eBird and Birding on the move (1 Viewer)

[ohlookabirdie]

Hey guys,

I'm a new eBird user and I'm loving it for keeping my lists and recording my sighting when I'm out birding. my question for you seasoned eBird users is this; what do you do when you are not actively looking for birds, but spot something you know isn't on a list while going about your daily business? do you open the app there and then and record the sighting as an incomplete list? do you stop what you are doing and take time to do a complete list of where you are? do you do one of the previous options but leave it until you have time? do you ignore it? what if you are driving?

an example from today, I was driving into town and I spotted 3 Hooded Crows, which I know are not on my 2023 list yet, and I just didnt know how to deal with it now that I use eBird. before I would have just ticked it off the list when I got home, pen and paper are sometimes easier

 

[pbjosh]

That is what incidental sightings are for. Get the location halfway accurate, and just record it as an incidental list. Incidental lists are not used for analysis / aren't really counted as "high quality data" but sightings still appear for you and for anyone that looks for the species in the area. So, essentially, an incidental list is designed for exactly what you're describing.

 

[ohlookabirdie]

That is what incidental sightings are for. Get the location halfway accurate, and just record it as an incidental list. Incidental lists are not used for analysis / aren't really counted as "high quality data" but sightings still appear for you and for anyone that looks for the species in the area. So, essentially, an incidental list is designed for exactly what you're describing.

thank you, i didnt see that option! perfect

 

[THE_FERN]

thank you, i didnt see that option! perfect

(Pretty sure it didn't exist once upon a time. It was one of the things I asked for...)

 

[kb57]

That is what incidental sightings are for. Get the location halfway accurate, and just record it as an incidental list. Incidental lists are not used for analysis / aren't really counted as "high quality data" but sightings still appear for you and for anyone that looks for the species in the area. So, essentially, an incidental list is designed for exactly what you're describing.

That's really useful advice - I've never managed to transition my whole list to eBird, largely because if I'm recording stuff on eBird I feel I have to count everything, and some days you either want to just enjoy the birds, or you've got a partner wanting to move you on....
To clarify based on the OPs question, you're adding the record when you get home, rather than using mobile tracks? Because the other issue with incidental records is sometimes you just don't have the time (or the data allowance) to open up the app for a casual record.

 

[01101001]

Not a seasoned eBirder, but what I do is when I see an interesting bird that's uncommon in eBird (not many observers around where I live, so it happens more often than it should) or when I feel the observation should be included in the scientific input for some other reason (I hate the way incidental sightings appear in bar charts), I stop to record a 5-minute stationary checklist and then move on (technically speaking, 2 minutes seem to be enough to make the cut for a non-incidental checklist), which is what eBird encourages its users to do if time allows. Otherwise, I use the incidental protocol or just remember the approximate time and location and enter the sighting later on--this way I ticked a Black Woodpecker from a speeding train (I even once entered a complete 5-minute stationary checklist--which wasn't precisely stationary but could well have been given that I didn't walk too far--solely based on what I remembered about the location and the species present, and I managed to reconstruct approximate counts too). I used to think that locations off by--say--50 metres, start times off by up to five minutes, etc., dumb down the data, but now I no longer do.

When it comes to the app, I like the slider option very much, as it helps me calculate repeated distance more easily by highlighting a given stretch of the track in blue. More information here: eBird Mobile Tips & Tricks, but note that not all other features described there actually work (well...).

 

[THE_FERN]

Ebird's data model is wrong which doesn't help. Ideally it'd record the location every time you pressed the button (with the provision to record placeholders like "bird 1", "bird 2" etc for things you id later). With a "background mode" the app could be always on and recording incidentals would be quicker, easier and locationally more accurate.

Instead, ebird ties things to "transects" or "hotspots", a collection of one or more bird sightings. This makes the location of any particular bird within the session uncertain, and for long sessions muddles the location so much it can be meaningless (why people tend to add additional coordinates).

As it is, I do record incidentals but it's difficult from a speeding car because of the start up time for the app (dunno why it has to get your location before you can record a sighting: could get location seperately in the background). I know people who operate mainly in incidental mode, and thiys have records which are closer to the ideal with much better spatial resolution

 

[01101001]

As it is, I do record incidentals but it's difficult from a speeding car because of the start up time for the app

I simply pinpointed the location afterwards.

dunno why it has to get your location before you can record a sighting

As a matter of fact, you can. Just turn off your location and patiently wait until eBird fails to retrieve it. Then, click 'Choose a bird list', set the appropriate country, and here you go. After you've finished, you need to zoom into the map and find the spot where you birded.

