Monday, March 18, 2013

eBird best practices
Be an eBird advocate: Share your lists!

I started eBirding just over 2 years ago. eBird, as a phenomenon, is probably unprecedented. I rank eBird right up there in importance to birding with Peterson's first field guide, email birding lists, and the recent abundance of low-cost powerful digital cameras.

How can I best share eBird with others? One way is that when I go birding with others I send them the eBird checklist by means of a "share." When they accept the shared list it adds the birds to their eBird lists. If they haven't signed up for eBird yet, perhaps my shared list will entice them to do so. After all, it is simply a name, location, and email to join the eBird community.

When leading a pelagic trip I use best practices to create smaller-area lists (harbor, near shore, 5-20 miles, and chum stop as separate lists). Then I share the lists and all observers then have their list show on the map at the same location flag, rather than a dozen lists in slightly different places, if they submitted their lists on their own.

Is there a way you can share your lists or otherwise become an eBird advocate?

I'm an eBirder. Are you?