Date: Tue, 19 Nov 2002 20:10:34 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Elliot Kirschbaum Subject: Re: Recommendations for CD-ROM on Birds In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.20021120002829.00683618@ellislist.com> Mime-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit on 11/19/02 7:28 PM, Bill Ellis at billellis@ELLISLIST.COM wrote: > I keep my birding records in an Excel spreadsheet. I can sort by date, by > species, or by location (site, county, state, or country, and biogeographic > province in MD), because that is how I designed it. It is not hard to > extract a year list, then add to my life list, but it is not automatic. To > sort on bird species, I have devised a numeric code for the ABA List of > North American Birds. My coded list is available on request (spreadsheet > form or formatted text file). I keep records of species, forms (male, > female, juvenile, color phases, etc.), whether seen or heard or both, count > (sometimes), and miscellaneous notes. I also track hours birding, so I can > calculate species/hour, and track whether my field skills are improving. > (They are pretty rusty, currently.) I recommend this method of lifelisting > for anyone who is already comfortable with spreadsheets - you have complete > control of what you track and how to arrange it. How many records do you have in your spreadsheet? I have over 40,000 records in my personal birding database. I always thought that so many records would be unwieldy in a spreadsheet. I also use a numeric code for species so I can sort them in taxonomic order. In fact, I have two codes for each species, one for AOU Checklist order and the other based on Clements Checklist. Elliot Kirschbaum Baltimore, MD USA mailto:ekirschb@bcpl.net ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================