The 2021-2022 Bird Study Group Speaker Series begins on Wednesday September 8th with a special presentation by Lyn Hancock, honouring Gus Yaki. This will be a virtual presentation using Zoom, and you have to be a Nature Calgary member to link to it.
(Nature Calgary memberships are available on their website here. If you already are a member, you should have received an email with the Zoom invitation.)
Almost forty years ago, Lyn Hancock took part in a 30,000-mile trip around North America led by Gus Yaki, the renowned naturalist who passed away just over a year ago. Gus lived in Calgary for the last twenty-seven years of his life, and he was an inspiration to many local birders.
Gus Yaki. Photo by Dan Arndt.
The trip in 1983 followed the route taken by Roger Tory Peterson and James Fisher thirty years prior, in 1953. Lyn documented the trip in her book Looking For the Wild.
From Nature Calgary:
Lyn’s special interest was the exciting climax of the trip on the remote Pribilof Islands in Alaska where she had close encounters with fur seals, murres and puffins, species she had raised as orphans in British Columbia in the 1960s and led to her interest in wildlife.
Lyn is the author of 20 books about her experiences with wildlife including THERE’S A SEAL IN MY SLEEPING BAG, LOVE AFFAIR WITH A COUGAR, TABASCO THE SAUCY RACCOON and THE RING: MEMORIES OF A METIS GRANDMOTHER, the pioneer love story of Sam Livingston and Jane Howse, the first settlers in Calgary.
The meeting begins at 7:30 pm and the Zoom link will open at 7:15.
Details of future Bird Study Group meetings and other Nature Calgary events and field trips can be found here.
Note: the books below have all been spoken for. Thanks for your interest. – Bob
If you live in Calgary and would like a copy of Lyn Hancock’s book Looking For the Wild, I have four copies to give away. They are all signed by Gus, and one is also signed by Lyn. I will give them to the first four people who respond and who agree to make a donation to either The Nature Conservancy of Canada or Birds Canada in whatever amount they wish. (These were two organizations that Gus supported.) The books are used, and one is a former library copy, but they are in good shape. Just email me at birdscalgary[at]gmail.com and we can make arrangements to get the book to you.
With spring finally in the air and migrants starting to arrive in numbers, this is the time of year that birders anticipate the most. This year was especially exciting for Calgary birders who were involved in the 2020 Challenge, a year-long effort to see as many species as one could within the city limits.
Harlequin Ducks, seen by many birders in the city this winter. Photo by Andrew Hart.
However, the Covid-19 crisis has made it impossible to continue group outings, and we really want to encourage people to stay home as much as possible. As you may know, Nature Calgary outings and the Friends of Fish Creek birding course have also been suspended. Reluctantly, the Challenge has been suspended. We have a few ideas as to how, if, or when to resume, which I’ll address at the end.
It’s too bad, because we were lucky enough to find quite a few great birds in the city for the winter months, and several birders had recorded over 60 species already. The WhatsApp Rare bird Alert (which has been suspended) enabled participants to rapidly re-find rarities as they were reported. One example is Gyrfalcon, a very unusual bird to get in the city limits. But many participants were able to find one that was feeding on Mallards inside the city, after it was reported on the app. (There may have been as many as three Gyrfalcons in the area over the course of a week a couple of months ago.)
Gyrfalcon, near Maycroft in SW Alberta, January 30, 2020. Photo by Raymond Toal.
Here is the statementfrom Howard Hefflerabout suspending the Challenge:
The BirdYYC2020 began as idea to repeat, taking advantage of modern online tools, the big year birding competitions previously held in Calgary in 2000 and 2010. Andrew Hart, Bob Lefebvre, and – later, gratefully, joined by Gavin McKinnon – agreed we would organize and promote the event.
We hoped to create enthusiasm in the Calgary birding community to “get out there and go birding”. AND, to share your sightings with others. We also hoped to collect the data to allow comparison with what had be done 10 and 20 years previously.
Modern digital tools, eBird being the main one, but also smart phones and a variety of in-the-field tools to assist birders of all levels, have changed the landscape. What fun to compare the new with the old. The best example is Gavin setting up the WhatsApp Rare Bird alert that allows anyone to instantly receive notification of a rare bird reported by other participants.
