http://ebird.org/content/ebird daily 1 2008-03-13T17:30:02Z http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/planned-ebird-outage eBird will be down from approximately 5am - 9am Eastern Time on Thursday July 24th. This is due to a major version upgrade of one of our Oracle databases. Thanks for your patience and understanding. Good Birding -- Team eBird. No publisher clw37 2008-07-23T17:29:51Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/new-location-management-tools-launched When eBird started in 2002 we didn't have the technology to allow you to select a location from a map for data entry (we do now--hooray!). Because of that it was harder to be aware of existing eBird hotspots, and many users created their own versions of these places. We've been asked for a long time to rectify this by creating tools that will allow you to merge your personal locations, and all associated data, with existing eBird hotspots. We've recently upgraded the "Manage My Locations" option found under "My eBird" to allow for this, along with a suite of other useful data management tools. Now you can easily combine your data from a duplicate personal location with eBird hotspots so that it can be shared by all. No publisher bls42 2008-07-16T14:32:04Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/ebird-map-of-the-week-4 We're pleased to introduce a new feature--the eBird map of the week. Early each week we will put up a map taken directly from eBird and you try to guess the species. After a week, we will post answers to the old "map quiz" and include a map for a new species. This map is taken directly from the Maps section in the View and Explore Data tab. The current map (Map #8) is taken for all years, but is limited to the winter season (December - February). Good luck! If you still see last week's map, hit Control Refresh (or F5) to reload the new map image. No publisher Team eBird 2008-07-15T20:32:03Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/make-your-checklists-more-meaningful As the eBird database grows by leaps and bounds, it is becoming ever more valuable. Your observations are making a huge difference in our understanding of birds at many levels. Our scientists are now analyzing your data to find new patterns in bird distribution, abundance and population trends. Although every record submitted to eBird is valuable, only observations with effort can be used in these more rigorous analyses, so we would like to promote several bird survey techniques that we consider most valuable in this regard. Make the most of your birding by conducting traveling counts, stationary counts and area counts in a more meaningful way. In this feature we'll give examples of how to make your observations count for bird conservation! No publisher bls42 2008-07-16T19:59:10Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/st.-paul-island-birding-blog Saint Paul Island is located 770 miles southwest of Anchorage in the east-central portion of the Bering Sea. A remote volcanic island within the Pribilof Island chain, Saint Paul is the most accessible of the central Bering Sea islands. It is a haven for birders who are searching for rare birds which stray to the islands from the Old World. While it is not as close to the Russian mainland as the other Alaskan outposts, its location in the middle of the sea hundreds of miles from all other land makes it a remarkable location to see birds. For the summer I will be working as a tour guide for those people who visit this island either to look for rare Asian birds, look for common breeders which are scarce elsewhere, or simply come to enjoy the wildflowers and seals that also call this island home. For the entire season, May 19th to about October 15th, I will continue to keep a daily or semi-daily log of the bird activity on the island whenever time and internet access allows. Contributed by Scott Schuette. No publisher bls42 2008-07-09T19:32:46Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/how-to-beat-june-gloom Many birders think that summer is the "off-time" of the year for birding, the general perception being that the most exciting birds occur during spring and fall migration, and during winter when many northern birds head south. While most resident birds are quietly breeding and not much migration is happening, birders tend to snooze a bit as well, again picking up their daily birding activity in August, when the bulk of the shorebirds and many landbirds begin their southward journey across the continent. At eBird we beg to differ, and we happen to find summer ripe with birding potential. In this piece we'll point out some great summer birding options; from finding mega-rarities to conducting your own structured bird surveys, summer birding has lots to offer. No publisher bls42 2008-06-30T21:45:24Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/ebird-flickr-how-to-share-your-photos We receive many requests from users who would like to be able to upload images of birds that they have photographed. This is particularly true for rarities (birds seen outside their normal range, or at an odd time of year). In the long-run we would like to integrate this feature directly into eBird, but we have come up with a short-term solution. We have created a group within the popular photo-sharing site, Flickr (www.flickr.com). We encourage anyone who has photographs of rare birds to share them with this group (making sure, of course, that you have already submitted the record to eBird!). Our intent is to provide a venue for people to photographically document species seen outside their normal range, outside their normal seasonal occurrence, or unexpectedly large counts of birds. No publisher clw37 2008-06-13T19:40:36Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/ebird2019s-blind-spots-and-black-holes2014and-how Recently, eBird use has been soaring and we are ecstatic to see its continued growth. As each checklist adds a new, valuable piece of information on bird distribution and abundance our maps and bar charts become relevant at finer and finer scales. However, most of our checklists come from populated areas (blue regions on map), leaving us with blind spots where we simply don’t have enough data to make predictions (white