“To the bird lover, a world without birds is a dead world; a mere shell of a world.”

— Frank M. Chapman, 1864–1945

Frank Michler Chapman was born on June 12, 1864, in Englewood, New Jersey. His father was an attorney for an important bank on Wall Street. His mother was a gardener, piano player and artist. Although he had no musical talent, Chapman always maintained that his mother’s love of music made him “deeply responsive to the songs of birds.” His lifelong love affair with birds started at eight years old, when he encountered a bright red cardinal.

After graduating from Englewood Academy, Chapman started working at a New York bank to follow in his father’s footsteps. However, his true passion was nature and birds, but he didn’t know how to earn a living from it.

A fortuitous meeting on a commuter train with other enthusiastic birders served to deepen Chapman’s passion and longing for a different life. An article published in January 1884 was a stepping stone: the American Ornithologists Union needed volunteers to work on a nationwide bird migration study. Chapman applied and was accepted into the program.

While working at the bank six days a week, he devoted every spare moment to the bird migration study. Ultimately, the call of the wild was too strong, and at 25 Chapman left his banking job and became a freelance naturalist.

In 1888 he became assistant to Dr. Joel Allen, bird curator at the American Museum of Natural History. Chapman’s dedication allowed him to become head of the museum’s new Department of Ornithology in 1920.

Throughout his 54-year career at the museum, Chapman demonstrated his brilliant skills as an administrator and writer. He roamed the earth to explore and research the world of birds in their most secluded retreats.

Chapman’s contribution to bird research is doubtless invaluable. However, he lived in an uninformed time period, where the common tool used to learn about birds was the shotgun. It is difficult to understand and accept that this lover of birds joined his counterparts in the slaying of birds.

Fortunately, the camera started to replace the gun as a research tool, and Chapman had a change of heart and views, particularly when confronted with an appalling 19th century Christmas tradition called “side hunts,” in which participants would compete in shooting the most birds in order to be declared winner.

In 1900, Chapman took it upon himself to put a stop to the carnage by suggesting a much better and beneficial option: counting birds instead of killing them. He wrote in Bird-Lore: “a new kind of Christmas side hunt, in the form of a Christmas bird census… we hope that all our readers who have the opportunity will spend a portion of Christmas Day with the birds.”

And so the Audubon Christmas Bird Count was born.

As an ornithologist, researcher, explorer, naturalist and writer, Frank Chapman has innumerable accomplishments to his credit; and yet, 80 years after his death, he is still remembered primarily as the Father of the Christmas Bird Count.

125th Anniversary!

Over the last 125 years, the invaluable data collected during the Audubon Christmas Bird Count has allowed researchers, conservation biologists, and wildlife agencies to study the long-term status of bird populations across North America.

Everyone is invited to join a team in one of the bird counts in the area. Participation is free and open to all ages and skill levels.

You can also count the birds in your backyard as part of the Lanark Highlands count. To add your name to the list, please contact Lise Balthazar at lbalthazar@xplornet.com. Let’s make it count!

Young and old, watching a backyard feeder or out with a group — the Lanark Highlands Christmas Bird Count is for everyone! Pictured above is Frank Chapman, the “Father of the Christmas Bird Count.”