One of my favorite tricks with eBird is the eBird rarity photo pool which allows 
you to upload your photos of flagged species using a free Flickr account. A 
recent development with Flickr is their mapping tool. You upload your photos to 
your account then go into Organize and Create, drag photos from a location and 
edit them as a batch. Once your got your group in the batch edit, click on the 
map then drill down to the location and drop them there. When anyone looks at 
your pix, they'll see a thumbnail map which zooms in when you wave the mouse 
over it. If you're a member of the eBird rarity pool group, you can open up the 
group from your Flickr page and drag your new pix into the pool for all eBird 
users to see on the eBird home page!

Also, once you've done this, you can link the URL for an individual photo either 
to the comments section of a submission or on the species line if you're so 
inclined. Makes life a lot easier for reviewers if they see a flagged species 
with a photo already attached.
 
Tyler Bell

California, Maryland 



----- Original Message ----
From: Bill Hubick <>
To: 
Sent: Fri, December 31, 2010 12:42:14 PM
Subject: [MDOSPREY] Maryland eBird--Thoughts and New Years Resolutions (Long)

#1 Most Wanted - Please add comments! When a species is flagged as rare and you 
are asked to confirm, please take a moment to describe the bird (or add a link 
to any documentation). This will save time for both you and the reviewers in 
discussing details of the sighting. It also hones our skills and makes our 
reports more meaningful when reviewing them later. Finally, and most 
importantly, remember that someday the eBird reviewers (and users of the data) 
will not know you personally. Imagine the difference in reliability 10 years 
from now between an unusual report with notes and one without. Comments should 
be considered nearly essential if a single reported individual is flagged (e.g., 
one December White-eyed Vireo or one September Willow Flycatcher). If a rare 
bird has been present for two weeks, notes are great, but at least add 
"Continuing" or "Continuing since found by So-and-so on this date". For high 
counts that are flagged, consider adding a
comment about how you estimated the flock (or maybe you carefully counted all 
individuals). If a count was flagged and you don't think it should have been, 
feel free to say so in the comments.