But the fun is over. For the foreseeable future at least.
The four of us have come to the unhappy decision that what we are doing is promoting unnecessary and unwarranted social contact at a time when the entire society is relying on each other to act responsibility.
We have decided to stop supporting any BirdYYC2020 initiatives. The first step has been to shut down the WhatsApp Rare Bird Group.
I sincerely hope that the actions being taken by our federal and provincial governments will slow the spread of the COVID-19 virus. This is a threat to our global culture and economy that we are only just beginning to understand.
The best – and honestly ONLY – defense against community spread at this time is to minimize infection by strict social distancing and, where warranted, self-isolation.
A couple of days ago I “chased” a reported sighting of a Eurasian Wigeon at Carburn Park. When I arrived, I walked briskly to the likely observation spot. I interacted with other people, some were birders, and some were not. Some I knew. And some I did not. I set up my scope. Within minutes there was a small group of interested passersby. To the best of my knowledge I am not infected. I expect everyone else in that small group also felt the same way. I, and they, would hate to think that we are contributing to the spread of the virus.
But we are. So, I for one, am going to stop. The other three (Andrew, Bob, and Gavin) feel the same.
We are not going to participate in a forum that promotes unnecessary social contact.
At this time, there is no government directive to not go outdoors for a walk etc. That may change. For me, the potential public health risk resulting from random, unnecessary excursions from your home is best described in an article by a very reputable medical reporter, Andre Picard. See: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-to-tackle-coronavirus-walk-and-act-this-way/
This is really unfortunate. The BirdYYC challenge was generating a lot of interest. There are over 60 people registered and a similar number who have established the BirdYYC2020 patch. I feel we were headed toward a truly “big year”.
What shall we do? Here is one idea. We could select a date, such as March 31st , and declare the end of this birding year. Then, next April 1st, 2021, we all start again. A bit unorthodox, I know. Let me know if you have any suggestions.
We will immediately stop promoting BirdYYC2020. We have shut down the WhatsApp group.
Stay tuned. Over the next weeks things may change.
Personally, I am still in a quandary if and how to continue birding this year. I have decided, it will not be in a group.
As Howard mentioned, eBird is of course still operational, and any Patch Lists are still valid, so you can add to your lists. I added one in my yard yesterday. Some people are still (very carefully) going out birding, although many parks are now closed.
So how do we continue the Challenge? Howard made one suggestion, and I’ll add a few. If you are a Challenge participant please email me at birdscalgary(at)gmail.com, or Howard at hheffler(at)shaw.ca.
Suspend the current Patch Lists on March 31, and resume the Challenge on April 1 of 2021. This presents some logistical difficulties, since eBird won’t be tracking the totals for a split year. It would take a little more work on the part of the organizers. I also think that birders are pretty attached to one-year lists and may not like a split year either.
When safe, resume the Challenge in 2020. For example, we could resume on July 1 and continue to December 31. This would mean that the entire spring migration would be missed (individual birders can of course still add species in the spring but there would be no group outings and much would be missed by most participants). Many species missed in the spring can be found again in the fall, but not all.
Cancel the Challenge for this year, but start over from scratch in 2021. Our experiences this year would be a sort of trial run. This would mean there is an 11-year gap between this Challenge and the 2010 one, and (presumably) a 9-year gap until the next one, instead of the intended 10 years. A minor point in my opinion.
Cancel the Challenge. The next City Challenge would be in 2030.
Of these, I favour re-starting the Challenge from scratch in 2021. If you have an opinion, or any other ideas on how to resume, please let us know.
The 2020 birding challenge is well under way! About sixty local birders have begun to build up their year lists, trying to find as many species as they can within the city limits in 2020. Here is an update on how things have gone so far.
First of all, I should mention that it is not too late to join. If you were away, if you didn’t get around to joining, or if you don’t get out much in the winter, there is no reason you can’t start now and still have a big year. Even if you miss all the winter birds you will have another crack at them in November and December.
To get started, just send your name, eBird name and email address to Howard Heffler at: hheffler[at]shaw.ca. For more information, see this post.
