Hannah Moyer Salvatore with her silkie chicken named Stella
Please join us in congratulating Hannah Moyer Salvatore, of Robesonia, Pennsylvania—winner of the July 2024 eBirder of the Month Challenge, sponsored by ZEISS. Hannah’s name was drawn randomly from the 7,917 eBirders who submitted 31 or more eligible checklists in July. Hannah will receive a new ZEISS SFL binocular for her eBirding efforts. Thank you to everyone who participated in the July eBirder Challenge, we are grateful for your support and continued dedication to data collection and conservation. Here’s Hannah’s birding story:
I feel so lucky to have had my name drawn for this award. Thank you to Cornell Lab, eBird, and of course ZEISS.
Green jay, Laguna Atacosa National Wildlife Refuge, Texas. Photo by Hannah Moyer Salvatore.
I have always loved all animals but didn’t consider myself to be a birder until more recently. When I traveled I always wrote down whatever animals I saw so when I started doing eBird I was able to enter all the birds I saw on past trips. Sometimes I knew exactly where I was and had a good record of the date so I could do actual back dated entries but sometimes I only knew generally where and when it was so I had to do the entries as historical. I still have a couple trips from the past to enter. Also I got a lot of birds ID’d because I often hung out with the birders on trips. Sometimes the guides don’t know the birds that well.
Bush stone-curlew, Hamilton Island, Australia. Photo by Hannah Moyer Salvatore.
I have been doing the Project Feederwatch since 2016. More recently, in 2022, I started helping with the Christmas Bird Count in my county. This year I did the Great Backyard Bird Count and the Global Big Day for the first time. I am a member of the American Birding Association (ABA), National and the Pennsylvania state Audubon, the birding Co-op, And New Jersey Audubon. My home club is the ‘Baird Ornithological Society’ in Berks County Pennsylvania. We have many scheduled bird walks each year during spring and fall migration. We also do several educational presentations each year.
I have been attending the New Jersey spring and fall birding festivals for several years. I also attended the San Diego virtual birding festival during Covid. I am looking forward to adding more bird festivals to my schedule.
I have birded in Florida, California, and Texas with my friend and mentor Wes Biggs from Florida. Much of what I have learned about birding was the result of his teaching. Other birding trips were to Nebraska, Belize, and the Pantanal in Brazil.
Since the beginning of this year I have tried to do at least one eBird entry every day. Most days I do eBird on my property while I am eating breakfast and lunch in my sunroom overlooking my cluster of feeders. I also eBird while on bird walks, at festivals, and on trips or anyplace I see birds. Not all of my trips are specifically birding trips. I also chase total solar eclipses. Recently I started at least trying to schedule some birding before or after non-birding trips. I was in Mexico for the 2024 total solar eclipse and got a tour by local guide to take me birding in Ixtapa.
West Mexican chachalaca, Zihuatanejo – Playa la Ropa, Mexico. Photo by Hannah Moyer Salvatore.
I have taken several of the Cornell Bird Academy courses and highly recommend the free eBird course, eBird Essentials, to people who are interested in starting to eBird.
I volunteer at both the Philadelphia Zoo and the National Aquarium in Baltimore. Both organizations have bird collections and whenever a visitor shows an interest in birds I talk to them about both Merlin and eBird. Many of the visitors are bird fans but don’t know about Merlin and eBird.
Gentoo penguin, Antarctica, Photo by Hannah Moyer Salvatore.
I bought a 1.13 acre property in 2000. That was pretty much 1.13 acres of lawn. Today it is about 1/3 acres of lawn and the rest is mostly native plants chosen to nourish and protect birds and other animals.
Happy Birding!