Guest blog by Joanne Sherwood - Director, RSPB NIFor me, Big Garden Birdwatch means fun, family time and good-humoured competition.It also means contributing to an important citizen science project to understand what is happening to our garden birds.When the weekend comes along at the end of each January, I take part in the Birdwatch along with my husband and my son (pictured, below).We get out the binoculars and the bird identification guides, crack open a packet of biscuits and put on the kettle for a cup of tea. And then the three of us crowd around the window to wait and see what arrives in the garden and who can spot it first. It’s very easy to get distracted, so we have to take it in turns to keep an eye on the whole garden while the rest of us are drawn into the antics of a particular feathered friend on the birdfeeder. There is always loud shouting as someone “bags” a new arrival and sometimes a lot of argy-bargy about what species we are looking at! We keep a tally of what we’ve seen (this is a great way to get younger family members to count and record) and then, at the end of the hour, enter all the results online. We’ve been doing the Big Garden Birdwatch for a while now and even though we sometimes struggle to identify something before it flies off again, it’s been a great way to get my son involved in a practical citizen science project and to connect him to what’s outside the window. And the best part? At the end of the weekend, we call our close friends in South Wales and compare what we have seen. There’s a bit of friendly competition about the number of species and anything unusual (absolutely no cheating or fibbing involved!) and usually a bit of discussion about whether the squirrels in their garden have foiled our friends’ latest attempts to squirrel-proof their birdfeeders. Even though they live in a large city, our friends in Wales usually beat our semi-rural garden in Co Down hands down – though we usually manage to win on the starling front and I am hoping they regain their top spot in Northern Ireland in 2019 after house sparrows replaced them at the top of the list in 2018. All in all, the Birdwatch is a fantastic way to spend an hour of family time and it has become a firm favourite in the annual cycle of family life for us.So I really hope you’ll take part in 2019 to celebrate the 40th year of Big Garden Birdwatch!Registration for Big Garden Birdwatch 2019 is open now – just visit www.rspb.org.uk/birdwatch for all details. The Birdwatch takes place on Saturday 26, Sunday 27 and Monday 28 January 2019, so please set aside one hour that weekend to take part!