First many thanks to all the birders who contributed their valuable effort on these counts!
Maybe this proves that breaking records isn't too tough in these perennially low-effort counts: Mt. Jefferson, Stone Mountain, and Upper Yadkin Valley.
Weather was a big deal for 2 of these counts: Mt. Jefferson was postponed because of sub-zero wind chills, which cut participation a bit, and Stone Mtn was impacted when a nearby count postponed its date and reset it to match this count, siphoning off one of our teams, which I could have adapted for if only I'd known /before/ the count. Even so, effort was much better this year, while still paltry compared to many other CBC's in more urbanized areas.
Even with those issues, we still broke records for total species for 2 counts, with 64 for Mt. Jeff (old 61) and 68 for Stone Mtn. (old 66) and our total individuals found was close to the top for both. The 3rd count (Upper Yadkin aka Wilkesboro) had no weather issues and broke a record for total individual birds found at almost 6000, and was very close to our high species count with 76(high 80).
Astonishing was 5 new count birds on the 33 year old Stone Mtn count, while the other two counts had one new species each.
Interesting that Northern Harrier was a new count bird on 2 of 3 CBC's, Stone Mtn and Upper Yadkin.
A great find was the first documented winter record in the northern mountains for Lincoln's Sparrow, on the Mt. Jeff count along the New River in Ashe Co.
