Starting a Bird Journal (1 Viewer)

[Chris Salem]

For all of you seasoned birders,

How exactly does one keep up a bird journal?
Is it just a daily log of species spotted? or is it more detailed? If so, how?
Should the journal include separate pages for all the different locations you may frequently visit (e.g., back porch, neighbor's orchard, etc.) or would this be part of the detail?

The idea of keeping a bird journal is very new to me, so I am interested in hearing about what practices some of you do.

 

[Larry Lade]

Keeping a journal or bird list is mostly up to the individual. It's your journal/list and you keep it any way you wish.

It is a pretty good idea to note the date, location and then the birds seen. Some people also note time of day, temperature, wind direction/velocity and things like that.

It is really up to you just how much information you want to record.

Good Birding!

 

[Xenospiza]

I have always just noted the interesting birds by day and location, sometimes with numbers. In recent years, I only keep electronic notes.
Some people list all birds, but I find that too much work (although it is of course a much better way to get an idea about the how the numbers of common birds vary through the year). I will add some notes about behaviour if appropriate.

 

[Maroon Jay]

As Larry said, it is up to you to do it anyway you wish. Many people have several lists. Some people have a list of all the birds they saw in their back yard. Many people make annual lists. I have one list with just a number and the name of the bird for the total of birds seen in my life. Then I have separate lists by continent or country with more information such as date and place seen and other comments. I don't make an annual list so I have no idea how many birds I have seen in a given year although I could go through my records and figure that out if I wanted to. Just check what other people are doing and then decide which ones you want to use for yourself. Cheers, Tom

 

[Gretchen]

I like to organize it by date and birds seen, and location - then I can look back a year later to find out what kind of birds I was seeing at a particular time and location. That gives me a better idea what to be looking for or good places to return to. Details about day, weather, tides etc. can help to learn about how those things affect the birds I see. I too like to write down interesting behavior just because I tend to remember the things I've written.

 

[owlsgomoo]

I think it's a very much a personal preference thing. I have my notebook (a Moleskine cos I'm a sucker for a Moleskine!) and I tend to fill it as I go (rather than have separate sections.) I write down the the date, location, very general description of weather (ie. "sunny", "cloudy", "windy",) approx. time and then I will write the species. I often note behaviour things too, for example if a crow flies past with nesting material in it's mouth or if a heron is actively catching fish. This time of year there are plenty of behavioural things going on that I like noting in my journal. I also note "common" birds. This is a reference thing, over time you realise what is common on one site is not as common on another.

I have a checklist I got from Bird Watch magazine (or was it Bird Watching?!) that I use that is purely for listing. My journal is meant to be about the experiences of birding rather than listing and ticks.

 

[YuShan]

I have recently started some kind of journal. It's more like a short diary of what I was excited about on a specific day. So it mentiones the less common birds that I have seen on a specific day but also interesting behaviour of common species and even really common stuff that just gave me a lot of pleasure at that moment, like a singing green finch looking gorgeous in the morninglight. Main pupose is that it is nice to read all that stuff back later (like a normal diary) but it can also be useful as a reference ("by what date did I see the first little terns returning last year?"). In addition to this I also do a complete list of all the species that I see on a specific site on a sample basis (like once a month or so). I Keep that in Excel so easy to look things up, filter, etc.