posted soon), see:

http://warnell.forestry.uga.edu/nrrt/nsre/index.html