MDOsprey,
Many of you probably enjoyed participating in the Comp List, which Fran
Saunders and others compiled for a number of years (see
http://www.mdbirds.org/counts/annual/comp06md.html). Basically the idea was
to have the MD birding community work as a team to see how many species
could be found in a given year. For the more competitively-minded (like me),
the game was to try to be the FIRST to get a given species (the first
arriving Ovenbird or Northern Parula for example, which should be right
around the corner).
This functionality is now provided within eBird. Simply report your bird
sightings and you will be part of the effort. Check out the new "Arrivals,
Departures, and High Counts tool" at
http://ebird.org/ebird/sightings?locInfo.regionType=subnational1&listType=fi
rst&continuous=false&locInfo.regionCode=US-MD. You can read about how to use
it here:
http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/Arrivals_Departures_and_High_Counts.html
I provide a quick tour of the tool's highlights here:
1) Select United States and Maryland (of you want to see another state or
country, try that--it works anywhere in the hemisphere!)
2) The "All time records" check box requires explanation: start with it
unchecked. When you check it off it looks at the earlier or latest ACROSS
ALL YEARS (of those selected). When checked, it looks for the earliest or
latest WITHIN a year.
3) ALL-TIME: You will see the total list of birds reported in MD, 1900-2008:
395 species! Note that the total MD list is about 430 though, so there are
still some to be filled in. And while subspecies, hybrids, and "spuhs" are
not counted towards the total, we are still working to have a way to exclude
obvious exotics like Swan Goose.
4) COMP LIST: Change the year to 2008 to 2008 to see this year's comp list
(201 spp.) or 2007 to 2007 to see last year's (333; I only saw two that
probably would not be considered "wild": Monk Parakeet and Trumpeter Swan).
You can check on any year (only three species from 1958, the year of Stewart
& Robbins' seminal work on Maryland's avifauna!)
5) ARRIVAL DATES: To see the earliest arrival date ever reported in eBird
(say you saw a 15 April Warbling Vireo and wanted to know if it was a new
record). Select all years, click "Arrivals", and MAKE SURE THE ALL-TIME
RECORDS CHECKBOX is unchecked. You will see that your 15 April vireo beats
the previous record of 19 April 2006, submitted by none other than Bob
Ringler.
6) DEPARTURE DATES: Same deal, just click "departures" this time. Again,
make sure the all-time records box is unchecked.
7) MOST RECENT BIRDS: Try this: to see the most recent eBird submissions
(and get a sense for where birds are being seen), click "all-time records"
and then click "Departures". Sort by date so that the current date is on
top. Now you will see the most recent eBird sightings of each species. If
you are checking on when a rarity was last reported, or looking for a spot
to find Yellow-throated Warbler for your year list, this can be a great way
to check out what people are seeing.
8) FIRST-EVER: OK, Now say you want to find out when the "first state
record" was (at least from eBird's perspective). Select all years
(1900-2008) and click the green check box. Click on Arrivals--what you will
see is the oldest record ever submitted to eBird. Bob Ringler has been
mining his old notebooks, so he has a lot of these locked up!
9) HIGH COUNTS: Pretty self-explanatory--these are the highest counts
reported in eBird. As with others, you can look at any individual year,
groups of years, or across all years (1900-2008).
Play around with it, but this new tool is a really powerful new way to
explore the eBird database. You can check out your favorite state, local
county, or even favorite birding spot (e.g., Hughes Hollow). If you haven't
tried eBird yet, maybe this will be the nudge that you need?
Best,
Marshall
PS - As always, feel free to send any eBird questions straight to me! I'm
happy to help with setting up an account or answer any questions or problems
you may have.
PPS - The records gurus among you will notice some erroneous data; the eBird
team is constantly in touch with people who submit records to try to keep
the data as clean as possible. This new visualizations exposes some new
errors, which I can assure you are being addressed.
--
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Marshall J. Iliff
West Roxbury, MA
miliff AT aol.com
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eBird/AKN Project Leader
Cornell Lab of Ornithology
159 Sapsucker Woods Rd.
Ithaca, NY 14850
http://www.ebird.org
http://www.avianknowledge.net
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