Robert Mortensen introduced the One-a-Day eBird Challenge several years ago and now eBird is taking it to the next level. The goal of the One-a-Day eBird Challenge is to submit at least one eBird Checklist per day. Starting in January 2014, eBird will be giving prizes away from Carl Zeiss Sport Optics and Princeton University Press for a new challenge each … Read More
National Wildlife Refuge Week eBird Challenge!
OK bird nerds, now that everyone knows how to look like a cool birder (if you don’t, follow these 12 steps), there is a new challenge that involves prizes. Interested? Read on. National Wildlife Refuge Week, October 13-19, is just around the corner. There is at least ONE refuge in every state (check out this link to find one near … Read More
Introducing eBird Hotspots Explorer
eBird just released an awesome new feature that really lets you figure out great places to bird, as well as giving us new ways to look at our favorite birding spots. Hotspots Explorer is epic! The first view shows a heat map, where you can see which areas of the world have the highest diversity. Not surprisingly, the coast is … Read More
Duval County Tickin’
During the last week of June one of my cousins was getting married in Orlando, so I took some time off work on the Eastern Shore of Virginia and drove down to spend a few days with my family. There was no way I could go down to Florida and not find a little time to go birding, so I … Read More
Watch eBirders in real-time!
With thousands of eBird checklists being submitted from around the world on a daily basis, the folks at eBird have created a real-time map showing exactly where checklists are being entered! For more information, check out this link:Â http://ebird.org/ebird/livesubs From eBird: “We’ve developed a new map visualization that displays live eBird checklist submissions. Each time a new checklist is entered, a … Read More
Another year of birding underway!
With the first month of the year officially behind us now, I thought I would take a look the current status of my year list. Beginning a new year is always fun – every single bird is ‘new’, it’s winter, and there are typically a bunch of winter rarities and other good birds around to chase. You never really know what the … Read More
Western Tanager and bonus Crested Caracara!
On December 5th, 2012 Cape May birder Will Kerling was riding his bike through Cape May Court House and spotted a male Western Tanager in some trees along the road at the intersection of Hand Ave and Dias Creek Rd! The tanager was following a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker around in some Siberian Elm trees, trying to get at the sap that … Read More
Delaware Big Day – January 2013
One of the main reasons for our New Year, New Birds trip was to do a January 1st Big Day in Delaware with Tim Schreckengost from Thermal Birding. Tim lives and works down in Delaware right now, and has been a friends of ours for a few years now. The following story was co-written by Alex and Tim and is … Read More
Lititz CBC 2012
Tomorrow I am headed on a trip through MD, DE, and NJ so today was my last full day of birding in Pennsylvania for the year. 2012 has been a great year of birding for me in the state, with my highest state year list ever – 292 species. I guess I should have tried a little harder and tried … Read More
Pink-footed fiasco turns into a great day of birding!
This morning, Ian Gardner and I joined up and drove from Hershey out to Peace Valley Park in Bucks County, PA to try our luck at finding the Pink-footed Goose that has returned for its second winter in the area. The bird would have been a lifer for the both of us and a species I REALLY want to see, … Read More