If you are already an eBirder it is easy to get started. Just register with Howard, then set up your city patch. If not, there is still time to begin using eBird to record your sightings and have a big year. Here are the posts that will get you started.
At the end of January the leader in the challenge had recorded 52 species inside the city limits. There were 86 species seen by all eBirders in Calgary county in January. The county is larger than the city, so Howard Heffler has attempted to determine which ones were seen in the city, and it looks like there were 73 species seen collectively. You can see the list of species on Howard Heffler’s summary on Albertabird here.
In addition to the usual winter birds, the list has quite a number of overwintering birds that most birders will be able to get in the spring, summer, or fall if they don’t see them now. These include the Trumpeter Swans at Carburn Park and the Tundra Swan at Griffith Woods Park, the Lesser Scaup, Redheads, and Ring-necked Ducks at Carburn, American Robins, American Crows, and many others.
Trumpeter Swan, an overwintering adult at Carburn Park. Photo by Andrew Hart.
There are also many of the usual winter-only species that that participants should make an effort to find in the next month or so, or else have to wait until next winter. This would include Northern Shrike, American Dipper, Townsend’s Solitaire, Bohemian Waxwing, Pine Grosbeak, and Common Redpoll (Hoary Redpoll has not yet been reported). Redpolls are very scarce so I hope we get a bigger influx next winter.
In addition there are quite a few species that are much easier to find in the city in the winter, though they are in the Calgary region year-round. Examples are Northern Pygmy-Owl (seen lately in Shannon Terrace), American Three-toed Woodpecker and Black-backed Woodpecker (Votier’s Flats and Shannon Terrace in Fish Creek Park), Barrow’s Goldeneye (lower Bow River), Northern Saw-whet Owl (various locations, and really hard to find, though they are beginning to sing now and may be heard in forested areas in the next month or two).
I would also make an effort to see Harlequin Ducks – there are a few on the Bow this winter but you never know if any will be there next winter. They have been seen most reliably at Carburn Park and Beaverdam Flats. The Greater Scaup at Carburn are worth seeing too. They can be here on migration but are not common in the city. This overwintering pair is more reliable (although I haven’t seen them in four attempts). Northern Goshawk seems to be reported more often in the winter as well. I don’t know if they are more numerous in the winter or just easier to spot with no leaves on the trees.
Harlequin Ducks. Photo by Andrew Hart.Greater Scaup. Photo by Andrew hart.
There have also been a few rare birds (for the city). A single Snowy Owl was reported on Nose Hill, and a Barred Owl in Griffith Woods Park. These were unusual one- and two-day sightings. But the Clark’s Nutcracker in Quarry Park has been there for a while, and they are almost never reported in the city. Go find it – I wouldn’t count on another being seen past the spring. Gyrfalcon has been seen in the city by many participants, and that may not happen again either.
Here are the Challenge leaders at the end of January:
BirdYYC2020 Leaders, January 31
Name
Species
1
John Thompson
52
2
Blake Weis
50
3
Tony Timmons
48
4
Dave Russum
47
5
Lorrie Anderson
46
5
Evan Walters
46
5
Christopher Law
46
8
Howard Heffler
45
9
John Anderson
44
10
Alan Knowles
43
Quite a few local birders are getting out this year!
Here is an update to the leaders as of today, February 16th:
1
Tony Timmons
59
2
John Thompson
56
3
Howard Heffler
55
4
John Anderson
54
4
Lorrie Anderson
54
6
Blake Weis
53
7
Andrew Hart
52
8
Alan Knowles
50
9
Dave Russum
49
9
Evan Walters
49
11
Jim St. Laurent
48
11
Gavin McKinnon
48
11
Christopher Law
48
14
David Mitchell
47
15
Lorna Aynbinder
45
15
Tim Bandfield
45
17
Daniel Arndt
43
17
Michelle Schreder
43
17
Kerry Korber
43
20
Keith Miles
42
Mountain Chickadee. This is a species that is often in the city in winter, but not every winter. Go find it now. Photo by Andrew Hart.
The next Birds & Birds social get-together will be held this Thursday, January 23, 2020. Gavin McKinnon will give a presentation, featuring photographs like the one below, on his Big Year in 2019. Gavin’s goal was to record over 300 species in Alberta in the calendar year.
