GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

[email protected] · 04-11-2010, 10:56 PM posted to uk.rec.gardening

On Thu, 04 Nov 2010 21:37:33 +0000, wrote:

Is it important that the gardeners' counts of birds is accurate or
not, for the British Trust for Ornothology's "Garden Bird Watch"
scheme?

Or is this just another charity survey to catch potential supporters
and donors by making them feel useful?

Nobody's answered my question.

Is it important that the gardeners' counts of birds is accurate or
not, for the British Trust for Ornothology's "Garden Bird Watch"
scheme?

If it's important that the counts are accurate then how does the BTO
ensure they are.

If it's not important then the whole survey is farsical.

It should also be borne in mind that these counts are only in
participating gardens and external influences, such as someone
starting to feed birds or stopping feeding birds nearby, could
dramatically change the number of birds counted in any participating
garden.

And the idea that a narrow study of these garden can be extended to
whole populations seems to me to be complete nonsense. Birds numbers
could be high because they're being fed or low because they are being
infected by disease by sharing bird tables.

So that brings me to my second question:

Is this just another charity survey to catch potential supporters
and donors by making them feel useful?

I believe the RSPB has started a similar scheme.