The new Belgian Rare Birds Committee (BRBC) is a fact!

The rumour has been out for a while and now it has finally materialized: the new Belgian rare birds committee is a fact! The new committee formally called the Belgian Rare Birds Committee (BRBC) is placed under the auspices of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Science (KBIN/IRSNB), Natuurpunt Studie and Aves-Natagora. The BRBC will be operational from January 2015 onwards.

For many years, the assessment of rare birds records in the country was split among two different committees: the BAHC for the Dutch-speaking part and the CH for the French-speaking part of Belgium.

Recently, the idea ripened to merge both committees into one new, all-Belgium committee. The main reason for this is that keeping track of the rare birds records on a national level is made unnecessarily complicated and confusing when the overlapping work is done by two committees. A merge just seemed like the right and logical step to take.

The BRBC will start assessing rare birds records dating from January 2014 onwards.

Website for more information:
http://www.belgianrbc.be

The committee has chosen a new logo: The Scaly Thrush (Zoothera dauma). In order to allow you to participate, it asks any talented ornithologist-artist to send a black & white high resolution drawing of this bird to info(AT)belgianrbc.be , by February 28, 2015.