Evening Grosbeak, photographed in 2019 by Gavin McKinnon.
Royal Canadian Legion, Centennial Calgary Branch#285,
9202 Horton Road SW.
Thursday January 23, 2020, 6:00-9:00 pm
Everyone is welcome to attend Birds & Beers, and there is no charge. We will meet in the big ballroom at the Legion. Food and drinks are available at reasonable prices, and children are welcome if accompanied by an adult. Come early if you want to avoid the lineup at the kitchen. The presentation will begin at about 7:15 so if you can’t make it at six pm, come later.
Nature Calgary is promoting a friendly “big year” birding challenge within the Calgary city limits in 2020. See this post for general information. To register to take part in this free year-long challenge, send your name, eBird name, and email address to Howard Heffler at: hheffler[at]shaw.ca.
Participants will have to set up a Patch List in eBird that includes all of their sightings within the city limits.
Will you be able to find a Northern Pygmy-Owl in Calgary in 2020? Photo by Tony LePrieur, Bebo Grove, Calgary, December 2, 2017.
Setting Up Patch Listsby Howard Heffler.
For the BirdYYC2020 eBird challenge, here is how you set up your patch list. If you are new to eBird, I recommend you review the eBird help pages. They define Patch List as:
Patch list: a series of locations for a specific area that you can
summarize in a patch list.
You can have any number of patch lists. For example; Fish Creek Provincial Park patch, which will include every location that you have birded within the Park. As you know, there are several hotspots in Fish Creek and creating a patch is a way to collect your checklists in one place and look at all the data together. For the BirdYYC2020 eBird challenge we will use the current Calgary city limits. (For those of you who participated in the 2010 competition, the City boundaries have not changed, so any information you have from then is still relevant.)
You only need to set up the patch list once, and all your past and future sightings will be included in the totals, broken down by month, year, and life. Use the patch name “BirdYYC2020”. If you already have a city limits patch, you merely need to rename your existing patch. (Remember to re-name it back to its original name when the 2020 challenge is over.) Also, if you submit an eBird list from a new (to you) location, you will have to remember to add that location to your patch list. Both established hotspots and personal locations are eligible.
If this is all new to you, here is a step-by-step guide:
Open eBird.
By this time, we assume you have an account and have signed in.
It will also be more meaningful if you have already submitted a few checklists from locations within the City.
Click on “Explore”.
Near the bottom you will find “Patch Totals”.
You will also see “Yard Totals”. You can also keep a yard list with this tool. You should remember to include your personal location for your home (your “yard”) in the BirdYYC2020 patch, but only if you live in the City.
Click on Patch Totals.
Click on “Add a Patch”. (If you have previously set up your BirdYYC2020 patch, go to Step 4.)
Name the patch BirdYYC2020.
Scroll down through all your locations and tick the ones within the City limits. The designated eBird hotspots all start with Calgary or Fish Creek PP. All your personal locations (non-hotspots) are also eligible – if they are inside the City limits.
Don’t worry, when you submit a list in the future from a location not yet on this list, you can add it later; usually when you get home that evening.
Click on “Save Patch”.
Go back to Patch Totals.
You will now see all the patch lists for the region. It will likely first open for all of Canada, so you will want to change the region to Alberta, and to Calgary.
This page shows all your patch lists within Calgary County. You can see your data in a variety of ways. Notice that anything that is blue and underscored is a link. Have good look around to get familiar with all the ways you can summarize your data. It’s fun!
You will also see all the patches by other eBirders within Calgary County. Some will be BirdYYC2020, but there will be others too.
This is why we ask all participants to NOT hide their data. (Take a look at this guide to see how to set your preferences.)
You will see who has reported the highest number of species in the BirdYYC2020 patch and how you compare. You can look by month, year or life.
Next year, 2020, this is where the fun begins. Who is leading? Where do you stand? What species have been recently reported?
That’s it. You are now in the BirdYYC2020 birding challenge!
Note that since eBird tracks all of your lifetime sightings, you can set up this patch anytime in 2020 and it will include sightings from earlier in the year. So if you are a latecomer to the challenge and don’t get started right away, you can still take part. But we would like to see as many participants as possible get their patches done by January 1st so we can see how it’s going.
