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Posted on 2 January 2013 by Bill Hilton Jr.

“This Week at Hilton Pond” we describe in words and photos results of the 22nd annual York/Rock Hill (South Carolina) Christmas Bird Count, held the Saturday before Christmas 2012. To read about our efforts compared with tallies from previous years, please visit the installment for 22-28 Dec at http://www.hiltonpond.org/ThisWeek121222.html

While there don’t forget to scroll down for a list of birds banded or recaptured at Hilton Pond during the period. We also include miscellaneous nature notes and acknowledgement of our generous end-of-year donors.

If you missed any installments over the holiday break—including one about effects of drought at Hilton Pond—they’re easily accessible from week-to-week links.

Happy Nature Watching!

BILL

P.S. Please “Like” our new Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/HiltonPond for timely updates on nature topics. 

Figure 1. A male Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, Sphyrapicus varius (above), present only in winter in the Carolina Piedmont, was one of only three woodpecker species observed during the 2012 York/Rock Hill SC Christmas Bird Count. (Photo copyright Bill Hilton Jr.)

 

Bill Hilton Jr. is an award-winning educator-naturalist and executive director of non-profit Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History near York, South Carolina USA, where he has banded more than 58,100 birds since 1982. He is the only scientist conducting long-term studies of Ruby-throated Hummingbirds (Archilochus colubris) on their wintering grounds in Central America. Check out his Web sites for Hilton Pond Center at www.hiltonpond.org and “Operation RubyThroat: the Hummingbird Project” at www.rubythroat.org