tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post2949202602343251638..comments2023-09-07T08:13:39.842-07:00Comments on Chip Notes - eBird Buzz: Comments on your comments!Brian Sullivanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12018034919522859524noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-75465125387338892862009-06-21T18:17:09.080-07:002009-06-21T18:17:09.080-07:00RE: The weather comment. I find it interesting tha...RE: The weather comment. I find it interesting that eBird is very interested in the exact location you birded (zooming all the way in and even recommending multiple lists for a larger park) and yet is not interested in "microclimate" data as well. I live in Seattle, where the weather can be quite variable from one hour to the next and even in different neighborhoods. While the official weather station may report high, low, rainfall etc for a day, that data is collected at the airport which is a good 30 minute drive from where I live, and really wouldnt seem to have the crucial detail for the specific area you are birding.<br /><br />For instance, I was at Discovery Park today, and it was thunderstorms and wind, so I went to the Ballard Locks (about 2 miles away) and it was overcast but warm with some cloudbreaks. None of this is likely reflected in the "offical" data recorded at SeaTac airport, but definitely has a big effect on the number and kind of birds observed.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-56696465734996460852009-06-01T07:23:15.009-07:002009-06-01T07:23:15.009-07:00If you need help with Hotspots for Florida I'd be ...If you need help with Hotspots for Florida I'd be happy to help where I can.<br />Gallus"G" or "GQ"https://www.blogger.com/profile/03232738279433092207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-49422608587614459242009-06-01T07:18:26.679-07:002009-06-01T07:18:26.679-07:00I really like this idea of blogging.
On sub-specie...I really like this idea of blogging.<br />On sub-species, though many are can not be seperated in the field by looking, many can be identified by location and time of year. Like a Grasshopper Sparrow in South Florida in June is Floridanus, while in January it could be Pretenis or Floridanus (Though they are seperatable if you are careful). Many Yellow Warblers species are the same, Galapagos, Cuba, Bahamas, South Florida, New Jersey in June are likely to be only one particular sub-species. No matter how you have I love eBird and will continue to add checklists. I spent 2 weeks adding all my back checklists from 1999 on. Hard to believe I've entered more than 1000 checklists. I actually have older checklists but I can't count them (long story). Still noticed that some "non-countable" species are in my totals based on where they were seen, is this something that can be addressed?<br />Thanks<br />Gallus"G" or "GQ"https://www.blogger.com/profile/03232738279433092207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-90562766119788595292009-05-29T13:13:41.928-07:002009-05-29T13:13:41.928-07:00I know this comment is better suited for backyard ...I know this comment is better suited for backyard bird survey feedback, but for the love of all that's good and feathery, do not ignore west Texas! Few and far between are the birders out there and when a good birder submits 20 Pine Siskins at odd times of the year, don't just ignore it! She was exasperated that even with a write-up, her submission was ignored and is highly unlikely to participate again in the future - much less regularly ebird at all. I've since moved, but the plight continues, we need more regional editors.heidihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06376018353561979984noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-76921762664161971292009-05-29T12:28:21.459-07:002009-05-29T12:28:21.459-07:00Regarding the desire to consolidate multiple locat...Regarding the desire to consolidate multiple locations into one observation -- there is another way to come at that, by adding "Day lists" to the options for examining your own data on the "View and Explore Data page." We can already do Year, Month and Week lists. Would it be much harder to let us do Day lists too? I've also occasionally found myself wishing that I could do a custom date range, both for looking at my data, and for looking at all data. Right now you can ask for a range of months. I'd like to have finer granularity. I could generate a trip list for that Alaska trip by asking for a summary of dates I was there, for example.<br /><br />I had also just stumbled on the idea of "following" the prolific birders in my area to get a better idea of what was being seen, where and when in my area. That's pretty complicated, I'm sure, but it would be cool. The Google gadget is a good first step.<br /><br />I loved LG Price's idea for a hierarchical menu of locations.<br /><br />I'm stoked to hear that there are plans to publish an API for eBird. I asked about this a few years ago, but it understandably wasn't at the top of the priority list. I'm a computer science teacher and would love to be able to work on some eBird related projects with my students.<br /><br />You asked what kind of data we'd like to see. I'll confess that I have been scraping eBird data to construct hotspot checklists for our local Audubon chapter bird walks for a couple of years now. (http://www.richmondaudubon.org/ForBirdsChecklists.html to see what I've been doing). What I wanted to do was provide checklists just of birds that have been reported from our bird walks, so I set up an eBird user for the chapter field trip leaders. We either enter our observations using that account, or share our individual observations with the chapter account (brilliant feature, sharing, by the way!). <br /><br />Now comes the hard part. I could embed a link to display the bar chart for the hotspot (as long as the location was a recognized hotspot - some of our trips are by permission on private land, and those locations, of course, can't be hotspots) on our chapter's web site, but I wanted to restrict the data selected to just the observations associated with the chapter account - birds that have actually been seen on our field trips. At the time, I couldn't find a way to do that. What I wanted was a way to essentially do the database query "show me all the birds seen in James River Park by user richmond_as". The only way I could figure out to do it was to log in as richmond_as, display the data I wanted, save the web page, and run it through a Java program I wrote to get it into a format that I could use on our web site (with ample attribution that the data was coming from eBird, so I hope I can avoid trouble over that. I did ask permission, but I never heard back...)