We ask that you register for the challenge by sending an email to Howard Heffler (hheffler*@*shaw.ca) with your name, email address and eBird name. Some people use a pseudonym in eBird, which is fine, but we would like to know who you are when we see your eBird checklists.
During the year anyone can look on eBird and see the all the
participants with a BirdYYC2020 patch. It will show how many species (and how
many checklists) have been reported by each. Your totals will show as well. It
is not possible to see an individual’s complete list of species, just a few of
their most recent sightings.
Nature Calgary is promoting a friendly “big year” birding challenge within Calgary city limits in 2020. See this post for details of the challenge.
What Are eBird Alerts?
eBird Alerts are lists of noteworthy birds reported in the past seven days in a specific county, state, province, or country. The best place to learn about eBird alerts is on the eBird Help pages about alerts and targets.
In a previous article we described how to open an eBird account with your name and email address. It will be very helpful if you set the eBird parameters on “My eBird” to alert you about local sightings that should improve your chances of adding to your year list.
Setting eBird Alerts
You can get to the Alerts page either from “Explore” and then, near the bottom, open “Alerts.” Or, from “My eBird,” open “Manage My Alerts.”
There are three Alerts:
1. ABA Rarities
This alert is for observations of rare birds in the American Birding Association Area.
2. Rare Bird Alerts
Email alerts for rare birds in a particular area.
3. Needs Alerts
Email alerts for species you have not personally recorded in a particular region or time period.
The
later two are likely the most relevant to participation in the BirdYYC2020
challenge.
You can set your region of interest to Calgary. It is important to remember that the eBird region named “Calgary” refers to an area larger that the City of Calgary.
The Calgary County on eBird.
After selecting Calgary as your region of interest, you can “View” the alerts or you can “Subscribe.” If you subscribe, eBird will send you an email – daily or hourly.
By setting your “Needs Alerts” eBird will notify you of all species reported in Calgary for the past seven days that would be new to your list of species on eBird. To be most useful to the BirdYYC2020 challenge, check the box “This year only.”
The Rare Bird Alerts will inform you of ABA Code 3 and above reports in the region, whether or not they are on your needs list.
You can also set alerts for any other other region you are interested in, for example if you plan to travel. Alerts can easily be changed at any time from “Manage My Alerts” on your “My eBird” page. It is a very useful feature of eBird and birders participating in the 2020 challenge should take advantage of it.
Nature Calgary is promoting a friendly “big year” birding challenge within Calgary city limits in 2020: BIRDYYC2020.
This article is for beginners with eBird to give them the essential information to get started and, we hope, the confidence to explore the powerful features of eBird.
What is eBird?
eBird is a publicly-accessible online database consisting of bird sightings from all around the world. The best place to learn about eBird is on their website.
The eBird Canada home page.
Since 2002 eBird has amassed over one-half billion reports from
birders around the world. It is a project of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and
is supported entirely by grants, sponsors, and donations. It is free and available
for everyone to use.
The first step is to go to the home page and open an account with your name and email address. You will have to select a username and a password. That’s all there is to it.
Using eBird to enter your sightings
There is a vast amount of data on the eBird website that you may access, but the two things to consider initially are; (1) entering checklists, and (2) looking up data. There is a “help” button on the top menu bar on the home page. Believe me, the help pages are very good.
In the Field
I think most people keep track of their sightings while they are birding in the field using the eBird mobile app. The first step is to get the app – available for free on both the Google Play and App Stores. After you download the app and open it on your smartphone, the screen looks like this:
The eBird smartphone app home screen.
The idea is to enter your sightings while you are birding. There are
several ways to do this and you will soon find your favorite techniques after a
bit of practice. You will have to spend a bit of time at your computer looking
through the instructions on the eBird help pages.
In a nutshell; open the app, start a new list, select a location, enter your sightings at that hotspot, stop the list (when you are finished at that hotspot), review it, and submit.
I admit it takes a bit of time initially to learn. But, after some practice, you will appreciate the many ways it is helpful to your birding.