 

[THE_FERN]

I simply pinpointed the location afterwards.

As a matter of fact, you can. Just turn off your location and patiently wait until eBird fails to retrieve it. Then, click 'Choose a bird list', set the appropriate country, and here you go. After you've finished, you need to zoom into the map and find the spot where you birded.

Yes, but that's not helpful for the situation I'm talking about. Of course you can use ebird without location but that rather defeats the object.

It's usually not possible to identify where in a long stretch of unfamiliar featureless highway (in South Africa, say) I saw the bird even if I have a detailed map. No: the app should allow you to register the bird even if it hasn't yet got a good lock and should then silently start recording as soon as it does.

(Really we're talking about a variant of a simple GPS logger: they allow you to add annotations as you go along. The "revised" ebird app could run all day like this)

 

[01101001]

I see what you want to say, though that could mean counting certain birds more than once as they fly around.
Or maybe not, I don't know, but it could be better, and much more detailed for sure.

 

[THE_FERN]

though that could mean counting certain birds more than once as they fly around.

This is a fundamental problem with surveying any mobile organisms: insects, plant seeds, mammals or birds. It's got nothing to do with the technology. Even if using ebird in a stationary mode you usually have no easy of knowing for sure how many individuals you've seen

 

[Kirk Roth]

It's usually not possible to identify where in a long stretch of unfamiliar featureless highway (in South Africa, say) I saw the bird even if I have a detailed map. No: the app should allow you to register the bird even if it hasn't yet got a good lock and should then silently start recording as soon as it does.

(Really we're talking about a variant of a simple GPS logger: they allow you to add annotations as you go along. The "revised" ebird app could run all day like this)

I'm not certain I'm understanding the issue here - the app by default uses an auto selection for a pinned geographic location, although one may then choose a hotspot or previously used location if they like. Not the other way around. In my experience, even if I am in an area with no phone signal, once I get to an area with reception the mapping (which is essentially Google Maps) has it located at the spot where I originally began the checklist.

 

[THE_FERN]

choose a hotspot

Never do this if you're recording an incidental. Ebird will substitute the coordinates it has for the hotspot and the actual location of the record will be completely lost. Instead, choose to "create new location".

Ebird will take your records into account when it calculates species for nearby hotspots anyway (it automatically assigns your records to them)—but you still have your actual coordinates. The difference can be significant for rare vagrants (where precise location is important), or for particular locations within large hotspots.

or previously used location if they like.

This may (rarely) be useful if you record at the same places habitually.

Those of us who try to log +/- everything we see on a trip often want to record a single pied crow (or whatever) we see from a speeding car. This is where Ebird app's slow start up really hits us. It's usually not possible to locate the sighting later even when you have good satellite or other mapping.

Edit: the problem is that you can't record the bird before it gets a GPS fix and it can take ages to get that. If you could record the bird when you see it and have it get a fix in the background you would at least have a correct time for the sighting. (Some of us also keep a simple GPS trace running all day too, e.g. for geolocating plant photos etc. With the correct sighting time you could use that to more precisely assign the Ebird record later.)

 

[01101001]

Never do this if you're recording an incidental. Ebird will substitute the coordinates it has for the hotspot and the actual location of the record will be completely lost. Instead, choose to "create new location".

Whoops! I think I'm guilty of doing just that. Luckily, I steer clear from rarities (or the other way round, rather), and I don't habitually use large hotspots, and I take note of the approximate location if I think someone may wish to replicate my sighting. I even used to take advantage of this bug/feature by recording an incidental checklist with the location set at home and only then linking it to the hotspot I birded at.

Those of us who try to log +/- everything we see on a trip often want to record a single pied crow (or whatever) we see from a speeding car. This is where Ebird app's slow start up really hits us. It's usually not possible to locate the sighting later even when you have good satellite or other mapping.

I relied on the good (?) old fieldmarks, then used Google Maps' satellite imagery.

Some of us also keep a simple GPS trace running all day too

I couldn't do that; my battery wouldn't survive.

 

[Kirk Roth]

Whoops! I think I'm guilty of doing just that. Luckily, I steer clear from rarities (or the other way round, rather), and I don't habitually use large hotspots, and I take note of the approximate location if I think someone may wish to replicate my sighting. I even used to take advantage of this bug/feature by recording an incidental checklist with the location set at home and only then linking it to the hotspot I birded at.

