A project of Bird Studies Canadaand the Cornell Lab of Ornithology

Why Birds?

Birds can be used as “bio-indicators” to help assess the health of our ecosystems

• Occupy nearly all habitats

• Concentrate pesticides and chemical loads

• Prey upon, plants, animals and insects

• Are readily visible to the public

• Are already being monitored every day, and have been for many years!

How Can We Keep the Common Birds Common?

Impacts of Citizen Science

Christmas Bird Count

Breeding Bird Survey

• Since 1900

• Since 1966

• From 25 to 2000 count circles over 100 years• Currently 50,000

participants

• From 600 to 3700 routes over 40 years• Several thousand participants

How is eBird Different?

• Advanced geo-referencing

• All species

• Hemispheric-scale monitoring program

• Year-round

• Broad user-base

What is eBird?

• Tool for gathering observational data

• Persistent archive of bird observations• Gathers baseline data on

bird distribution and abundance

• Internet-based checklist program

• Public tool for data visualization

Gather

Archive

Disseminate

• Tool for maintaining personal records

• Avian Knowledge Network

Birding with a purpose…

...and it keeps your lists!

eBird—Current Stats (2009)

• >1,600,000 checklists submitted

• 2,945 species reported

• ~35,000 different users have entered data

• 21 million observations reported

• ~540,000 site visitors

• 173 countries/territories

• 600+ participants submitting checklists• 216,426 checklists submitted• 1,716,496 observations reported• 552 species

eBird Canada—Current Stats (2009)

CurrentNorth AmericaCaribbeanCentral AmericaSouth AmericaNew Zealand

Geographic Coverage

Encouraging Participation - Portals

National(eBird

Canada)

Local(Vermont)

Applied(BCN)

eBird

Regional Applications – Empowering Birders around the world

• Checklist statistics

• Discussion board

• Birding news and features

• Top contributors

• Resources

eBird—Building the eBird Community

• Entering observations

• Keeping your lists

• Viewing data

• Bulk uploads

The eBird Experience

• My locations

• Hotspots

• Mapping tool

• Latitude-Longitude

• Location management

eBird—Data Entry—Where did you bird?

eBird—Data Entry—Mapping Tool

eBird—Data Entry—Mapping Tool

eBird—Data Entry—Mapping Tool

eBird—Data Entry—Mapping Tool

eBird—Data Entry—How did you bird?

eBird—Data Entry—Just fill in the checklist!

eBird—Data Quality

eBird—Data Quality

• Aseasonal reports• High counts

• Rarities

• Network of reviewers (generally one per province)

Every record submitted to eBird goes through some level of data verification

eBird—Data Entry—Age, Sex, Species Comments

eBird—Data Entry—Confirmation Page

eBird—Data Entry—Email this report

eBird—Data Entry—Sharing checklists

• View your eBird statistics

• Manage and edit your data

• Maintain and manage lists

• Year, Regional, state and county

• View and manage profile

My eBird--Keeping Track of Your Lists

Detailed checklist view

My eBird--Keeping Track of Your Lists

Lists first date and location

Sort by location ordate

View all observationsof a single species

My eBird--Keeping Track of Your Lists

Lists for any location or region

My eBird--Keeping Track of Your Lists

View diary notes

Easy access to edit tools

Print or download reports

My eBird--Keeping Track of Your Lists

eBird Data Visualizations

eBird Data Visualizations--Maps

• Week, month, year• Any location• High count• Abundance• Frequency• Group size• Totals

eBird Data Visualizations—Tabular Reports

eBird Data Visualizations—Bar Charts

Frequency bar charts

Any date and location

• View sample size• Download data

• Interactive graphs

• Glossary links

eBird Data Visualizations

White-crowned Sparrow Frequency— BC Interior

Hide/Show SampleSize

eBird Data Visualizations—Arrivals and Departures

eBird Data Visualizations—High Counts

eBird Data Visualizations—Top 100

What Happens to the Data?

eBird data are available for free internet download

eBird data are combined with other bird survey data in the Avian Knowledge Network (AKN)

Can be used to create local checklists

Can be used for long-term monitoring

eBird CanadaeBird Canada

...where birding meets science!

www.ebird.ca

Thanks to Ralph Hocken for bird images

Bird Studies CanadaBird Studies Canada

www.bsc-eoc.org