At your desk
It is also possible to submit checklists from your computer when you get back home. Open eBird and look for the “submit” button at the top of the home page. You then select the location where you were birding (if you visited several locations, you will need to submit a checklist for each), enter the time and date, type of observation, and begin to enter your sightings.
The eBird desktop interface.
Again, remember that each checklist is to be associated with one hotspot. It might be a public hotspot such as, Calgary–Inglewood Bird Sanctuary, or it might be a location you define yourself. It is not a list of all the birds you saw that day at a variety of locations.
I encourage you to look through the help pages on the eBird website.
They are very well thought out. Remember, there are many thousands (even
millions) of birders just like you. Everyone one of them at one time was a
beginner with eBird.
Looking up Data
I consider eBird to have two modes: data in and data out. “Data in” refers to entering your sightings. “Data out” refers to looking up information that has been compiled from the vast number of reports from the many millions of checklists; including your own checklists. There are many more things that can be done with this data than I can even begin to describe. Here are a few things you will initially want to do.
Check out Hotspots and Species
On the eBird home page, open the “Explore” page. From there you can find a hotspot, look at what birds have been reported over any time period, see the location on Google maps, and study the historic data in any way you could imagine. Most likely, you will want to see what birds were seen in the past few days to help you anticipate what you might find there.
Alternatively, you may want to explore by species name. In this case you enter the common name of a species and eBird displays a map of all locations where this species has been recorded. You can then zoom in to the desired geographic scale – perhaps right to a hotspot near you where that species was reported in the past week. There are a few sensitive species that do not allow you to zoom in to specific locations. In Alberta these are Gyrfalcon, Great Grey Owl, Northern Hawk-Owl and Burrowing Owl.
My eBird
Of course, you will also want to look at your own data. On the eBird home page open “My eBird”. On the main part of the My eBird page you can look at your own data. On the right-hand side are several tabs. Likely the one you will use most frequently is: “Manage My Observations”. When you open this page, you will see all your checklists. They can be sorted by date, by location, or by region, and can be edited or shared.
There are many other actions you can do on or from “My eBird” such as setting up alerts to let you know about rare bird sightings or to advise that a bird you have not yet seen that year has been recently reported – we will discuss this feature in another article. One set of parameters I want to draw your attention to is: setting your eBird preferences. We want all participants in BIRDYYC2020 to share their eBird lists and make sightings on eBird visible. The purpose is to allow all participants to chase sightings by others. Specifically: from the eBird homepage, under My eBird, select Preferences; Data privacy – elect to NOT hide your eBird data.
One other feature of eBird that will be of special interest during the BIRDYYC2020 challenge will be how to establish a “Patch”. We will develop another instructional article on just that topic. The starting point on the eBird home page is the “explore” button. Try it and see how you do.
Closing
I can remember many times my Dad telling me when I was young: “Don’t play with that, you’ll break it.” That’s not true with eBird. You won’t break it. Sign in and go exploring around the whole site. Look through the help topics. Look at the data for one of your favorite hotspots. Explore the Region, “Calgary County”. Be aware that “Calgary County” is quite a bit larger that the City of Calgary.
Nature Calgary is promoting a friendly “big year” birding challenge within Calgary city limits in 2020 (BIRDYYC2020). (See this post for an introduction to the challenge.) This guide to Albertabird is one of a number of posts we will present to help everyone who participates.
What is Albertabird?
One useful tool for those taking part in the challenge is the online discussion forum “Albertabird”. This is a place where birders can share sightings, locations, and photos, so it will be useful to participants in keeping informed during the year and giving them the best chance to see as many bird species within the city limits as possible. This article is for newcomers to Albertabird. Anyone can join Albertabird or use it as a resource – it is not just for BIRDYYC2020 participants.
The Albertabird email list was started in early 2000. Initially hosted by Yahoo Groups, a switch to the more compatible platform, Groups IO, was completed in late 2019.
This list functions within the guidelines found in the American Birding Association Code of Ethics. The Albertabird Moderators are Gerald Romanchuk, Malcolm McDonald, and Caroline Lambert.
To post messages to the list you must be a member. To join, you simply go to the site’s Home page and click on “Apply for Membership in this Group.” You will be asked to submit your email address. You should get a response to your request for membership in a day or two.