Never do this if you're recording an incidental. Ebird will substitute the coordinates it has for the hotspot and the actual location of the record will be completely lost. Instead, choose to "create new location".

Ebird will take your records into account when it calculates species for nearby hotspots anyway (it automatically assigns your records to them)—but you still have your actual coordinates. The difference can be significant for rare vagrants (where precise location is important), or for particular locations within large hotspots.

I see. If your emphasis is on precise location, then certainly hotspots are not the thing for you. But it is certainly not eBird's guidance never to use incidental reporting for a hotspot - so long as the bird is actually within the hotspot it is still useful data. Generalizing to a hotspot can be useful for mobile birds which are not necessarily going to be in the same spot when a chaser arrives later... or even during the duration of one's observations. If a precise location is necessary, I've seen lots of people do exactly as you recommend - place a precise new location and the coordinates are right there. But a good description works well too (e.g. "the bird frequented the hedge behind the blue building" or etc.).

I've got no good advice for logging birds while driving (using eBird or otherwise) - except please be safe!

 

[Tero]

Incidental. Sometimes I am on a stakeout for a known bird, as at someone's back yard feeder. Those I record as stationary.

 

[THE_FERN]

If your emphasis is on precise location, then certainly hotspots are not the thing for you.

Precise location is always more valuable than a hotspot of unknown (and variable) extent. That's true whether you're just birding or using the data for serious scientific purposes. The only good reason for ambiguating locations to a hotspot would be to save computer resources. These days that shouldn't be a concern.

I've got no good advice for logging birds while driving (using eBird or otherwise) - except please be safe!

Well I'm not the driver...

 

[raymie]

Precise location is always more valuable than a hotspot of unknown (and variable) extent. That's true whether you're just birding or using the data for serious scientific purposes. The only good reason for ambiguating locations to a hotspot would be to save computer resources. These days that shouldn't be a concern.

Well I'm not the driver...

Hotspots are most useful to other birders, so they can know what species were present at a particular location on any given day. If they want to know what species were seen at their local park, for instance.

 

[THE_FERN]

Hotspots are most useful to other birders, so they can know what species were present at a particular location on any given day. If they want to know what species were seen at their local park, for instance.

"Particular location". No: 'hotspots' refer to areas, not point locations. They are represented by points but the point stands in for a larger (unknown) area. A checklist for a hotspot tells you what was seen in the general area not at any given place within it.

My point is that hotspots are logically different to individual obsevations. Once you have a set of observations you are free to combine them into checklists for a "hotspot" (or not). You don't have this freedom in ebird because you're forced to throw away the basic underlying information---exactly where you saw each bird.

Since there is no definition of what constitutes a hotspot, and other people are free to add their own clashing definitions of hotspots for a focal area, it's very difficult to understand what's meant by a hotspot. This is especially so for places you're unfamiliar with.

As a simple example, can you tell me what the bounds of this are?

What area does the hotspot cover?

...You can't tell me (no one can) because it's not tied down or defined anywhere at all:

https://ebird.org/hotspot/L1973735

 

[01101001]

What area does the hotspot cover?

A reasonable distance from the edge of the town and the town itself, which--admittedly--varies between individuals, but then a single square/point in eBird's status and trends itself spans multiple kilometres (for example 27 x 27 km for eBird Trends, although that's an extreme example), so the large picture is still more or less the same. eBird isn't transparent enough for us to be able to report such mistakes, so we have to get over it for now. (By the way, I do wonder what happened to the media reviewer's powers that I was supposed to be getting after having posted at least 100 checklist the year before.) Hotspots differentiate eBird from some other schemes, and the statistics and bar charts they power are indeed a tradeoff between accuracy and convenience. Incidental checklists are the worst impacted, but they don't count anyway (perhaps that's the reason why). All other types of checklists have their precise location saved in the system (and presumably these are the ones that are used for scientific purposes).

What's more, and what I find a bit counterintuitive, is that neither the range maps nor the abundance maps are based on actual data reported by someone. They are delineated by an algorithm, which learns the patterns of occurence from eBird's dataset and then applies them to each individual grid, which--if you zoom in close enough--produces curious results in some parts of Poland, for instance, that are undersampled. So, none of the maps produced by eBird are actually by any means 'real' (with the exception of the one in the 'Explore' tab, that is) which is sad but perhaps necessary to obtain any map at all. I'm not into statistics, but there are some models that are at least supposed to do a decent job of winnowing out the chaff.