Sunday, April 25, 2010

New (to me) Toy: eBird

Hey, gang; I just filed my first-ever birding report on eBird! I had looked at it a long time back and thought it was a little slow and not so user-friendly; I don't know if I was just impatient back then or if I'm just that much smarter now, because I was able to get in, check off the birds I saw with my BFF Gretchen this morning, and be done. I emailed the report to myself with the checking of a box, and here's my copied-and-pasted report:

Location: Bald Eagle SP
Observation date: 4/25/10
Number of species: 27

Mallard X
Common Loon 1
Turkey Vulture X
Osprey 1
Ring-billed Gull 2
Mourning Dove X
Eastern Phoebe 1
American Crow X
Common Raven X
Tree Swallow X
Bank Swallow X
Eastern Bluebird 2
American Robin X
Northern Mockingbird 1
Brown Thrasher 3
European Starling X
Cedar Waxwing 1
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle) 6
Eastern Towhee 4
Field Sparrow 1
Song Sparrow 10
White-crowned Sparrow 1
Northern Cardinal X
Red-winged Blackbird X
Common Grackle X
American Goldfinch X
House Sparrow X

This report was generated automatically by eBird v2(http://ebird.org)

The Xs indicate that I saw the species but either didn't or couldn't count (or remember) the number I saw. It was a very dreary morning with a constant drizzle/sprinkle, but we had a good time.

I'm going to get into this whole eBird thing; it looks cool! Wish I'd gotten pics (we saw a lot of these birds at very close range!) but I still don't have my camera back. Had to use Gretchen's binocs, even. But it's coming soon.

3 comments:

John B. said...

EBird is a great list-keeping application. It doesn't do everything I would like, but what it does, it does well. The user interface and output options have gotten a lot better over the past few years.

Felicia said...

EBirds rocks--if you're so inclined, you can generate county lists, year lists, any kind of list you want with almost just by pushing a few buttons. And by keeping your lists on EBird, you're contributing to the larger birding and bird research community as well. Glad you're in!

Earl Cootie said...

A few years ago, I went back through the dlog and added all major outings on eBird, but after some months, I started slacking. Lately, I've only been updating when I see a lifer (and really only occasionally even then). I need to get back into it though, if only for the sake of contributing to the counts. Thanks for the reminder.