You can open the “Messages” page to see the latest posts. You can also go to “Subscription” and set the parameters in a way that suits you. You may elect to receive each message in an individual email or in other ways or to not receive emails. Once you are a member, you can post messages and photos for all to see. You can post either right on the website or by sending an email to Albertabird[at]groups.io.
Albertabird
has been a powerful and useful tool for years, allowing birders to share
stories and help others learn.
We encourage you to look frequently at Albertabird and to post stories about your adventures during the BirdYYC2020 challenge.
Albertabird
Guidelines
The complete guidelines for users of Albertabird can be found on the Albertabird website under “files”.
A
few points to remember are:
Do
not to hit the “Reply” button when responding to a message unless you
are intending to send your comments to all subscribers.
All
posts should contain your name and location by city.
Be
prepared to share directions to interesting birds, except for species at risk.
Do
not share directions on private property until you have permission from the
landowner to do so.
Do
not post detailed information on a nest location, particularly for species at
risk, to minimize disturbance to nesting birds.
The
list allows attachments such as photos or files. Files should be kept as
concise as possible in the interest of saving storage space
Photos can be attached to the message as a file or pasted into the
message. (See the guidelines on the Albertabird website for more details and
restrictions.)
Enjoy!
Any questions or suggestions about BIRDYYC2020 contact: Howard Heffler: hheffler*@*shaw.ca Andrew Hart: andrewhart*@*shaw.ca Bob Lefebvre: wbird7*@*gmail.com Gavin McKinnon: gmckinnonbird*@*gmail.com
For the past two decades Nature Calgary has sponsored year-long birding competitions every five years. In 2000 and 2010 the goal was to see as many species as you could within the city limits in the calendar year. In 2005 and 2015 goal was the same, but the area used was the 80-km-diameter circle centered on the Center Street Bridge.
Willet, photographed by Brian Elder in Calgary during the 2010 competition. This won first prize in the photography portion of competition.
In keeping with the pattern, we’d like to announce the Calgary 2020 Big Year Birding Challenge. This will be a year-long event, in which participants try to identify as many species as they can within the city limits between January 1, 2020, and December 31, 2020. The challenge is led by Howard Heffler, Andrew Hart, Gavin McKinnon, and myself.
As in 2015, we will exclusively be using eBird to keep track of participant’s progress. Simply name your city limits patch “BirdYYC2020” and include in your patch all the locations for which you have submitted lists that are within the city limits. (If you already have a city limits patch, just rename it.) If you are not yet using eBird you will have to set up a free account first.
There are a lot of good articles on the eBird website about how to sign up, and how to set up patches. It is really quite easy, and the eBird site is also a tremendously useful resource for birders.
We are going to keep this very simple and informal. There will be no entry fees or prizes, no categories for different experience levels, and no waivers to sign. Rather than a competition, it will be a challenge – a personal test for each participant to try to reach new goals, explore new birding locations, and learn more about the birds of Calgary.
Participants are asked to send their name, ebird name and email address to Howard Heffler at: hheffler[at]shaw.ca. This will allow the organizers to communicate with active participants. At the end of the year, we will ask participants to share their species list to allow comparison with the results of the 2000 and 2010 competitions.
In the weeks and months ahead, we will be prepared to answer questions and take suggestions. We will use this blog for ongoing communication and to write helpful instructions for participants. We also will post stories on Albertabird and on Nature Calgary’s website. We encourage all participants to share their adventures and birding tips on Albertabird.
In the 2010 competition, Michael Harrison won with 240 species! (Amazingly, he saw every species while riding his bike, competing in the “Non-motorized Transport” category.) To read about the 2010 competition, see the 2010 blog here.
Of course, 240 is a very high total – about 265 species are seen within the city limits in a typical year, but many of those are one-day wonders. In a challenge like this, you should set a reasonable goal for yourself. My goal is to see more than 180 species, which is the best total I’ve had since I started using eBird in 2012. I would love to get 200!
A challenge like this is a lot of fun and gets you really involved in the local birding community. I hope you join us!
Please see the guidelines below for more information.
Calgary 2020 Big Year Birding Challenge
Nature Calgary is promoting a friendly “big year” birding challenge within Calgary city limits in 2020.
