Correction: The caption for the photo of Michelle Michaud looking for waterfowl incorrectly stated the time of day. The photo was taken near sunset in the late hours of the Christmas Bird Count.

A bundled-up Michelle Michaud looks for waterfowl on Kachemak Bay just off Kachemak Drive in the late hours of the 2025 Homer Christmas Bird Count on Dec. 20 in Homer. (Photo by Nancy Lord provided by Kachemak Bay Birders)

By Marcia Kuszmaul
Homer Independent Press

The 2025 Homer Christmas Bird Count (CBC) results are in. Volunteers documented 69 species of birds on Count Day, Dec. 20, 2025, four above the average of 65 over the past 20 years. One species, Wilson’s snipe, had never before been recorded in a local count.  Four additional species were recorded during Count Week, the three days before and after Count Day. 

Other highlights included the third occurrence of a Fork-tailed storm-petrel, five species of woodpeckers and four species of owls.

Thirty-one intrepid volunteers with the Kachemak Bay Birders, both experienced and novices, braved 10- to 20-degree temperatures the Saturday before Christmas to scour the fields and beaches for birds. Another 12 volunteers, called “feeder-watchers,” monitored their bird feeders at home and recorded the species and numbers that visited during the day. Two volunteers from Eagle River and two from Palmer came down specifically to help with the Homer bird count.

Dave Erikson, the CBC coordinator and compiler for the past 49 years, tallied a total of 4,144 individual birds.   

“This is half of the number seen last year,” Erikson said. “The number of individual birds on Count Day can vary among years depending on the weather and presence or absence of key species, such as waterfowl or shorebirds.”

In his online summary, Erikson notes that heavy sea ice in the inner bay covered much of the prime foraging habitat for mallards and greater scaup, typically among the most abundant birds on the count. Only one mallard was observed during Count Week, and no greater scaups were counted this year. To no one’s surprise, the American crow was the most abundant species with 875 counted, while 12 species were represented by only one individual bird.

“I take a year at a time,” Dave Erikson said, reflecting on his long-time leadership of the CBC.

“I really support the Christmas count census of North and South American birds. Bird populations are going down on a regular basis, and we have to draw attention to that,” he said. “The number of count areas and people participating in the count is increasing, but the overall trend for the birds is down.”

Count Day kicked off at 8:30 a.m. and ended about 4:30 p.m. with hot drinks and snacks at the Alaska Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center, hosted by Lora Haller, visitor center manager. Volunteers formed 11 teams to cover a 15-mile diameter count circle centered at the base of the Homer Spit. 

Homer’s count circle encompasses Fritz Creek to the east, near Virginia Avenue on the Sterling Highway to the west, the Anchor River drainage to the north and offshore Kachemak Bay to the south. Calvin and Coyle Trail and Seaside Farm were reported to be exceptional hotspots this year.

Only one mishap was recorded from the field. Gary Lyon, lead for the team covering the Spit, reported that wind gusts picked up in the late afternoon and snatched the team’s count sheet. It blew onto the ice floes 20 feet below the Deep Water Dock in the Homer Harbor.  With no hope of retrieving it, team members were able to recall the species they had observed and recreate their count.

Homer’s 2025 CBC was one of 44 locations in the state of Alaska, including a count on Shemya Island near the end of the Aleutian Islands chain. The full roster of locations this year ranged from a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration vessel off the tip of South America to Guam to Arctic Bay, Canada. 

The National Audubon Society originated the CBC 126 years ago in response to a 19th-century holiday tradition called the Christmas “Side Hunt,” in which North American hunters competed to see how many birds they could kill. Beginning Christmas Day 1900, ornithologist Frank M. Chapman, an early officer of the Audubon, initiated a new tradition, a Christmas bird census to count birds instead of killing them. 

 

The CBC is now thought to be the oldest and largest community-science project in the world. The Homer community has participated intermittently since 1960 and continuously since 1973. The data collected by observers over more than a century has enabled Audubon researchers, conservation biologists, wildlife agencies and others to study the long-term health and status of bird populations. 

The star: Wilson’s snipe was observed for the first time on Count Day of the 2025 Christmas Bird Count in Homer, Alaska. (Photo by T. Rinaud, Creative Commons, via Wikimedia Commons)

2025 Christmas Bird Count by the numbers