<br /><br />So, anyway, that's my wish for the API -- a way to do what I'm doing periodically by hand, but on the fly, either with a query-type link that includes restriction to a particular user's data, or with some simple scripting in JavaScript, Python or some other widely available web scripting language. Hope that made sense.lbarnetthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07478051605036257117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-32212249232700670972009-05-29T07:43:33.924-07:002009-05-29T07:43:33.924-07:00Kim, your question is one we struggle with a lot a...Kim, your question is one we struggle with a lot at eBird. Many others keep bird lists from around the house while gardening, talking on the phone, or doing various other tasks. <br /><br />Basically, we feel that anytime birding is your primary focus, it is possible to supply a reasonable estimate of effort that make the data more meaningful. But if your primary focus is gardening, driving, or talking on the phone, you are probably missing a large percentage of birds that you would have recorded with more focused effort. In these cases, we do recommend using "Casual Observation". However, one of our pet peeves (and something we used to see often) is when birders submit a Casual Observation with mileage and duration, which indicated that it could have been entered as a traveling count.<br /><br />My personal approach to this is to submit it as a complete checklist and traveling count (or stationary) when I am comfortable that I am getting a majority of the birds present. If I take a phone call while on a birdwalk, I don;t downgrade to "casual obs", but if I feel like I was really really distracted and lost my focus on counting birds, then I do consider it a "Casual obs". Keeping a notebook with you at all times is a good practice to make sure that you don't forget to record the common birds.<br /><br />Good question! Only you will know how rigorous your survey was, but I hope this was helpful.Marshall Iliffnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-42994519459880091592009-05-29T07:41:21.372-07:002009-05-29T07:41:21.372-07:00Thanks for the comment post to the initial comment...Thanks for the comment post to the initial comments; I think it will help people see they are at least being noticed.<br /><br />I will wait and comment on xml feeds and sharing lists when the posts are, um, posted (as long as I don't forget to keep checking).Seanhttp://www.sean-ward.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-17664214143982437282009-05-29T06:09:54.403-07:002009-05-29T06:09:54.403-07:00I've been posting on ebird since very early (2000?...I've been posting on ebird since very early (2000?) and I'm wondering about the utility of my data. I bird where I am and while I'm doing what I'm doing and I keep a list of that. Based on e-bird, I work hard to keep a complete list. If I am in a specific are, I list that area, but if I am out and about, I use a city or county. Mostly, I'm turning in a day list for every place I've been that day.<br /><br />I am trying to figure out how I can add effort information to my checklists. When I do go out specifically to look for birds, I include effort information. Most of my checklists, though, I'm not actively looking for birds, I'm doing something else and writing down what I see. My focus varies. My effort varies. I'm birding from the same house and yard, but from different windows -- so what I can see varies. I'd love to add an effort component to make my data more valuable, but I question how to do so due to consistency issues.<br /><br />Any advice?Kimhttp://www.thespinninguy.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-278203822298685782009-05-28T13:01:16.560-07:002009-05-28T13:01:16.560-07:00Something I would like to see is customized filter...Something I would like to see is customized filters for well-known hotspots. Where I live (Arizona) many species are expected in the valley but not in the mountains (and vice versa). As a birding vacation spot, many out-of-state birders come through and do not necessarily know what to expect where. I think it would be helpful to tailor hotspot submission pages for the places everyone visit. You are not likely to see Northern Goshawk or Hepatic Tanager at Sweetwater Wetlands in Tucson, but they are on the list, and people report them without setting off any filters. Obviously, it would take some work but for the most popular sites I think it would be worthwhile (and would be willing to help).Andrewhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07285873302397405707noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660809782905042528.post-6186265890552760082009-05-28T10:57:39.293-07:002009-05-28T10:57:39.293-07:00Thanks to everyone for great comments. I am one of...Thanks to everyone for great comments. I am one of the other eBird proejct leaders, alon with Brian and Chris Wood. A few follow-up comments:<br /><br />To Evan: We share your concerns about the 60 minute timeout, but it is a necessity at this point to avoid putting too much strain on the system in case people forget to log out. Another way to avoid the annoying loss of a checklist is to submit it and then re-open it and start on the comments. This way your checklist will be submitted and safe and you can fill in the checklist later. So try considering entering long lists as a TWO-STEP process.<br /><br />To Gallus: A bit more on subspecies, since that is something I work with a lot in eBird. Many subspecies are poorly defined and taxonomists disagree about how distinctive they are. For that reason we have tried to make eBird include all "groups" or field identifiable forms, but not necessarily all 15+ subspecies of Yellow Warbler since many of those are difficult to distinguish. We try to walk this line as best we can, and are coordinating these groups with Clements http://birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist<br /><br />Anonymous RE: Weather: I always include weather info in my submissions, and always put it in the checklist comments. Recently I have been systematic abolut including this with a unique text string that I could always search for and extract from an excel eBird data dump. This, for today I wrote in my comments: "Morning birding with my favorite dog Chula. Nice migration overnight. WEATHER: Overcast with wet grass from drizzle overnight, calm, 60 F." <br /><br />Consider using these types of delimiters in your comments so that you can always search for certain topics. I also use: MAMMALS, HERPS (i.e. Reptiles and Ampphibians), LEPS (butterflies), ODES (Dragonflies) as other delimiters sinc eI usually take note of more than just birds. The checklist comments section is where each eBirder can customize the notes to their own preferences. See our story on comments here: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/news/a-comment-about-commentsMarshall Iliffnoreply@blogger.com