Background
There have been two “big year” competitions in Calgary; 2000 and 2010.
(There were also “Calgary Region” competitions in 2005 and
2015.)
Scope – an eBird “Patch” challenge
Challenge yourself to find as many species of
birds as you can within the Calgary city limits in 2020!
All sightings must be within the city limits. See link below.
Calendar year 2020.
Open to all.
No sub-categories for participants.
No entry fee or prizes.
No waivers.
Nature Calgary field trips would have waivers exactly as per current practice.
Objective – a friendly competition
Share sightings.
Promote interest in birds and
birding.
Enjoy Calgary’s natural areas.
More field trips.
Compare results with 2000 and
2010.
Challenge Guidelines and Procedures
The organizers are proposing the following guidelines and procedures
to make the challenge more enjoyable and rewarding for all participants.
Participants “register” by adding an eBird patch (or re-naming their existing Calgary city-limits patch.) with the name: “BirdYYC2020” by January 1, 2020.
Participants are asked to send their name, eBird name and email address to Howard Heffler at: hheffler[at]shaw.ca. This will allow the organizers to communicate with active participants. At the end of the year, we will ask participants to share their species list to allow comparison with the results of the 2000 and 2010 competitions.
We recommend that participants re-name their patch back to their own city-limits patch after the challenge year is completed.
Participants MUST share eBird lists and make sightings on eBird visible. The purpose is to allow all participants to chase sightings by others. Specifically: on eBird, under My eBird, select Preferences; Data privacy – elect to NOT hide your eBird data.
Anybody at any time can see who is leading and his/her total number of sightings to date by looking on eBird at patch totals.
We have created “BirdYYC2020 RBA”, a WhatsApp group for sharing instant updates on unusual birds within the city limits of Calgary. To join the group, send a message to Gavin McKinnon (403) 519-8703.
Helpful Hints and Participant Expectations
There are about 200 hotspots in the Calgary “county”. All the ones within the city-limits (90) begin with the prefix “Calgary” or “Fish Creek PP”.
Over the next few weeks we will develop detailed procedures and instructions for things such as:
how to set up an eBird patch,
how to set up eBird alerts,
how to join Albertabird,
how to use WhatsApp,
how to use the mapping tools, and
other topics that might arise.
We hope to make a seasonal list of birds to help participants target specific species during each season.
Some species will be identified as “reportable” so you know what will be of special interest to everyone else.
Of course, we will do what we can to ensure participants respect private property, drive and act safely and responsibly, and follow ABA ethical guidelines: especially as it relates to protecting sensitive species.
We have maps of the city boundary in PDF format available.
When we last checked in on Gavin McKinnon’s quest to find 300 species of birds in Alberta in 2019, he was at 291 species. That was at the end of July (see this post). Since he had already seen almost all of the more common species, progress was expected to be slow for the rest of the year, as he would have to track down rarities that showed up during fall migration.
I’m happy to report that Gavin did reach 300 species on October 11th! He was slowly adding new species until he reached 299. On October 9th an Ash-throated Flycatcher was reported in St. Albert. This is the first confirmed record of this species ever in Alberta. It is native to the SW United States and the Pacific northwest. On October 11th Gavin travelled to St. Albert and saw and photographed the bird.
Ash-throated Flycatcher, St. Albert, October 11, 2019. Photo by Gavin McKinnon. Ash-throated Flycatcher, St. Albert, October 11, 2019. Photo by Gavin McKinnon. Ash-throated Flycatcher, St. Albert, October 11, 2019. Photo by Gavin McKinnon.
Not only was this bird #300 for Gavin and a first Alberta record, but it was a life bird for him. A great way to reach his goal!
Here are few of the birds that got Gavin within striking distance of 300. He tried to photograph as many of the species he saw as he could.
Black Swift. Photo by Gavin McKinnon. Vaux’s Swift. Photo by Gavin McKinnon. Western Sandpiper. Photo by Gavin McKinnon. Sabine’s Gull. Photo by Gavin McKinnon.
By October 12th Gavin had reached 303 species, which is where he stands today. He has also seen a total of 370 species in Canada this year, which is tied for the third-highest total in the country. Here are links to those eBird pages:
