Join us for the 2013 Global Great Backyard Bird Count! Saturday, February 16, 9 am – 10:30 am The Nature Discovery Center will take part in the Great Backyard Bird Count. This year the GBBC is going global! People from anywhere in the world will be able to participate. Bird watchers from around the world will take part in this annual event sometime between Friday, February 15, and Monday, February 18, 2013. Participants in the free event will join tens of thousands of volunteers of all levels of birding experience to count birds in their own backyards, local parks or wildlife refuges. We are inviting you to come join us for the count at the Nature Discovery Center (7112 Newcastle, Bellaire, TX 77401) on Saturday, February 16, 2013 from 9 to 10:30 am. Families are welcome. Registration is not required. We will meet at the front porch of the Nature Discovery Center. It would be good to bring a pair of binoculars, but we may have a couple of extra pair here. Please call or e-mail Mary Ann ahead of time to make sure we have a pair for your use if needed. Checklists submitted by "citizen scientists" all help researchers at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society learn more about how the birds are doing—and how to protect them. Last year the GBBC smashed previous records with new records set in 22 states and 6 Canadian provinces. Participants turned in more than 104,000 checklists online, identifying 623 species and 17.4 million bird observations, creating the continent's largest instantaneous snapshot of bird populations ever recorded! Visit our website at http://www.naturediscoverycenter.org/birding for a link to more information about the Great Backyard Bird Count or how to have a count in your own backyard as well as joining ours.