areas). We even have a few black holes, without a single checklist submitted. No publisher mji26 2008-06-03T15:33:08Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/sad-news-from-ebird Roger L. Slothower, eBird’s GIS and mapping specialist, died suddenly on May 18, 2008, near his home in Ithaca while walking to work. Roger had been a member of the core eBird development team since the project’s inception in 2001, and is responsible for all the maps that appear within the eBird project websites, as well as those in many other Lab projects. He graduated from Earlham College, received a Master’s degree from the University of Oregon, and earned a PhD from Cornell University in 2001. Roger brought a buoyant spirit to the eBird team and the entire Lab of Ornithology and was the organizer of the regular lunchtime volleyball games on the lawn outside. Roger loved people and the natural world, and generously shared his enthusiasm for what he loved with those around him. His loss has left a tremendous void in our midst, even though the memory of his welcoming smile, and enthusiastic, positive spirit lives on within each of us. Roger is survived by his wife Cyndi, daughter Molly, and sons Sam and Peter. No publisher mji26 2008-05-23T15:02:07Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/we-need-your-painted-bunting-observations The migratory Painted Bunting is one of the most colorful North American birds. It breeds in shrubby habitats, mixed with some trees, in the southern US and in northern Mexico and winters from Florida, Mexico, and the western Caribbean south to Panama. For some lucky homeowners, Painted Bunting is a backyard bird in the summer months, or a visitor to bird feeders in the winter (in Florida and Middle America). Populations of breeding Painted Buntings have declined significantly across its range, according to data gathered between 1966 and 2006 for the North American Breeding Bird Survey. No publisher mji26 2008-05-14T20:57:22Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/north-american-big-day-record-broken On April 19th the EDG Birding Team sponsored by Nikon Sport Optics and Birding America set a new Big Day record for the ABA area with 260 species. The day started in the Texas Hill Country and ended in the rice fields of the central Texas Coast. The team, consisting of Ken Behrens, Pete Hosner, Michael Retter, and Cameron Cox, experienced an incredible day of birding… No publisher Pete Hosner 2008-05-14T20:07:25Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/download-my-data-released Birders have asked for eBird functionality that allows one to back up their data on home computers. We have built a tool for this, and are pleased to announce its release. We've recently added the ability for users to retrieve a file containing all the data they've ever entered into eBird in spreadsheet format, which can be easily read using Microsoft Excel, manipulated and analyzed using tools outside eBird, and saved and stored on your home computers. This new tool gives users the ability to analyze their own raw data and to look at patterns in their own observations beyond what the eBird View and Explore data tools now provide. The idea is to make eBird as versatile as possible, and give you the raw data in order to allow you to perform your own data exploration! No publisher Team eBird 2008-05-01T22:25:52Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/bird-watchers-urgently-needed-to-track-rusty Populations of Rusty Blackbirds are crashing! Their numbers have plummeted by as much as 88-98% over the last few decades, according to data gathered between 1966 and 2006 for the North American Breeding Bird Survey and Christmas Bird Count. A species that was once considered to be abundant is rapidly disappearing before our eyes. Your observations can help save this species by arming scientists with critical information about this species' ecology during migration. Bird watchers across North America are being asked to help scientists track spring migrant Rusty Blackbirds from April 1-7 using the eBird online checklist program. Your observations of this species can help fill in the important missing pieces of this conservation puzzle! Note: Your observations from outside this time frame are also sorely needed, so please enter any and all Rusty Blackbird records into eBird if possible! No publisher Team eBird 2008-04-28T15:23:56Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/el-grupo-ceruleo-to-receive-conservation-award Congratulations to all members of El Grupo Cerúleo, an international group of scientists dedicated to the study and conservation of Cerulean Warblers. The Chief of the U. S. Forest Service at the Office of International Programs has awarded the group the Wings across the Americas International Partnership Award for 2008. The award is given in recognition of the group's efforts to develop the assessment of the nonbreeding range of the Cerulean Warbler in South America. Priority Migrant eBird contributed significantly to this effort. Read on to learn more about this collaboration and Priority Migrant eBird. No publisher Team eBird 2008-04-28T15:24:12Z Feature http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/modo-constituto-eu-sit We are pleased to announce the release of several new eBird output tools featuring Arrivals, Departures and High Counts. These tools provide birders with new ways to explore the eBird data, to learn when and where birds are being reported and to get a better sense of eBird's historic data. Are you curious about how many species birders have reported in your state or county this year? Do you want to know if your 15 March Yellow-throated Warbler was the first one seen this year, or perhaps even the earliest record ever submitted to eBird? Or do you want to know if the 137 Stilt Sandpipers you counted at your favorite shorebirding spot was the all-time high count reported to eBird? Exploring the answers to these questions is now possible within eBird. Simply log in to eBird, go to 'View and Explore Data,' and then try out the 'Arrivals and Departures' or 'High Counts' options. These new tools allow you to dig deeper into the eBird database than ever before! No publisher Team eBird 2008-04-30T16:02:38Z Feature